Doorways, Disney, and Drawers

My never-resting husband started this week installing what door casing we had left around as many doors as he could finish.  The result is now completed doors in the master bedroom and master bathroom.  The hallway is almost finished, and the guest room only needs casing around the door to the hallway.  We ran out of casing, so back to Home Depot we went to buy more.  That casing, of course, is primed but needs two coats of finish paint before we can install it.

Completed casing around the doors finishes the master bedroom.

Our other chore was to try to salvage the baseboard that needs to be cut shorter around the remodeled closets.  Rick cut the caulk that was on top of the baseboard, took a thin putty knife and slipped it behind the boards, and then gently pulled them forward.  Then patience, more gentle prying with a pry bar, and careful lifting actually provided intact baseboards.  We carefully removed the nails and remaining caulk and were able to cut the baseboard to the correct size to fit around the new casement. Yes!  Neither of us wanted to buy and paint new baseboard.

A crane towers above Cinderella's castle for
some updates and repairs.  I guess even Cindy
needs to remodel her house every few years!

Last year we bought annual tickets to Disney World.  We wanted to take advantage of being Florida residents, and the tickets were a good deal.  We have previously visited all of the parks except the Magic Kingdom, so that was our destination on Tuesday.  Overall, we were very disappointed in our visit.

We were expecting crowds to be low; however, we soon found that many more people were there than anyone expected.  While we did not have terribly long waits for attractions (no more than 20 - 25 minutes), we were not thrilled with the crowds in the stores or the streets.

For whatever reason, Rick was in a foul mood.  Parking has increased to $15.00 per car which really is ridiculous, and this park in particular has lots far, far away from the main entrances.  We waited a bit for a shuttle to the park, only to learn that the shuttles were going to be down for maintenance the rest of the day, so we would have to find alternate transportation (ferry or bus) back to the lots.   The weather was in the 70s and sunny, so at least that was not a problem; I did slather on the sunscreen, however, to stay somewhat protected.

We did find a few good attractions.  The Hall of Presidents was up to date with speeches coming from an automated Barack Obama.  Disney's 1964 Carousel of Progress also was updated to include video games, voice-activated appliances, and laptop computers.  The Haunted Mansion was fun, and Pirates of the Caribbean was a nostalgic revisit for me.  Other than those, however, the rest of the attractions seemed outdated, trite, or just lame.  We avoided roller-coaster type rides since my equilibrium is not the greatest right now.  Ha!  Who knows?  Maybe a roller coaster ride would have made me less dizzy.

A feathered friend and some of his buddies stood guard
while we ate lunch.  No worries about crumbs littering
the eating areas in this park!

Lunch in any theme park will bankrupt a person, and ours was no exception.  We spent $20.00 and had very little food to show for it.  I am so glad that I did not have to pay the bill for some of the families that I saw in the park!  We had brought along our own filtered water, so at least we stayed hydrated for free.

While we were there we saw a couple of "characters" roaming the streets or signing autographs.  Rick snuck through areas where he probably should not have been to get a couple of pictures of Winnie the Pooh and Tigger since our grandson's room is decorated in Pooh and friends.

Just to show our grandson that Winnie the
Pooh and Tigger are real... Tigger holds
a small child while his dad takes pictures.

A riverboat ride in the afternoon offered us some relaxation and shade; however, by that time I was exhausted.  We had booked a hotel a short distance from the park, so by 4:00 p.m. we were on our way out.  We decided not to return for the Electric Parade and fireworks, enjoying an evening reading by the pool instead.

Cruising on the man-made river in the Magic Kingdom
was relaxing.

Maybe we are just old, but we think that anyone who takes a child less than 8 years old to Disney is wasting money.  We saw whining children lying on the pavement because they were bored, hot, or just exhausted, and exasperated parents who had just spent a couple of thousand dollars to give those same miserable children the magic Disney trip of a lifetime.  Clue in, folks.  If the children are less than 8, they will not remember the trip and will not enjoy themselves that much.  Keep your money, take them to the beach, and let them swim for the day.  That is what they want, and you will have a much better and less expensive vacation in the end.

On our way home today, we stopped at Ikea in Tampa to see if we could find an end table for the Florida room.  We looked at many, many different tables and finally chose one that matched the other storage cabinets in the room.  It is small, so it works well with the Ikea chairs; it has drawers, so I can store my sewing materials in it, and it has glass on top to protect it.  We purchased a small table lamp that matches the others in the living room for a coordinated look.  The furniture in the room is all white, so I badly need to find some colorful accent pieces to give the room some zing.  I found a great teal bowl at Ikea, but it was both too big and too expensive to make it into my shopping cart.

The completed table and lamp stand ready to invite us to
read or to sew in the Florida room.

Hopefully, that table and lamp are the last two pieces of furniture that we need to purchase for Gladys.  She still needs a rug to make the living room snug, some accent pieces to brighten the rooms, and a few more pieces of art for the walls.  Those will come in time.  For right now, though, the old doll is starting to look pretty good inside.