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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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When I last left off I had booked all of my ADR’s and had to figure out how we were going to get down. Driving was out of the question for us. We live in the thumb of Michigan and the idea of spending 20 plus hours cooped up in a car was not what you would call high on our list of things to do. Besides when it is time for Disney I want to be there as fast as possible. Now I do not begrudge anyone the time well spent as family, but it is just not for us. I can only imagine the drama that would go on with 3 kids wondering where in the world we are going. Anyways on to transportation and the fun of looking for the right flight at the right time.
Flying out of Detroit Metro is our preferred choice and honestly the earlier the better. We have typically flown Delta (NWA before) but fares we outrageous! Not to mention adding on luggage and our carry on. So off to Southwest I went and what I found was lovely. The 5 of us will be flying out at 7:00am with a short layover in Nashville and we will arrive in MCO just before noon. Perfect. My hope is we will be in the room or park by 2:00. I am assuming that the room will not be ready so off to the park we go. I will just have the Poly hold on to our baggage and off we go. My return flight was not what my first choice would be, but for the price I could not pass it up. We have to leave the Poly at 9:00am for our 12:00pm flight home. That was the hardest part for me, leaving so early. Our Colin, Owen & Olivia will all start school 2 days after we return home so I guess getting them to bed at a decent time will be best. We are due to land around 5:00pm and should be home by 7:00pm. We will have to leave home no later than 4:00am to make it to make it to Metro by 5:30am. That will be the hard part with 3 kids who have no idea what is going on. That leads me to the big reveal.
How do I let them know what we are doing up so early? I think I might finally have it all worked out. We are no strangers to rising early to go someplace fun. We get up early to take the kids to the Detroit Zoo quite often and have gotten up very early to go to rather large farmers market in Detroit. So that should not be a problem. My hopes are that they will go back to sleep once we get going. I do have t-shirts for the kids that I would like to have them wear, but worry that the surprise might be spoiled if I have Disney shirts placed out in the morning. I may not be able to control myself. Maybe I should hold on to all of the Disney shirts for our first full day in the park. When we get to Metro the sun should be rising and they will figure out that we are not at the zoo or the market. The luggage will have been in the back of the car with the slide thing over it (real technical term I know) so it should be out of sight and once we park we can tell them of our surprise. I hope they handle it well. I have seen some videos and kids do not always react how parents would want them to. The only issue I believe we would have is our puppy. We have an English bulldog that our kids just adore. Whenever we leave Olivia always gives him a hug and in her best mommy voice tells him” bye sweetie, be a good boy, no chewing on anything, we will be back soon.” It is rather cute and she will surely miss him, so I hope that they are not unhappy about not giving him a proper goodbye. All in all I am quite confident that all of the planning and hard work will pay off and they will be in for the time of their lives.
So what do you think? Have you ever surprised someone with a Disney vacation or any vacation for that matter? How did it go? I would love to hear your comments and suggestions for how it should go.
Plans sound great. Not sure on how to surprise, but maybe you could casually have your daughter give the dog a hug that morning, since you'll be away "all day."
Your plans sound good so far! Can't wait to read more.
We haven't done a surprise yet, but we are planning one. We've got our next Disney trip already planned for December 2013, and the kids have absolutely no idea. It's going to be a Christmas gift for both kids/golden birthday gift for my son.
Your flying plans sound great!! We used to fly Delta too, then found Jet Blue to be a much better deal with the free luggage and everything. I think Southwest is about the same as Jet Blue for us, but I prefer to have a seat number in hand. So far as the surprise, we were going to do the same thing, but we cracked early. Hubby and I were going to wear shirts that said "We're going to Disney!" and cover them up until we were at the airport. Maybe you could do something like that? You could even have shirts ready for the kids to change into at the airport. Might be fun!! I agree that you should find a way to have your daughter give the dog an extra cuddle and kiss for the day. Can't wait to see how it all goes over!!
I am late to the party (but not too late!). So happy that things are going well with your mom. This sounds like a fantastic trip and I love the surprise idea. I think secretly it appeals so much to me because I would like nothing better than for someone to surprise ME! DH wants to stay in the Poly but we always stay in moderates....next time maybe I will splurge. Looking forward to hearing all about your trip.
Awww, the goodbye scene with your puppy is just too cute. Maybe you can just tell your little ones that you already went over the "rules" with him, if she asks
__________________
Jennifer "Scraps" Walker, Queen of the Helper Monkeys
2013 Scrapbook Page Goal: 98/175
Finished the packing this morning at 2:00am My kiddos stayed at my sister in law's last night and for 4 hours I was able to 3 clean closets,arrange dresser drawers, refold clothes, pack for the the 3 kids and myself all this while my husband packed for himself. I felt like a rock star not to mention the dog was following me and underfoot the entire time. He has never seen our luggage and I know he was nervous about me packing up. Poor thing. So all I have left to do tomorrow before we take off is pack our toiletries and load up the car for the airport. I have packed each of the kids a carry on with crayons a coloring book, some snacks, a change of clothes, their swimsuits and sandals, gum, sunglasses and some money in these cute little Disney change purses I found at a gum ball machine at Buffalo Wild Wings. Am I forgetting anything? I packed all of the electronics in my bag along with my things so I think we are ready. Wish us luck and you never know I may just post something from Disney.
And I know just the Disney change purses you are talking about! My kids rooked us into a bunch of them from the gumball machine here at one of their favorite restaurants. LOL!!!!
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Anyways on to transportation and the fun of looking for the right flight at the right time. 
Maybe I should hold on to all of the Disney shirts for our first full day in the park. When we get to Metro the sun should be rising and they will figure out that we are not at the zoo or the market. The luggage will have been in the back of the car with the slide thing over it (real technical term I know) so it should be out of sight and once we park we can tell them of our surprise. I hope they handle it well. I have seen some videos and kids do not always react how parents would want them to. 
The only issue I believe we would have is our puppy. We have an English bulldog that our kids just adore. Whenever we leave Olivia always gives him a hug and in her best mommy voice tells him” bye sweetie, be a good boy, no chewing on anything, we will be back soon.” It is rather cute and she will surely miss him, so I hope that they are not unhappy about not giving him a proper goodbye. All in all I am quite confident that all of the planning and hard work will pay off and they will be in for the time of their lives.
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Love all of your ADRs! 
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Mary - not enough trips!
I felt like a rock star 
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