Thanksgiving 2009 at St. Pete Beach - the Brrrrr trip - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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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
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Moving on with the current of the years.
We go on
Moving forward now as one
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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.
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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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Thanksgiving 2009 at St. Pete Beach - the Brrrrr trip
It all started when I told DH that I wasn't cooking Thanksgiving Dinner. After he did , he mentioned that maybe we should go somewhere for the long weekend.
Why wasn’t I going to cook Thanksgiving dinner you ask?
Well, the past 3 years I’ve slaved over cooking a big Thanksgiving meal, turkey, cranberry sauce, homemade mashed potatoes, gravy, other vegs and 3 different kinds of pies. After spending hours and hours in the kitchen, my family snarfed down the few things they decided they liked in minutes, my DD10 complained about dessert because she doesn’t like pie and then they left. Leaving me to handle all of the cleanup and deal with bunches of leftovers because the kids decided they didn’t like Turkey after all. So after dealing with it for 3 years, I was fed up and not doing it this year. And I’m not doing it ever again unless we have company. And now back to the trip report.
We decided to head to Florida weekend since usually the weather is still decently warm in Florida during that weekend. We also hadn't gotten to the Beach this year and I needed my Beach fix.
Our first choice was Clearwater Beach because I love to go shelling and we find wonderful shells on that beach. But it was not to be. I didn’t want to stay at the hotel we’d stayed at the last few times because each year, the beach area was more and more eroded until there was very little left on our last trip. The only other resort I had found on the internet and liked that was directly on Clearwater Beach itself was fully booked.
Now I'm spoiled. When I go to the Beach I want to stay at a hotel on the Beach, not across the street, not 1/2 a block from the Beach but actually on the Beach. Oh and I want a Beachfront room too.
So we decided to go to St. Petersburg instead.
We hadn’t stayed at that end since my DS was 2 years old. He is now 14 so it’s been awhile. LOL
With the help of Papa Mouse and Sue M. on the boards, I decided that the Sirata Beach Resort would work well. I found a code that gave us 25% off on a beach front room and booked it. In addition, this resort has a Club Sirata card which got me 10% off the food at Compass Grille and 10% off anything bought in their gift shop. It is free so I signed up for it.
Then I packed. Our swimsuits, shorts, tank tops and t-shirts were all ready to go in the suitcases 2 weeks before leaving. I was so happy to get all that work done.
A few days before we left, I checked the weather. Uh Oh. It was going to be unseasonably cold. Rats. We talked it over and my husband wanted to go anyway because the weather changes alot in FL so maybe it would warm up a bit.
So after repacking our bags to reflect the cold weather the morning of the day we were leaving, I took our 2 cats and the dog to boarding for their vacation and we headed to the beach. I should have repacked a few days before but I kept hoping the weather would warm up. This was the day before Thanksgiving.
The drive was uneventful until we hit Florida. Once we crossed the state line, it was pouring down rain. And I was driving this stretch. And I hate to drive in the rain. And it poured all the way into St. Petersburg. Since we got a late start, I pulled into the Sirata Beach Resort in the dark, pouring rain.
Needless to say, we didn't get to enjoy the beautiful view from the bridge we crossed. I just love the warm, fuzzy feeling I get when we cross the bridges heading to the beach.
Up next, will the Sirata Beach Resort live up to my expectations? (pictures coming up!)
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, he mentioned that maybe we should go somewhere for the long weekend. 
I was so happy to get all that work done. 
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