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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Hi all. I thought I would write up a little report about our spring getaway this past Spring, April 17-19.
For those that don’t know me, I am Jen and a big Disney fan, however this trip was only a local weekend trip. I am a mother to 3 and a grandmother to 1. My youngest is10 and she still likes traveling with us. I am married to Skip, who for the most part is anti-travel, though he does have his good moments. And when I say anti-travel it usually means the travel I want verses what he wants.
It started about a month or so before we actually went. Skip said he would like to do a weekend trip. OK that sounds great. Originally we had been talking about going to Disneyland this year some time. Skip kept putting it off for various reasons…bad winter, selling the dairy cows, and a few other odd reasons.
For those who don’t know, Skip has been in the dairy business since the day he was born. He and his brother run the business and basically had just become burned out. It is a LOT of work, Every…Single…Day…Of…The…Year! It became official at the end of March. We made the switch from Dairy farmers to beef farmers. Those who followed my last report did read about this switch at the end. It is now July….3 months of dairy retirement….and we are going back into the business. Needless to say I knew this would happen. They both were board about 2 weeks later. Without getting into all the details, about a month or so after retiring, they decided they wanted back and in and put an order in for a robotic milker. We will be milking a lot less cows this time around and the robot will free up a bunch of time. The first part of the robot actually arrived yesterday and the plan is to have it all ready to go in the fall when the next round of cows will be ready to be milked. Again, there is a lot more to it, but that’s the quick and easy version.
So back to the weekend getaway….Skip said it would have to happen after the retirement. His first suggestion was to go to Tennessee to Pigeon Forge. That sounded like a lot of fun but it’s a long drive from Ohio. We would really need to leave on a Thursday and come home on a Monday for it to be worth the long trip. After looking it over Skip told me to look up fun things to do in Ohio. Well…Let’s just say Ohio is pretty boring, especially in the Spring. It was funny to see how many things that popped up were actually in the Toledo area and we had done most of them already. Cedar Point is a big attraction in Ohio, but it was too early for that to be even open. I am not a big waterpark person, but I did look into those options because Claire, our 10 year old, does love to swim. Literally the week before we left we finally came to a decision. I had found a mansion to be toured in the Akron Ohio area. That’s a couple of hours away, so it wasn’t too far, but yet far enough to say we went away.
The mansion is called Stan Hewett. It was also celebrating it’s 100 year anniversary, which kind of made it exciting. The mansion was built by F.A. Seiberling for his family. Who is F.A. Seiberling? Well he is one of the creators of The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company. The company was named after Charles Goodyear who actually invented the vulcanization process of rubber.
I did a bit of quick research and it really looked beautiful and they offered paid tours or you could do a self-tour of the grounds and house. We then decided that one night in the Akron area was all we needed and looked for a 2nd night elsewhere. We decide a waterpark hotel would keep Claire happy. I looked at all the popular places in the Sandusky area. Ideally we wanted to stay at Kalahari, which we stayed at several years ago. It was pretty much booked up and what was available….well let’s just say the cost of the room could’ve paid for half of a trip for our family to go to Disney World. I next looked at Great Wolf Lodge, and again very little available and what was left was a bit pricey. In the end we went with Castaway Bay which is Cedar Points Waterpark hotel.
During the researching process I thought it would be nice for Claire to bring a friend along. We are boring and we know it. At 10 we knew a little weekend away would be more fun with another 10 year old. My very good friend has a 10 year old, Haley, and she and Claire went to school together. I had in the back of my mind to suggest this to Skip…..and he beat me to it and asked Claire if she would like to bring Haley along. Of course she did, so we contacted Haley’s family and the plans were all made.
We would be leaving Friday right after school and come home sometime Sunday afternoon. It wasn’t Disney, but we would be getting away!