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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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'm sure you are having a great day Dawn!! Just had to let you know that back here there is about a foot of snow, so right now I am even more jealous of you!
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I hope your day has gone well thus far. It's so amazing to think, that someone I "know" is a CM!!
How are the girls handling all this? And what about the "Grandma time" they're getting?
Just had to let you know that back here there is about a foot of snow, so right now I am even more jealous of you!
Sorry about the snow! It was a balmy 75 at the AK today for our DAKlimation!
To answer a few questions first, hubby is surviving (barely), and has been surprisingly supportive through this whole process. He was VERY happy I got AK, knowing that it was important to me. He's asked me to send photos of my costumes and has promised not to laugh. I think he's resigned to the whole thing now and has really pleasantly surprised me with his attitude.
DDs (and I) are barely surviving my mother. She was supposed to be here to help teach them and she has done nothing at all in that area. I finally left her a printed lesson plan (I had given her verbal directions and left the very obvious activities marking the very obvious pages, but she still didn't 'get it' ) I needed her to teach averaging today (add these 3 numbers, then divide by 3) and she couldn't handle that. The rest of the day's lesson plan, the leftovers from yesterday, she didn't do either b/c she couldn't find it, even though it was right where I'd left it and showed her where it was. Exasperating would be the best description. Fortunately, DDs were savvy enough to figure out averaging from the example given on their pages and they worked their math on their own (and got them all right!). Their other things (incorporates social studies, science, and language arts into a themed study) have now been skipped for 2 days. We are starting to move my older DDs when I get off work tomorrow, then they are all going to the Homeschool Days on Monday, so I told them we'd just pick up again on Tuesday with me working with them in the evenings. My mother has been very little help and very much a headache, which I knew would happen. She's the drama empress of the universe.
OK, enough about her...on to today!!!
Today was DAKlimation day. It was a class, then a walking tour of the AK, more class and, finally, our costume fitting. A lot of it was things I already knew (of course) and the walking tour was fast-paced, but fine. I did see someone walking clutching a Passporter guide and I *almost* said something, but didn't know if it would be a no-no. At the end of our tour, we got to ride the safari which was the most awesome one yet, LOTS of activity with the animals and the baby giraffe was SO close, but guess what??? NO CAMERA! We had to leave our stuff in the training room! At least I have my memories, right?
I will say, it was pretty special eating lunch next to FOLK performers. That was almost like eating lunch next to Mickey...
After lunch was costume time. I have 2 costumes, actually. First is the Dinoland neon green w/ dino prints shorts with the color-blocked camp shirt. Yes, there will be photos and yes, you have my permission to laugh. Quietly. Behind my back, please. The second is the costume for Dinosaur. Two words: White Pants. The top is kind of cool, though. Costuming was sorta fun. The CMs there were great and funny in a kind of schoolmaster-ish kind of way. They did a great job of getting us all fitted out and looking spiffy.
Tomorrow is my first day in costume which is exciting in its own right. It has been quite strange "commuting" from AKV and will be even weirder in costume, I think...
After work tomorrow, we are going to start moving DDs things over to our new place. I stopped by there tonight and it is pretty nice, so that's a relief (I hadn't seen it yet)!
One more thing, obviously there is "onstage" and "backstage", but so far, IMO, Disney does a really great job supporting the CMs backstage and still keeps it a special place to be. Maybe I'm still starry-eyed, but even the cafeteria seems a bit more magical than others I've been in. Every space I've been in has felt encouraging and has done an excellent job of reminding me of dreams and magic, esp when I start to get that nervous thing in the pit of my stomach.
awww....what a great feeling it must be for you to be in your favorite place! and i still think your mom and mine are cosmic relations of some kind...ha ha ha. pixies for you in THAT area, my dear!
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Pixie Dust
Dawn! I am very proud of you!
So proud of you Dawn!!
Liz 
I can't wait to hear how things go.
) I needed her to teach averaging today (add these 3 numbers, then divide by 3) and she couldn't handle that. The rest of the day's lesson plan, the leftovers from yesterday, she didn't do either b/c she couldn't find it, even though it was right where I'd left it and showed her where it was. Exasperating would be the best description. Fortunately, DDs were savvy enough to figure out averaging from the example given on their pages and they worked their math on their own (and got them all right!). Their other things (incorporates social studies, science, and language arts into a themed study) have now been skipped for 2 days. 
We are starting to move my older DDs when I get off work tomorrow, then they are all going to the Homeschool Days on Monday, so I told them we'd just pick up again on Tuesday with me working with them in the evenings. My mother has been very little help and very much a headache, which I knew would happen. She's the drama empress of the universe.
At the end of our tour, we got to ride the safari which was the most awesome one yet, LOTS of activity with the animals and the baby giraffe was SO close, but guess what??? NO CAMERA! We had to leave our stuff in the training room! At least I have my memories, right?
The second is the costume for Dinosaur. Two words: White Pants. 
The top is kind of cool, though. Costuming was sorta fun. The CMs there were great and funny in a kind of schoolmaster-ish kind of way. They did a great job of getting us all fitted out and looking spiffy.
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