How much magic can one vacation include? - Page 3 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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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.
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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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How much magic can one vacation include? Updated Aug 5
Thanks for the encouragement everyone! I hate having lapses in writing, but my husband recently started up his team practices (2 a days) for football, and with our Florida like heat, we've been having rolling brown and blackouts Oh well, it is August!
We arrived almost 35 minutes early for our 4:10 reservations at the Sci-Fi, but we went ahead and checked in. I was relieved to see that they already had our ticket stamped with the ALLERGY alert in red ink, they CM verified Patrick's allergies. We had a short wait which the boys spent playing on the car outside the restaraunt. A really friendly CM came over to talk to us - he'd noticed the boys Ohio State hates (he was from Columbus) and got to talking football with my husband. He gave each of the two older boys about 20 stickers after congratulating them on their first trip (they were wearing buttons).
We were seated after a short wait - 15 minutes. The boys were immediately enthralled with the atmosphere - I was impressed again when our waiter noticed the allergy stamp on our ticket and immediately went to get the chef (a BIG sigh of relief for me because I'd been very nervous about the whole eating aspect of the vacation). The chef was really nice - he offered to make Patrick bow tie pasta, with a "dip" of vegetarian marinara sauce. He gave him two side dishes of fruit (Patrick LOVES all types of fruit) and then was going to surprise him with a desert.
Brian had a chicken sandwich, Nolan had a hot dog and I cannot remember what I ate b/c I was so nervous over Patrick (he'd had a bad reaction at our hotel in Georgia that morning because someone had spilled milk on the packets of oatmeal and I didn't realize it until he'd eaten some.). Anyway, the portions were huge, the movie flicks were great - the boys loved them. For desert the chef personally brought the boys ice cream - Nolan got vanilla with hot fudge sauce and Patrick had Tofutti (looks like vanilla ice cream but is made with Tofu) and a special dairy free chocolate sauce. He was jumping up and clapping, yelling "I get to eat white ice cream that doesn't hurt my belly. Mommy I'm just like Nolan!" I got tears in my eyes, the waiter got tears in his eyes, and the Chef had a HUGE smile and told us we'd just made his job very worthwhile!
Brian called our waiter over after looking over our bill - we hadn't been charged for Patrick's dish. He explained to us that the chef requested we not be charged for Patrick's meal because he "enjoyed it so much". Needless to say we left a nice tip!
After dinner, we decided to "divide and conquer" a bit. Nolan and his Dad went off to ride Star Tours and I took the younger two to see the last showing of Playhouse Disney. We missed the last show by about 5 minutes because I got a bit confused trying to get there ;( However, we were able to walk right into a showing of The Little Mermaid Patrick was so enthralled with the show I don't think he ever blinked his eyes! The baby loved the songs. While in the show, we recieved a text from my hubby - they were already off of Star Tours (they'd had about a ten minute wait). We agreed to meet at the entrance to Toy Story Mania.
I'd figured that since it was now 6:30, it wouldn't be too bad of a wait. WRONG! The wait was actually 4 hours at this point! Nolan started crying because this was on his "must -do" list. At this point, it was raining, so we headed into the line to meet Buzz and Woody. It took us about 30 minutes to get through the line. I started talking to the family in front of us - they were there celebrating their 18 year-old daughter's high school graduation (they were from New York). They were really very sweet - Mary asked to hold the baby, and talked to the boys about the characters as we waited. When Cullen started "singing" and doing his sign for spider, Mary turned and sang "Itsy-Bitsy Spider" to him in sign language. She told me that she wants to be a preschool teacher, but was having trouble getting into a college program (she has Downs Syndrome). Mary used our camera and took a family picture for us - she was so sweet!
After meeting our heros, and being greeted with a sopping wet stroller because our cover blew off, we found the line to Toy Story had grown longer (the wait was now 4 1/2 hours) and a CM was standing at the end of the line explaining that the Cue was closed. I don't know if the ride had stopped, or they just weren't letting anyone else in because they wouldn't get through before the parked closed. Actually, it was already 7:30, and the park was to close at 10 that night. We walked around a bit more and decided to head back to the hotel. The bus ride back to the Contemporary was much smoother and quicker (there were a lot of people arriving at DHS) once we figured out where we were to get the bus. That took a bit of walking around because I let hubby lead the way and he REFUSED to ask a CM which number bus we should be looking for. We got back to the hotel at 9:30, used our coupons to get our refillable mugs and I used our first two snack credits - a mickey rice krispy treat for the oldest and a special dairy free chocolate chip cookie for Patrick. We had our snacks on the fourth floor observation deck while watching the fireworks from the MK. Everyone was tucked into bed and asleep by 11:00 p.m. Next up: getting to the MK for the opening show!
The first picture is Patrick getting his "ice cream" - he liked it so much he used the spoon in one hand and was picking up ice cream with his other hand too!
The soldiers performing by Toy Story Mania
Our family picture - Nolan pointed out that Zurg was behind us
The boys - meeting their heroes for the first time
Okay - with all three napping I have a little time for another update!
Monday, the 19th rolled around EARLY because baby Cullen decided that 6:00 am was a great time to get me up! I grabbed a quick shower and took the two youngest down to the fourth floor so I could refill my mug, and grab breakfast. A quick text to my mom told me that my parents were already downstairs (they'd stored our strollers in their room overnight). So I filled Patrick's mug (which a very thoughtful CM wrapped a ribbon on the handle and drew a Mickey face on the lid so he would always know his mug from everyone else's - no cross contamination on this trip!) with the last of our Rice Milk in our room, grabbed Patrick's hand and carried Cullen to the elevator.
As we were getting off, Patrick dropped his mug and spilled his Rice milk EVERYWHERE and started crying - loud enough that my Dad followed his panicked cries and found us. I was trying to calm Patrick down when a CM walked over - after learning about our problem, she took him by the hand to Chef Mickey's where she promptly refilled his mug (free of charge) and told him he could come back any time for more. Is this place awesome or what???
Patrick scarfed down his breakfast, telling everyone that came near him about Chrissy and what she'd done for him. By now, it was 7:30, and my hubby wandered down with Nolan who was too excited to sit and eat breakfast. We decided to walk over to the Magic Kindgom rather than wait on the monorail (mainly because I wanted to grab a shower and get to the MK before 9 a.m. - I thought the boys would enjoy the opening show.
We managed it - actually while I waited with our backpacks and bags, my parents went to trade in their tickets from 20 years ago. Because the tickets were so old, they were able to get park hoppers, water park and Disney quest. After talking with the CM, Dad was able to trade in the park hopper option for an extra day pass for them .
We watched the opening show and Patrick turned to me and said "Hey Mom, you always sing me the Good morning song they just sang!" Very cool that he recognized it. We headed straight to Fantasy land - Somehow I ended up being the navigator which is pretty funny because I'm clueless about directions - I use landmarks to get everywhere). I was floored when we walked right on to Peter Pan! Patrick loved it so much that he and I walked right on a second time while the rest went on It's a Small World. We then joined my parents for their second ride of It's a Small World (Dad's favorite ride, Cullen's too!). Brian then took Patrick and waited about 20 minutes for Dumbo while Dad and I rode the Carousel with the other two. We took a small break for Nolan to have his first Mickey Bar, and Cullen and Patrick each had a Dole Strawberry bar (they really are as good as I remembered them to be). We then walked on The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (rode this twice), The Teacups and we had a small wait for the Speedway. We were absolutely floored that we had ridden all of this in two hours.
It was starting to get a bit more crowded now. We had to wait 20 minutes for Buzz Lightyear. The boys then declared that they wanted to ride the People Mover (I know it goes by a different name, but I can't think of it right now). This ended up being one of their favorite rides.
After riding this, Brian and I decided to head back to the hotel to let the boys nap for a bit and swim. My parents stayed on at the MK and while we were having lunch and napping, they went through the Carousel of Progress, Stitches Great Escape and the Hall of Presidents. They met us back at the hotel around 2 - we were going to get the boys up to swim for a bit.
We spent a really nice couple of hours down at the pool. Nolan conquered his fear, rode the slide and loved it. In fact, it was hard to get him to do anything else! Patrick and Cullen both really liked the spray area. When Cullen got a bit cranky, we put him in his float and my Dad walked around in the pool with him while he took a snooze. There were a lot of people down at the pool, but it never felt very crowded because it is such a large pool. I couldn't believe it when the lifeguard told us that they actually have a system to cool the pool water to a toasty 83 degrees! Wonder how warm the pool would have been without the cooling system?
We let the boys swim until four when we started taking them upstairs to shower in shifts (Nolan got the most pool time). At 5:30, we were ready to head back to the park. The plan was to eat then ride, but the boys decided they weren't hungry yet. So we headed back to the "Happy Haunted Mansion" in Nolan's language. The line was about 30 minutes, so we entered the stand-by cue. Everything was great until we were almost to the turnstile - Nolan decided he needed to go to the bathroom now. The line behind us had almost doubled since we'd entered, so I took him politely to the front to find a CM to see if there was a quick exit. Everyone was really nice - except one man who told me to just "throw him over the fence to use a tree" - He really gave me a problem about going ahead of him, so we waited until he and his family cleared the turnstile - luckily, a CM was just ahead. She let us out the quick exit, and even told me how to re-enter without having to wait in line again. After a quick detour, we were able to re-enter. We just missed the rest of our family by about three cars!
We then headed for dinner while we discussed what our next ride idea was going to be.
UP next - awesome CS for dinner, and even more magic
Glad you had such an awesome meal at the Sci Fi. It's one of my favorite places to eat and they have always been very good to me with my allergies.
And I have also been "treated" to several complimentary desserts by chefs (including one anniversary cake that was a special surprise from Chef Amber Kent who is more than just a chef -- she is a lifelong friend -- she literally saved my life once)
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Oh well, it is August!
Patrick was so enthralled with the show I don't think he ever blinked his eyes! The baby loved the songs. While in the show, we recieved a text from my hubby - they were already off of Star Tours (they'd had about a ten minute wait). We agreed to meet at the entrance to Toy Story Mania. 
Nolan started crying because this was on his "must -do" list. At this point, it was raining, so we headed into the line to meet Buzz and Woody. It took us about 30 minutes to get through the line. I started talking to the family in front of us - they were there celebrating their 18 year-old daughter's high school graduation (they were from New York). They were really very sweet - Mary asked to hold the baby, and talked to the boys about the characters as we waited. When Cullen started "singing" and doing his sign for spider, Mary turned and sang "Itsy-Bitsy Spider" to him in sign language.
. We got back to the hotel at 9:30, used our coupons to get our refillable mugs and I used our first two snack credits - a mickey rice krispy treat for the oldest and a special dairy free chocolate chip cookie for Patrick. We had our snacks on the fourth floor observation deck while watching the fireworks from the MK. Everyone was tucked into bed and asleep by 11:00 p.m. Next up: getting to the MK for the opening show!
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