Jan 2016: Everyone and Their Mother Goes to Disney - Page 10 - 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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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The neighbor wants to know my plans. For each day.
I tried to explain that we're in different family modes right now; her youngest is to young to have an opinion about where they go and her oldest can plan and understand that some things are on different days. But I don't know if Adam will like the same things this time, and my plans are flexible to include dialysis going mothers and saint like fathers.
As it stands, here are the rough:
Sunday: arrive around 4:30PM, check in, MK for what I hope is Adam's first Space Mountain ride.
Monday: no plans yet, dinner date night at Cali Grill
Tuesday: HS for TSMM and Jedi Academy (I hope); MK for fireworks at 8.
Wednesday: Pirate Adventure for Adam then??
Thursday: MK for Princess Breakfast, Dinner date at Citricos
Friday: MK again
Saturday: Epcot for family dinner at Spice Road Table.
AK day is TBD as are many FPs. I've booked MK FPs for two days, HS and Epcot for another day. Otherwise I'm just playing it by ear, with pool time and "Adam's Choice" as significant factors.
I did order groceries just now too. $298. Yikes!! I'll still need to pack a few grocery/kitchen items though. A sharp knife, a small wooden cutting board (both sorely lacking in the DVC rooms), my lunch cooler of charcuterie, coffee filters, spices, sugar/splenda, and laundry soap.
Otherwise, I'm done. I don't want to do a trip like this again for a long time.
(she said as she just planned a May 2018 trip with another family....)
Your plans look great especially since you have several factors that will call for you all to be flexible. Don't know if our trips will overlap, but Luke and I will at WDW in May, too. We'll be there May 9 - 18.
Love your report, I was literally LOL! My husband and I are taking our first trip to WDW January 21-25 without our girls, they are 13 and 10. Needless to say they are not too happy about being left behind.
And the news you've been waiting for (what? You haven't held your breath?)...
Adam rode Space Mountain!!! He was tall enough and all is well with the world!
Also, four zebra are hanging out in front of our standard view Jambo House DVC room. Sure, we also can see Kidani, and a weird bit of roof, and some shed looking things. But the sunset on this side is amazing!!!
Tomorrow we conquer Everest. The kid is so excited I can't stand it.
We're back. No delays for us due to our direct flight that avoided snow storms.
It was a trip of huge successes and frustrations; the biggest one right now being our decision to come home on a late flight, creating havoc this AM with preschool, work, and breakfast items (or non-existent breakfast items, as the case may be).
Adam was brave big boy this trip: Space Mountain (seven times!), Everest, Tower of Terror, Jedi Training (Darth Vader may as well be eight feet tall!!), Pirate Adventure, and fireworks.
My parents were, well, sometimes totally awesome, sometimes rip-your-hair-out frustrating: dialysis went well, babysitting and Lego store visit went well; the lost wallet, $100 room service bill for waffles (when we had Eggos in the freezer), and insistence on not doing laundry until the last minute were less awesome. It was good to have them around but I'm pretty sure this is the last time we do this. Matching our needs to theirs was a challenge.
The neighbors were great. They did their own thing, the kids played together once a day or so, and we had some drinks. Nothing to complain about there.
The weather was uncooperative, the coldest I'd felt in Florida, and became a limiter sometimes, but still better than Upstate NY.
I'll do a more detailed report on Adam, our meals out (CG earned back some love and Citricos was awesome), and some interesting refurb news from AKL (okay, not that interesting, but seeing stuff happen fast and quiet blows my mind).
Back to the grind, but I'll leave you with this tidbit to sum up the trip:
Adam started to cry at the hotel, continued to cry all the way to the airport, and through the security line. Because he loved Disney so much he couldn't stand to leave.
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Don't know if our trips will overlap, but Luke and I will at WDW in May, too. We'll be there May 9 - 18.
Hope you have a wonderful trip and plenty of time for the three of you.
Deer Isle Mom
on riding Space Mountain, Adam! 
with Everest! Neat view without additional cost! 
Dreams, Wishes, Hopes... these are the parts of childhood we should never lose.
Linear Mode
