My Very "Meety" Christmas Party - COMPLETED!! 12/15/10 - Page 22 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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!
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Remember when I told you earlier about the five of us posing in front of the castle, and then we heard the fireworks starting to pop, and the photographer told us to stand still? Well, here's what happened about a zillionth of a second after that!
Wow! I think that qualifies for Magical Moment #4 (if I'm counting correctly, which by now I'm probably not -- but who cares? )!
I think it's appropriate that my PhotoPass pics run out with a couple taken of Sandy and me at Epcot that Friday night. She and I spent more time together than anybody! And we had so much fun!
OK, we were up to Saturday dinner at the Hollywood Brown Derby, dahling! So now we're counting down to the end of my trip. But don't because we're coming to the most magical night of them all!
The Reunioneers had an optional dessert party that night which sold out almost immediately -- and when I heard it was dessert with the Osborne Family Lights on the backlot streets of my favorite park, you know I got my ressie in IMMEDIATELY.
Nora had managed to get on the wait list, and at the last minute she got to participate! Sandy and Kaleigh and Michael and Erica were there, along with so many of my new friends.
We met at R&RC and then were escorted back to. . . . the Fantasmic terrace. Wh-aat? I was a bit concerned and went to ask, as nicely as I could, "Umm, will we have time for the Osborne lights? Because if we don't, I would honestly skip Fantasmic because I'm leaving in the morning and simply HAVE to see the Osborne lights again."
Well, I was sent back to my table with assurances that we would see the Osborne lights a bit later. So we watched Fantasmic, which of course is a wonderful show, but we were all a bit antsy. After it ended, we had to wait until the park emptied out.
That's when the magic started to occur. A Disney Cast Member was at the front of the line with a light stick, and another CM was at the rear. In between, 100 excited Disney nuts. It was a pleasant evening -- cool enough for a coat, but not freezing like we'd had the previous two nights.
It was neat walking through DHS with lights on but nobody around. The stores and attractions had their doors closed.
Then we headed down Pixar Place. Kaleigh was walking alongside me and said, "Wouldn't it be neat if we all got to ride Toy Story again?" I said " yeah I'm sure all the Cast Members would want to stick around just for us" and then our group came to a stop and we realized the door to the attraction was OPEN and LIGHT was spilling out from it and there was a CAST MEMBER standing there.
I started jumping up and down and screaming like women do on Oprah's Favorite Things show. Kaleigh and I grabbed hands and kept jumping and yelling, and then all 100 of us seemed to be doing likewise. It was soooooo cool!
Then we ran through the building and played TSMM one more time! It was so awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Nora and I played against each other, with neither of us doing terribly well -- but who cares? This was too, too ! And it turned out to be Nora's first time playing TSMM anyway! How great to do that under these circumstances! She was way more accurate than I was, that's for sure!
Once everybody was out and we'd had bathroom breaks (which we needed after all that excitement following a dessert party ), we formed a fairly neat line once again. This time it was obvious we were being led to the backlot streets. The holiday lights were turned off, and there was no music playing. We all fell silent as we wandered into the abandoned backlot area.
Beci Mahnken and Annette Owens of Mouse Fan Travel were clearly in charge of this big party. A Disney photographer was standing on one sidewalk, asking all of us to spread out on the opposite sidewalk and to help him count down from "3 - 2 - 1" and even though we knew what would surely be occurring on "1," with the uprush of all the colored lights and the sudden swelling of Christmas music, I burst into and knew I was having that special, "just me" sort of magical moment and that I probably had 99 people having similar "just me" moments all around me.
We were all pretty silent and started wandering off on our own, up and down the streets, quietly taking in this wonderful moment created just for us. Tears were streaming down my cheeks, but I just kept brushing them away. I went down the street the way we'd come in because that end of the street was mostly deserted. This was definitely a "thank you, Walt" moment. Occasionally one of my new friends would walk up to quietly ask "Are you OK?" and I would nod vigorously and wave them away. I can't begin to express how I felt other than:
The lights were synchronized perfectly with the music, which wasn't the kitschy "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" stuff but much more majestic. I remember hearing "Carol of the Bells," but I honestly don't recall what else was played for us that night. All I know is I was completely mesmerized and felt Walt would have loved this so much.
There was even "snow" falling down the windows of the buildings.
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because we're coming to the most magical night of them all!
yeah I'm sure all the Cast Members would want to stick around just for us" and then our group came to a stop and we realized the door to the attraction was OPEN and LIGHT was spilling out from it and there was a CAST MEMBER standing there.
! And it turned out to be Nora's first time playing TSMM anyway! How great to do that under these circumstances! She was way more accurate than I was, that's for sure!
), we formed a fairly neat line once again. This time it was obvious we were being led to the backlot streets. The holiday lights were turned off, and there was no music playing. We all fell silent as we wandered into the abandoned backlot area.
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