The Mighty Morphing Birthday Trip - Thread 1 - COMPLETE (last update 7/30) - Page 9 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
As of January 1, 2019, we have closed our forums. This is a decision we did not come to lightly, but it is necessary. The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk. The server software itself must be updated, and it cannot be without removing the forums.
So it is with a heavy heart that we say goodbye to our long-running forums. They came online in 2000 and brought together so many wonderful Disney fans. We had friendships form, careers launch, couples marry, children born ... all because of this amazing community.
Thank you to each of you who were a part of this community. You made it possible.
And a very special thank you to our Guides (moderators), past and present, who kept our forums a happy place to be. You are the glue that held everything together, and we are forever grateful to you. Thank you aliceinwdw, Caldercup, MrsM, WillCAD, Fortissimo, GingerJ, HiddenMickey, CRCrazy, Eeyoresmom, disneyknut, disneydani, Cam22, chezp, WDWfan, Luvsun, KMB733, rescuesk, OhToodles!, Colexis Mom, lfredsbo, HiddenMickey, DrDolphin, DopeyGirl, duck addict, Disneybine, PixieMichele, Sandra Bostwick, Eeyore Tattoo, DyanKJ130, Suzy Q'Disney, LilMarcieMouse, AllisonG, Belle*, Chrissi, Brant, DawnDenise, Crystalloubear, Disneymom9092, FanOfMickey, Goofy4Goofy, GoofyMom, Home4us123, iamgrumpy, ilovedisney247, Jennifer2003, Jenny Pooh, KrisLuvsDisney, Ladyt, Laughaholic88, LauraBelle Hime, Lilianna, LizardCop, Loobyoxlip, lukeandbrooksmom, marisag, michnash, MickeyMAC, OffKilter_Lynn, PamelaK, Poor_Eeyore, ripkensnana, RobDVC, SHEANA1226, Shell of the South, snoozin, Statelady01, Tara O'Hara, tigger22, Tink and Co., Tinkerbelz, WDWJAMBA, wdwlovers, Wendyismyname, whoSEZ, WildforWD, and WvuGrrrl. You made the magic.
We want to personally thank Sara Varney, who coordinated our community for many years (among so many other things she did for us), and Cheryl Pendry, our Message Board Manager who helped train our Guides, and Ginger Jabour, who helped us with the PassPorter-specific forums and Live! Guides. Thank you for your time, energy, and enthusiasm. You made it all happen.
There are other changes as well.
Why? Well, the world has changed. And change with it, we must. The lyrics to "We Go On" for IllumiNations say it best:
We go on to the joy and through the tears
We go on to discover new frontiers
Moving on with the current of the years.
We go on
Moving forward now as one
Moving on with a spirit born to run
Ever on with each rising sun.
To a new day, we go on.
It's time to move on and move forward.
PassPorter is a small business, and for many years it supported our family. But the world changed, print books took a backseat to the Internet, and for a long time now it has been unable to make ends meet. We've had to find new ways to support our family, which means new careers and less and less time available to devote to our first baby, PassPorter.
But eventually, we must move on and move forward. It is the right thing to do.
So we are retiring this newsletter, as we simply cannot keep up with it. Many thanks to Mouse Fan Travel who supported it all these years, to All Ears and MousePlanet who helped us with news, to our many article contributors, and -- most importantly -- to Sara Varney who edited our newsletter so wonderfully for years and years.
And we are no longer charging for the Live Guides. If you have a subscription, it's yours to keep for the lifetime of the Live Guides at no additional cost. The Live Guides will stay online, barring server issues and technical problems, for all of 2019.
That said, PassPorter is not going away. Most of the resources will remain online for as long as we can support them, and after that we will find ways to make whatever we can available. PassPorter means a great deal to us, and to many of you, and we will do our best to keep it alive in whatever way we can. Our server costs are high, and they'll need to come out of our pockets, so in the future you can expect some changes so we can bring those costs down.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your amazing support over the years. Without you, there's no way us little guys could have made something like this happen and given the "big guys" a run for their money. PassPorter was consistently the #3 guidebook after the Unofficial and Official guides, which was really unheard of for such a small company to do. We ROCKED it thanks to you and your support and love!
If you miss us, you can still find some of us online. Sara started a new blog at DisneyParkPrincess.com -- I strongly urge you to visit and get on her mailing list. She IS the Disney park princess and knows Disney backward and forward. And I am blogging as well at JenniferMaker.com, which is a little craft blog I started a couple of years ago to make ends meet. You can see and hear me in my craft show at https://www.youtube.com/c/jennifermaker . Many PassPorter readers and fans are on Facebook, in groups they formed like the PassPorter Trip Reports and PassPorter Crafting Challenge (if you join, just let them know you read about it in the newsletter). And some of our most devoted community members started a forum of their own at Pixie Dust Lane and all are invited over.
So we encourage you to stay in touch with us and your fellow community members wherever works best for you!
Welcome! We're happy you've found the PassPorter Community -- the friendliest place to plan your vacation to Walt Disney World, Disney Cruise Line, Disneyland, and the world in general! You are now viewing the PassPorter Message Board Community as a guest, which gives you limited access. As our guest, feel free to browse our messages by selecting the forum you want to visit from the list below.
To post messages and ask questions, join our FREE community today and you'll get access to tools and resources not available to guests, such as our vacation countown timers, "living" avatars, private messaging system, database searches, downloads, and a special PassPorter discount code. Registration is fast, simple, and completely free. Just click the Join Our Community link.
If you think you've already joined, log in below now. If you don't remember your member name or password, please visit our Member Name and Password Recovery page. You are also welcome to contact us.
Already have my ADR's, counter service meals, and tourimg plan on my big @$& spreadsheet for December. Bring it on.....
Can I even tell you how tickled I am that Big A@$ spreadsheet has become part of the Passporter lexicon? But Melissa, my dear, you have not reached unprecedented levels of nerdiness until you actually calculate how many bills of each denomination you'll need during the trip. In honor of you, I've got the song "White and Nerdy" by Weird Al in my head now. It's seriously Z-Man's favorite right now. "They see me roll on, my Segway..." By the way, you are prepared for all the grief Ms. Eileen is going to give you over your daily "rest" periods, right? Right?
I'm so freakin' excited for you two, you'd think I was going with. Have a great time!
__________________
Karen, aka Zack's Mom - Lover of all Things Disney and the San Francisco Giants!
Oh I forgot about Eileen and her misunderstanding of our rest periods...
And, you really haven't seen nothing yet chickie! I may not determine how many of each bill, but I have determined how much cash to carry to each park.
And, I've really become one with my notecards....you shall see
Registered Message Board Members Get Our Free Newsletter! When you register you'll have the option to sign up for our weekly PassPorter Newsletter. It's chock-full of feature articles; news; tips; contests; photos; and special offers in our online store.
Can I even tell you how tickled I am that Big A@$ spreadsheet has become part of the Passporter lexicon?
Figured you'd like that. The description fits so well. Hope you aren't going to hit me up for $ because I used it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by zacksmom_1993
But Melissa, my dear, you have not reached unprecedented levels of nerdiness until you actually calculate how many bills of each denomination you'll need during the trip.
Now, that's just plain scary.
__________________
ºOº ~*~
Oct '99: CSR ~ May '02: CR ~ Nov '04: SOG ~ May '06: SOG ~ Dec '07: Solo @ Pop ~ May '08: Pop w/friends ~ Oct '08: SOG ~ Dec '09: Pop w/LeAnn ~ Sept '10: Solo @ Pop ~ Spring '11: AKL ~ Jan '12: Pop for 1/2 Marathon ~ Sept '12: 1st trip for DL 1/2 Marathon? ~ Feb '13: Pop w/pals? ~ Mar '13: Tokyo Disney w/PP's?
I just caught up!! I don't understand how I just found your pretrip report. I am loving it and can't wait for more. Hopefully you will miss most of the racing traffic. We live off of I-40 and have to watch out for UT football game traffic. Hope you have a safe and wonderful trip.
PassPorter's Free-Book to Walt Disney World It’s hard to believe anything is free at Walt Disney World; but there are actually a number of things you can get or do for little to no cost. This e-book documents over 200 free or cheap tips to do before you go and after you arrive. You could save a considerable amount of money following these tips. Perhaps more importantly; you can discover overlooked attractions and little-known details most people whiz by on their way to spend money. Click here to see free sample pages from the e-book! Get this popular e-book free of extra charges when you join the PassPorter's Club for as little as $4.95. A club pass includes access to all our other e-books; e-worksheets; super-size photos; and more! This e-book is also available for separate purchase in the PassPorter Online Store for just $5.95.
I'm so disappointed, we'll be arriving the night you're heading home! Let us know if plans change again, and you guys add a day on to the end of your trip!!
Moving along, it's time to show my nerdiness. I'm sure my nerdiness doesn't compare to some of your nerdiness....but in my family circle, I am the queen nerd
So, I started my planning fun by checking out Eileen's site (great site by the way!!! here's a plug for it.... Eileen's Mouse House )
I found her daily park hours chart and I snagged it and sort of made it my own. (That's what we teachers do... we steal great ideas, change 'em up a little bit, and make them work for us )
In the end I came up with this...
That's the final version, with a few scratched out plans and moved plans... you should have seen the sloppy copy (first grade writing term) that I started with. It had all kinds of revisions marked all over it. It kinda looked like a football play card
After that was pretty much set, I moved on to making notecards for the little hidden treasures that you can find around the World. I used the lists on All Ears and made notecards for each park of the things I wanted us to see and remember.
Then I moved on made notecards for the Hidden Mickeys we wanted to find this trip. We have found a few in the past (thanks to Angie) and I want to try and find as many as I can this trip (within reason). I used my Hidden Mickey guide book to make these and then found a few more on the website that printed I out and added to the collection.
Once the schedule was completely final I wrote out the plans for each park for each day so we could carry them in and not forget anything....
Then, this is where I scare Andy a little bit....
I redid some of my Hidden Mickey cards b/c originally they were all done by park...but I couldn't separate them by day that way b/c we would be in different sections of the park each time we visited.... so I redid them based on where we would be on a specific day... Now all my cards are organized by day, parks for that day, plans for the parks, hidden mickeys in those parks, and the little things to remember for each park. Yes, I've completely lost it....
So here are some pictures to show you my cards organized by day/park...
You've already seen Day one in the examples....and I didn't make them for our surprise day or the Friday we drive down...
These are the rest of the days...
So now we can just carry in the 3 or 4 cards for the specific park, not forget anything, and not be loaded down with notes or my PP
I'm sure Andy will have some raggy comment about my obsessive compulsive behavior... Sometimes I remind myself of the anal retentive chef (SNL)
One more update from me to come before the trip..... so stay tuned....
In all seriousness...I really love Melissa's nerdiness And it makes for a much smoother and more enjoyable trip and we get WAY more done. I almost don't even have to look away from the video viewfinder when walking because it is planned so well!!
__________________
Melissa and Andy, Charleston SC, February 2008.
--------
Coming up: July 2010 - Animal Kingdom Lodge for Mel's 30th Birthday!!!!!
About This Page: 
Like
Thank
Pixie Dust
But Melissa, my dear, you have not reached unprecedented levels of nerdiness until you actually calculate how many bills of each denomination you'll need during the trip. 
In honor of you, I've got the song "White and Nerdy" by Weird Al in my head now. It's seriously Z-Man's favorite right now. "They see me roll on, my Segway..." 
By the way, you are prepared for all the grief Ms. Eileen is going to give you over your daily "rest" periods, right? Right?
Oh I forgot about Eileen and her misunderstanding of our rest periods... 
The description fits so well. Hope you aren't going to hit me up for $ because I used it. 
ºOº ~*~ 
)
Linear Mode
