Thank You Disney Movie Rewards TR (November 16-22, 2014) - Page 6 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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I promise I am going to finish this dang TR!!! It may take forever with everything going on in our lives, but I promise you will see the end.
Today's Update: Walt Disney Archives!
After leaving Legends Plaza we made our way to the Frank G Wells Building which is where the Walt Disney Archives is. It was so amazing just to get to step foot in there and I could have spent hours in there just looking at things, even though the area is actually quite small.
Inside the archives is a work area that is to show what an artists space would have looked like back in the day:
Then there were the cases with all the memorabilia
I loved all these books!
When we came into the room, there was a lady working at one of the tables on her computer. I made a comment on how I would just love to read all the books in there and she said she had a book I could look at. Turns out she was Mindy Johnson the author of Tinker Bell:An Evolution. She was doing research for her next book that will be about the Ink and Paint Women. We visited with her for quite some time and she told us a lot about the new book and she went through discussing a lot of the Tinker Bell book as well. She was very friendly and was willing to answer any questions we had. This is the reason I don't think we made it inside any of the sets because we spent a lot more time here than I think was originally planned.
After visiting for a little bit, Drew stepped into another room and came out with an Oscar. I can't remember exactly what it was from but I know it was a documentary of some sort. The kids were not allowed to hold it without one of us "grown-ups" having a hand on it. Oh and yes, they are heavier than they look.
Just outside the archives was the multiplane camera designed originally for Snow White.
After leaving the archives we made our way back to the other end of Animation Hall and I got a few more pictures.
Drew was calling to make arrangements for us to meet up with Beth (she was the person I dealt with for a year getting the tour scheduled. We stopped at Mickey Ave and Dopey Drive while we waited.
Right at this corner is "Pluto's Corner", which the kids got a kick out of, especially the 3 pawprints that were left in the concrete next to the fire hydrant.
When we met up with Beth, she offered to get a picture of us with Drew.
Next was lunch! We were treated to lunch at the Commissary, which I have absolutely no pictures of because I didn't want to look like a total dork taking pictures while all these people were getting there lunches. There were lots of choices of things to choose from and we all went our different directions to select our food choices.
We had a table together and it was really fun visiting with Drew and Beth during out meal. It was so hard though at the same time because I knew our tour was quickly coming to an end.
After lunch we were able to go to the Studio Store and shop for about 30 minutes. Sorry I have no pictures of this either because I was too busy shopping!!!! Mostly this store is like any Disney store, but there was a small area that had Studio specific merchandise. I got a Studio hoodie, Pat got a t-shirt, Hunter got a Vinylmation set that was specific to the studio, and Shana got a portfolio. I can't find the pictures of these items at the moment, but will see if I can either track them down or get pictures for the next update. I do have a picture of my Director Mickey that was the first thing I grabbed. He is too cute!!!
While we were in the store, Mindy Johnson happened to come in and we had picked up a copy of the Tinker Bell book in the store, that she had already signed, but we asked her if she would personalize it for us and she was happy to do so.
At this point our tour had come to an end and it was time for us to go. Drew walked with us back to the parking garage and we said our goodbyes and made our way back to our really hot car on the roof of the garage!
This is a picture of the parking garage and our final picture of the water tower.
After leaving the studios we made our way back to Griffith Park in search of the Carousel. We drove around in circles for awhile, this park is enormous!!! We finally managed to find the Carousel that Walt took his girls to when he came up with the idea of Disneyland. However, it is only open at certain times and this was not one of them, and it is completely closed up. But I took a picture of what we could see.
Then we made the drive back to Disneyland! I called my dad on the way back and was able to walk him through the process of rebooting the WiFi.
Once we were back at the Grand Californian we decided to just do some shopping and wandering around Downtown Disney before our dinner. We stopped in Disney Vault 28 and I found a Harvey bag that I knew I was going to have to have, but I decided to swing by after dinner and purchase it.
Our dinner this night was at House of Blues, this place is very loud! I had the French Dip, Pat and Shana both had Jambalaya and Hunter had chicken strips. The meal was good, but I will admit FL wins for dining in Disney.
After dinner we stopped back at the Disney Vault and picked up my new bag:
When we got back to the room, I threw on a load of laundry, and then we watched The Reluctant Dragon (I'm pretty sure the kids picked this because of seeing it mentioned in the Archives) and then we went to bed.
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The archives is so amazing! So many things packed into every case. Meeting Mindy Johnson made this really special for you. I'll be really interested to read her book about the Ink and Paint women. Pluto's Corner with the 3 paw prints in cement was one of my favorite spots! I went straight to the Studio exclusive merchandise in the shop also!
Oh my goodness, what an absolutely amazing tour that was! I loved reading all about it.
It was such an amazing fun day! Glad you enjoyed it.
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Originally Posted by xwewhisper
Glad you were able to enjoy the tour so much and love that adorable little Mickey!
We had such a great time and I'm happy the kids really enjoyed it as well. I love my Mickey, he is too cute!
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Originally Posted by pamcarey
Wow, what an amazing tour! I really enjoyed reading about it.
Thanks, it was a ton of fun!
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Originally Posted by lauriep
The archives is so amazing! So many things packed into every case. Meeting Mindy Johnson made this really special for you. I'll be really interested to read her book about the Ink and Paint women. Pluto's Corner with the 3 paw prints in cement was one of my favorite spots! I went straight to the Studio exclusive merchandise in the shop also!
I could have spent so much time in the archives, there was so much crammed in that small space. Meeting Mindy Johnson was such a fun surprise and I will also be looking forward to the new book. I thought Pluto's corner was so cute. And my only regret is not buying the Studio exclusive glass set they had, Pat and I both had picked them up and talked about them and somehow didn't end up getting them.
I am just catching up after not being on the boards for awhile. The tour looks amazing Stef - and my oh my - what I wouldn't have given to be strolling through when JD was out on a cig break.
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~ Jenn **Disney is REAL LIFE Magic, so much more than optical illusions **
I'm all caught up again. That was an amazing tour for sure. I do have a question about the Legends area. Did Ward Kimball mess up his hand print? It looks like he has 12 fingers.
I am just catching up after not being on the boards for awhile. The tour looks amazing Stef - and my oh my - what I wouldn't have given to be strolling through when JD was out on a cig break.
The tour was so much fun and I agree I would have paid big money to see JD out having a smoke!
Quote:
Originally Posted by num1DVCfan
I'm all caught up again. That was an amazing tour for sure. I do have a question about the Legends area. Did Ward Kimball mess up his hand print? It looks like he has 12 fingers.
I least I get behind enough for you to catch up! I went back and looked at the picture and you are right he has 12 fingers!! Wish I had noticed that at the time and could have asked about it. Looks like I'm going to have to find a way to go on another tour!
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The tour was so much fun. I wish were were able to do it again!
I tried to make sure to take a lot of photos! I am really bad about taking photos on trips, I prefer to be in the moment.
PassPorter Guide Author
I loved reading all about it. 
~ Jenn 
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