Managed to get this photo posted.....

Yesterday I had the chance to meet a blogging friend, Jackie, for lunch at California Pizza Kitchen. She had been kind enough to mail me a specialty ruler to try out....and I had the chance to return it in person. We had a very nice lunch and a good time chatting. The weather was beautiful and we walked back to the parking lot together, along with my friend, Nancy. Here is a photo of me and Jackie that Nancy took after we finished lunch. It is so nice to meet up with people we have come to "know" in Blogland!!! (And this Thursday, I should meet two more......Pat Wys and Gene Black.)

Missing for a few days....

I'll be missing from Blogland for a few days. I don't have wireless internet access at the house where I'm staying until Tuesday morning...and I don't want to tie up their computer. But....I hope to get online again by Wednesday morning. (I'll continue with more about my trip at that time.) Going to be 70 and sunny today........will HATE to leave this kind of weather in a couple of days. *sigh*

Like a slap in the face.....

We made the most of our last several hours at Disney yesterday.......saw a couple of things in the Magic Kingdom that we'd not seen yet and did some shopping and ate lunch there. Then...it was time to move on to our next stop. We stayed last night at a place that was SO different from our beautiful hotel at Disney....it was like a slap in the face or having cold water dumped on me. LOL I think after staying in a nice place like that, I need to be certain the next stop isn't so drastically different.......I think I need to have a gradual adjustment back to reality. At least the weather was warm and I sat out by the pool for an hour reading my Kindle. Today we are going to stay by a friend for three days and her house is nice, so we'll be comfy there. (The weather is also supposed to be nice in the daytime while we are there...so we'll still be in warm weather for another few days...YAY!!!)

Here are a few photos from yesterday.....this shows 9 snack items we got before we left Disney. We had a dining plan and had 9 unused snack credits.....so we got cookies and fudge and stuff like that. The item in my hand is ONE cookie (that one is white chocolate/chocolate chip flavored). We will try to be very good and will eat these items slowly.......I hope!
We passed a lot of orange groves and some pick-your-own places. I suppose the driver of this truck had gone to a pick-your-own grove......what fun to see a truck filled with oranges driving along with us. It makes me forget it's the end of January and COLD back home!Oh, yes....me and my Kindle reader by the pool yesterday afternoon. If the pool water had been heated, I'd have been IN the pool.

All good things must come to an end....

*sigh* I guess the saying is true: All good things must come to an end...and I guess we'd not appreciate them as much if they lasted forever, would we? So....today we move onward from Walt Disney World. It has been an excellent trip. The only daytime rain we had was the first afternoon we were here...and it was only for a short period of time. One day it was windy and chilly (but sunny) and the rest of the week had nice daytime temps and plenty of sunshine....the one bad night storm was when we were eating dinner. The weather, overall, was extremely pleasant for us...considering the cold, wintry weather back home.

Yesterday we spent time in the Magic Kingdom and the crowds were low when we first arrived. We walked right onto most rides. Funny thing, though, I realized as we were breezing into them, that we didn't get to see all the fun things Disney usually has along the way when you are waiting to go on a ride. (I'm not complaining....would rather miss them and get right on the ride than to stand and wait!) The weather was wonderful....crystal clear...and down to shirt sleeves by lunchtime. Here are a few photos......

Love the topiary work on display here....Mickey and Minnie....Alice and her tea party friends....just a small sampling of the beautiful work done to keep this place so pretty and magical.

Yummy sweet treats....and a special dinner!

Karamel-Kuche (German for Caramel Kitchen) is a wonderful, specialty candy shop located in the Germany section of EPCOT in Walt Disney World. They have so many homemade confections and their display case would make anyone drool. Hubby got some chocolate caramel fudge and I got what is pictured below. (I'd have loved to get many more things but one has to be a bit careful of all that sugar and those calories, ya know? )

Strawberries (LARGE ones) covered in either milk or dark chocolate and drizzled with caramel!

Here's mine....it was WONDERFUL!!!AND....now for the special dinner. A few months back I became reacquainted with a gal on Facebook with whom I had been friends in elementary school. We did the math and determined we'd not seen each other in 50 years and had long ago lost touch with each other. Since she has moved to FL and isn't far from here, we made plans to meet for dinner. We had a very nice evening with her and her husband and found out how much similarity there has been in our lives over the years! Here is a photo of Carolyn and me......showing our school girl smiles (on our much-older-now faces).

Sunshine and storms (bad ones)....

Sunshine started the day yesterday (in spite of predictions otherwise). We got to take a lot of nice photos of flowers (which we love doing) and other things by the countries in Epcot and also got to ride two of the most popular rides there with NO wait (since we took advantage of the early opening for hotel guests here). Then....it was back to the hotel for me to go in the pool......YAY!!!! Off to dinner and when we came out, the temperature had plummeted about 20 degrees and it was absolutely pouring....thunder, lightning, and a tornado watch....NOT nice at all, but....we were headed back for the night anyway, so it didn't spoil any of our plans. Here are some photos from our day.....Gee...more photos that could inspire some quilting ideas....Yup...it's me in the pool. Then I went in the hot tub. Hubby didn't go in either one.

He just sat and took pictures (even of his own feet)!!!Tomorrow I hope I remember to show you photos of a really delicious treat I got for myself at a recently-opened sweet shop in the Germany section of Epcot. Yummmmm.....

Sandals and capri pants!!!

Yesterday, the temperature was in the 70's and I wore capri pants and sandals and was very comfy. We also ate lunch outdoors. LOVE being able to do that in January!!!

Some photos from yesterday....

Such pretty blue skies at Animal Kingdom.......and the animals were all out and letting us see them on our photo safari there. What a pretty place!
Another quilting idea for Gene!!!
I think this would make an interesting pattern for quilting, too...sort of a variation on doing bubbles.Me with Tigger....Today is supposed to be in the 70's again BUT cloudy and rain early and then some severe thunderstorms. Of course, our legs are pretty sore from all the walking, so maybe this will give them a day to feel better.

Ahhhh........loved yesterday's weather....

Once we got beyond the early-morning chill, it was a beautiful day. We enjoyed being outside seeing things at Downtown Disney and Hollywood Studios from about 8:30 a.m. until 8:30 p.m. Here are a couple of photos from yesterday......

This is me standing by a dinosaur made out of Lego's!!! There is a Lego store in Downtown Disney that is phenomenal....and it is unbelievable what they have made using Lego blocks.
This is a picture of what people were doing around the pool after lunchtime when we got back from Downtown Disney. There were others in the pool, but even those folks out of the pool had no trouble relaxing in the sun.And look at the cute little ducks (guess it's Huey, Dewey, and Louie) that our maid created for our room out of several washcloths and some elastic bands and some stick-on eyes! Cute, isn't it?

Sunny....but not as warm as it should be!

Yesterday was very sunny with bright blue skies......but it was very breezy, so we needed light jackets all day and then fleece ones at night with long-sleeved shirts underneath them....it was still better than the cold temps back home, though! Sadly, I had a blister develop on the bottom of one of my toes and it really caused me some difficulties.....I am going to lay low for a few hours this morning and see if I can walk more easily after that. Here are few photos from yesterday....

Hubby and me outside Animation Studios at Disney World. I took the animation drawing academy class...it was fun. I did Jimny Cricket and didn't do half bad (and I CANNOT draw but their instructor was very good).Just hanging out around Goofy for awhile.....Love the way Disney plants flowers and maintains the grounds....

Ways to relax......

Yesterday had some rain (BOO) and wasn't anywhere near 78, but we found some fun ways to relax anyway........

Looking at lots of pretty flowers...even though it's winter....
Checking into our lovely room (which was READY for us at 11 a.m.) at Walt Disney World in a newly-refurbished building that just reopened last week. It is VERY nicely done!
And watching kids swim in the 82 degree pool water at 10 p.m. (even though the air temperature was only 55)!!! Gotta love kids, huh?

Ahh....a day of WARMTH and sunshine!!!

The pictures might speak for themselves.......Notice the outside temperature showing on the car thermometer!! Woo-Hoo!!!

The sun FINALLY came out....

Yesterday the sun was out in the morning...about 7:30....but then clouds and fog rolled in and it was still a bit chilly. FINALLY...about 1:00, the sun came out to stay and the temperatures felt nice....just a bit over 60. We did get to eat at Lady & Sons....caught it when we were able to walk right in.......already they had the first two floors filled, so we ate on the third floor. We chose the buffet....some of those dishes (and the breads they served) were EXCELLENT!!! I know sometimes she or one of her sons make an appearance, but if they were doing that yesterday, it didn't happen when we were there. We enjoyed our meal, though. We got one photo but it's a bit dark and I can't lighten it here "on the road", so that will have to wait. Here are some photos to show the sun DID shine yesterday, though!

If any of you saw the movie Forrest Gump, you may recall a feather came down from a church steeple at the beginning. This is the church steeple.
Forrest spent a lot of time on a bench in the movie. The bench was a Hollywood prop bench that was put in place where this sign says Chippewa Square. That square never had a bench (and still doesn't), but there was one in place while the movie was being filmed. (Sure spoiled MY illusion!!! LOL)
We also saw a lot of pretty church steeples as well as some great buildings and monuments and took photos of them....also the phone booth Julia Roberts used in Something To Talk Abou (which I never saw)....and the courthouse that will be in the soon-to-be-released movie directed by Robert Redford called The Conspirator. I may post some more photos of Savannah at a later date, but that's it for today.....gotta hit the road again.

Sunshine and 60's in Savannah....

Gotta LOVE all the "S's" in that title......Sunshine......Sixties.......Savannah. To be truthful, it wasn't totally sunny yesterday (until late in the day) but it was high enough in the 50's to stroll comfortably around town and TODAY it will be sunny and in the 60's......YAY!!! Here are some photos from yesterday......hoping for some more today when we take an "on/off" trolley tour! IF we can get in, we are going to eat at the restaurant owned by Paula Deen and her sons. (If not, there are plenty of great places to eat around here....that's for sure!)

Between Charleston and Savannah, we found a great shop with all different kinds of ciders and southern snacks. We stopped AND shopped! Yummmmmm...(love places like this)!
Me waiting for our room to be ready in the hotel in Savannah....nice hotel. (I really like Comfort Suites!)The pool (hot tub not visible in this photo). We used both of them last night after we had walked around the city a bit. VERY relaxing.....and nice for us to be in a pool in the month of January! LOLThe City Hall building in Savannah....a very impressive building. I believe the dome used to be copper but in the late 80's it was gold-leafed. I'm sure the photo would be nicer with a bright blue sky.Old Cotton Exchange Building in Savannah.....this needed a blue sky, too....sorry!Oh, look!!! Isn't this a nice idea for a quilting design? I took this for my quilting buddy, Gene!I need to get some good photos of the Spanish moss that drapes so many trees around here...and then I need to research online about this moss.......need to find out things like: does it damage the trees to which it attaches itself? Is it always this "blah" color or is it sometimes green? Stay tuned....

NOTE: Edited to add one of the above photos (photo-shopped by Gene!!) that shows blue sky now!! LOL Also....regarding Spanish moss, it always looks gray but does have some tiny, hardly visible flowers at times. It can cause a tree not to do as well as it might normally do as the moss blocks light, although it doesn't kill the trees. It can make them less wind resistant, though, which can be a problem in hurricanes, I read. Okay...here's the photo Gene "fixed" for me! Thanks, Gene....

HA...it was short-lived!!!

So....remember that sunny, warm weather I spoke about yesterday? Well overnight it changed to cloudy and cool and THEN light rains came. It was just enough to make for a day in which you didn't want to be outside very much. We did get a carriage ride first thing in the morning and that was before it rained. We enjoyed it and got a few photos along the way...also took photos of the Carnival Fantasy at the dock preparing to leave for another cruise late yesterday. Then we ate lunch at a nice Irish pub....good food, great waitress. We browsed some shops and then I enjoyed a brief nap back at the hotel. We ordered take-out from a nearby restaurant for dinner. Then......it was time to get organized for the next leg of the trip. I hope to blog about that tomorrow! Here are some photos from yesterday.

This is me petting "Pete" one of two recently-retired Amish farm mules who now pull carriages through the historic area of Charleston.The cruise ship Carnival Fantasy....unloading some passengers and getting ready to take on the next group. You can see what a dull, uncheery (is that a word?) day it was!They do have some beautiful private residences "south of Broad" (as they call it) in Charleston! Some are for sale. If you have some spare "change" (between $2,000,000 and $5,000,000), you might want to go take a look!Some varying styles of architecture......and colors (or not). I'm sure you'd find something you like!