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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Looks like a fun breakfast! June definitely seems to have a crush on Dylan. We should have done that breakfast with Lexi last time as she has started to be more interested in "Good Luck Charlie" and "Austin and Ally" than Jake and Little Einsteins.
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Okay so I've been lurking in the backround here for a while and have to commend young Mr Dylan on his artwork and the prominent place it was displayed. Glad to see his lip starting to heal Greet interaction wiyh cast at H and V That waitress looked like she was worth going for
Welcome Mike! Our waitress was a lot of fun.
Quote:
Originally Posted by OneLittleSpark
Sounds like a great breakfast and you got some good pics too.
Thanks! My FiL was photographer at all our character meals.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Colexis Mom
Great pics from your early start! How nice for it to be so empty!!
It was strange to be so empty, but neat too!
Quote:
Originally Posted by lauriep
Lovely way to start the day, with a walk along the canal to DHS. Looks like it was a beautiful morning. I have no idea who those characters are, but the interaction looks wonderful. I agree, that character meal will only work while they're very young.
They're all on the preschool shows. And some aren't even really shown all that much either anymore, but the kids (Dylan mainly) still knew them and enjoyed it and that's what matters.
Quote:
Originally Posted by dutchdisneyfamily
What a lovely walk! The character interaction looks great. The time does fly when they won't be into those characters anymore. Good idea to grasp it while you can. They are so cute!
I was fine with doing this twice in a year since I wasn't sure if we'd ever go back.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cam22
Love the sunrise shot from your balcony! Breakfast looked quite successful!
Thanks Cam! I think that's one of the earliest days I've ever had at Disney. Save for SWW.
Quote:
Originally Posted by shazza
Great photos from your early morning at HS. The boys looked like they enjoyed the character breakfast.
I think they did. I'm pretty sure Dylan did.
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
What great character interaction to start the day! How cool to see the park so quiet as well.
I've never seen it so quiet before so that was a treat just wish I had a little more time to savor it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lfredsbo
Love your sunrise photos!
And great character interaction!
Thanks! It was pretty to watch too.
Quote:
Originally Posted by PrincessSharon
Looks like a fun time at DTD. And that character meal looks amazing - so much character time! It's too bad they don't let you get shots closer to the hat, though.
It was great to have so much character time. The characters seemed to enjoy being there too - which you know you don't always get. It is a shame you can't get closer to the hat.
Quote:
Originally Posted by KMB733
Looks like a great time at breakfast!! It's great that you got in a lot of character time.
It was a great meal all around!
Quote:
Originally Posted by lexiemom
Looks like a fun breakfast! June definitely seems to have a crush on Dylan. We should have done that breakfast with Lexi last time as she has started to be more interested in "Good Luck Charlie" and "Austin and Ally" than Jake and Little Einsteins.
June did pay attention to Dylan quite a bit more. The boys are into Power Rangers, Ninja Turtles and Sponge Bob. Although Lukas will watch Mickey Choo Choo (the never ending snow episode) ALL the time if you let him!
Quote:
Originally Posted by KHarrod
Wow! Fantastic character interactions! I love all the photos!
All caught up now! I love Dylan's dino. I wonder what they could do with it at Animator's Palate... There's just something special about Disney early in the morning- great pics!
What a great sunrise walk to DHS! Beautiful pictures, Kelly.
Character interaction at H&V looks special. Breakfast in the parks might just be a good way to have an uncrowded meal.
What a great sunrise walk to DHS! Beautiful pictures, Kelly.
Character interaction at H&V looks special. Breakfast in the parks might just be a good way to have an uncrowded meal.
OK after seeing your pictures you have me convinced. Evan and I are doing H&V on our next trip. He loves Jake and you are right there is just a short time where he will be interested and not "too cool" to go there.
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All caught up now! I love Dylan's dino. I wonder what they could do with it at Animator's Palate... There's just something special about Disney early in the morning- great pics!
I don't know, but maybe we'll find out what AP could do with it in October.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jlhill4444
Looks like a picture perfect breakfast/morning!
It was pretty good.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kenny
What a great sunrise walk to DHS! Beautiful pictures, Kelly.
Character interaction at H&V looks special. Breakfast in the parks might just be a good way to have an uncrowded meal.
Well at DHS at least. We've been to Askerhaus & CP early too and while the parks are fairly empty, the restaurants aren't as much.
Quote:
Originally Posted by honeybee723
You definitely had a great breakfast. The characters were having a blast with your boys.
Dylan especially, but Lukas started in on the fun too. And there was no one sitting around us either which made it that much more special.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mommapants
OK after seeing your pictures you have me convinced. Evan and I are doing H&V on our next trip. He loves Jake and you are right there is just a short time where he will be interested and not "too cool" to go there.
You should take Evan there he'll love it! We went early this time, but in June we went at 10 and it was empty both times so you can't choose wrong here I think.
Woo hoo, I'm all caught up! Great TR so far! I especially enjoyed seeing pictures of Biergarten, as we will be eating there for the first time exactly one month from tomorrow. I will definitely be sure to try the pork roast. Now that I'm caught up, feel free to continue at any time .
Woo hoo, I'm all caught up! Great TR so far! I especially enjoyed seeing pictures of Biergarten, as we will be eating there for the first time exactly one month from tomorrow. I will definitely be sure to try the pork roast. Now that I'm caught up, feel free to continue at any time .
You've been busy!
I hope you enjoy Biergarten!
I know, I really need to get moving on this! And I have the girl's trip to start too!!
So when we last left off we had finished an early breakfast at H&V. By now the park had opened and we were curious how touring would go. First up was seeing the chaos that is TSMM. At 9:27am it was showing a 15 minute wait! Wow! Maybe this won’t be so bad after all! We grabbed FPs for later and then hit the regular queue.
Mike wanted his picture taken in front of Peevy's
Proof!
I'm guessing I had Lukas in my lap this time around.
Next up was to see if Phineas & Ferb were out as it was around 10am and they come out then. I know this line can fill up quick so I figured the earlier the better. Wouldn’t you know it?! No one in line! (OK, so there might have been one family that got in front of us as I was digging out the autograph books.) These 2 are so much fun and we had a great character meet with them. Since it’s been months since this happened I have no idea what the conversation was about.
waving & a smile!
After our visit with the coolest brothers we went to see Muppets. We all love this show! I’m not sure a day goes by without someone saying a quote from the show, whether it be the pre-show or the actual show itself. Favorites include “Stop this foolishness!” and “Look at the guy in the Goofy mask. Oh sorry lady!” watching the pre-show
I texted the girls (Dawn, Linny & Melissa) to tell them that this was a good day and a great time to be in the world. They asked about the weather (rain?), today was a gorgeous day, and that we were “rockin’ & rollin’”. I loved these windows!
We headed to Art of Animation to see some characters. Lukas finally got close to a character! His beloved Pooh. There was no one in here today either. The longest line was for Sorcerer Mickey, which wasn’t too bad either. Lukas even hugged Mickey too! Maybe he’s getting used to them. Instead of the drawing class we visited a table they had set up where a CM was coloring. Dylan loves to color so he chose Sorcerer Mickey and I did Tinkerbell. Dylan was very into this and watched what the CM was doing so he could make his like hers. Even asked how to make Mickey’s face the right color. She told him to use orange, but lightly color. And he did! She said most kids just do it regular and comes out darker. While Dylan colored I took Lukas back up to see Pooh since no one was in line.
one more hug
Mine
Lukas'
Dylan's
It was now time to use our TSMM FPs, so we headed to Pixar Place to use those. I love that ride – so much fun! And to think this was the first year we’ve been able to actually ride it as it just never worked out in past years. After that we had a little time before our lunch ADR so we went to VoLM which he hadn’t done in a while and I’m not sure Lukas had ever seen it.
My score is on the left! I think this was against Mike.
Oh yeah!
Up next…a lunch must do & the rest of our afternoon @ DHS
Wow you guys accomplished a lot before lunch! I just love the crowd level in Sept...now with Lexi in school it is going to be harder to make it during the lower crowd seasons without taking her out of school. Tough decisions!
You got a lot done! You did a great job coloring Tink! More great character time. My kids can't wait to see Phineas and Ferb! They weren't there the last time we were there.
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We should have done that breakfast with Lexi last time as she has started to be more interested in "Good Luck Charlie" and "Austin and Ally" than Jake and Little Einsteins. 
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How cool to see the park so quiet as well. 
Disney Magic - Oct 2015
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