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 The software our forums run on is just too out-of-date and it poses a significant security risk.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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Another great day and funny with Cora with all these new discoveries that she's not accustomed to but loving them like elevators! Glad you got some time to yourselves in the MK for a bit as you probably needed it. Carousel oP was a good choice with the long waits on the others. Riding the People Mover or WDWRR would have been other good choices with minimal waits as I like to do on my trips.
Yes, it was good to get away by ourselves for a little while.
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Originally Posted by tdhc
Great way to end the day.
Yes, it was!
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Originally Posted by chezp
Sounds like you had a really relaxing time and how wonderful to just be able to pop over to the Magic Kingdom for an hour!
One of the things we love about staying at BLT!
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Originally Posted by Colexis Mom
Great pictures from MK and the resort! Sounds like a great afternoon/evening!
Yes, it was!
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Originally Posted by num1DVCfan
Thank you for the info on the grocery delivery. It looks like this was such a relaxing day, but you really packed a lot into it. I love that you could just walk over to MK for an hour.
That was one of the reasons we chose BLT for this trip...easy access to MK!
We were up early again, and Jeff had gotten the coffee pot ready to go in our room the night before, so when we woke up we could make coffee without disturbing Liz and Cora, as they usually slept in a bit longer.
We showered and dressed and heard Liz and Cora up by 7:30 or so. We had our breakfast and were out the door by 8:30 and took the bus to DHS.
Our original plans were FPs for Voyage of the Little Mermaid, Frozen sing along and TSMM, if we felt we could do get it in. I made some changes the day before, eliminating Frozen Sing along and moving the time for VLM a little later so we could get to Olaf, Minnie and Mickey before the wait time got too long. Also, we’d figured out that waiting for the characters worked best if Cora didn’t know what we were waiting for.
When we arrived at DHS Liz and Jeff went through bag check, and Cora and I did the no bag entrance. Then we headed for Mickey and Minnie, where there was just a 5 minute wait. We got to the CM and were ushered right in! Cora was awestruck!
Then we headed around the corner to see Olaf. On the way a DVC CM gave us a strip of stickers. We gave Cora one and Jeff pocketed the rest for later. Olaf was a 15 minute wait but Cora was pretty good in line. She enjoyed playing with the sticker as we moved up the line. Plus, it’s helpful when you have to wait behind a line, so you can’t see the character until it’s your turn. Cora loved Olaf as well!
After that we had some time to kill before VLM, so we went over to Animation Courtyard. We didn’t get in any character lines, but we did see Sophia go by and she waved to Cora. Then Pluto was heading back to his post and patted Cora on the head.
We waited only a few minutes and were let into the theater. Remember I said Cora got anxious with something new? Well, she’d never been in a theater before and wanted no part of sitting on the crazy fold down chairs. She sat on the floor and cried. So, Liz took her to the side by the exit door, thinking she’d wait until the show started and Cora would settle down. Unfortunately that did not happen because it took a long time for everyone to get situated before the show started. We just ended up walking out. Liz felt bad because Jeff and I left too, but I told her this trip is for Cora, and if she is not happy, none of us are happy!
We took a walk down Pixar Place, to the end where there are some tables and chairs. We had a snack and rested for a bit.
After some discussion, we decided to skip the FP for TSMM and headed out of the park. So, no rides or shows at DHS, but the character M&Gs were definitely a hit and we wouldn’t have missed them!
We saw the Stormtroopers (coming and going) and also got a PP photo on the way out.
Great character meets and Cora seems to be taking it on full throttle and enjoying every bit of it!
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
Those character interaction pictures of Cora are so beautiful! What sweet & lovely memories to capture! I also agree that Main Street looks beautiful at sunset. Gorgeous pictures.
Awww poor Cora in the theatre. Luckily she's so great with character interactions which sometimes kids hate. Those pictures of her and Minnie are sooo adorable.
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I've never been to WDW with anyone under age 4. Your report is very interesting. Love all the photos. Looking forward to more. Thanks for taking the time.
Great character meets and Cora seems to be taking it on full throttle and enjoying every bit of it!
She had such a wonderful time meeting each of the characters.
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Originally Posted by Ella678
Those character interaction pictures of Cora are so beautiful! What sweet & lovely memories to capture! I also agree that Main Street looks beautiful at sunset. Gorgeous pictures.
I've made a photo book that I intend to give Cora for her birthday in January.
I know that they say little ones don't remember their early trips to WDW, but I'm hoping the photos will help her remember some of it.
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Originally Posted by chezp
Cora is definitely completely entranced by the characters - you can see that in her face.
Can't you just?
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Originally Posted by patclairesmom
Awww poor Cora in the theatre. Luckily she's so great with character interactions which sometimes kids hate. Those pictures of her and Minnie are sooo adorable.
I know! That's the part I was worried about - that she'd be afraid of the characters! I did show her lots of videos beforehand of character meets, so maybe that helped.
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Originally Posted by purplegal
More great pictures, the joy in her face is a pleasure to see.
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Originally Posted by Colexis Mom
More great pictures with the characters! Sorry Cora didn’t like the theater!
It's funny, there were some things she loved, and others she wanted no part of. We just went with the flow and didn't force anything.
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Originally Posted by HiddenMickey
I've never been to WDW with anyone under age 4. Your report is very interesting. Love all the photos. Looking forward to more. Thanks for taking the time.
This was quite a new experience for us too. We were determined to be flexible and not worried if we didn't do everything that we'd planned.
We waited a while for a bus, but it was pretty deserted so we just walked around with Cora until we saw the bus heading our way. She was not good on the bus. She fussed and cried most of the way back. But when we got off and headed to the resort, she was fine.
When we got back to the room we got our swimsuits on for the pool, which was again a big hit!
But after that Cora was cranky again. We just could not figure out what was wrong. I changed our movies for two new ones and we watched Lady and the Tramp for a while. Then I took her for a long walk around BLT grounds and she finally fell asleep. She slept in the room, in her stroller for an hour or so, but when she woke up she was still not happy. It was so frustrating, not knowing what was wrong.
Plans for the evening were supposed to be a boat ride to WL and dinner at Roaring Forks. Instead, Jeff and I went alone and Liz stayed back with Cora.
We got to WL and walked around a bit trying to decide if we wanted to eat at RF or see if we could get in to WCC. We ended up at RF. Jeff had a pulled pork sandwich and I had an Asian chicken salad.
Both were good, but my heart just wasn’t in it. Finally I had an epiphany! I realized that Cora hadn’t pooped since Sunday! (Sorry, no other way to say it!) Of course she was not herself! Why it took us so long to figure out, I don’t know! : I texted Liz and she replied that she had just been thinking the same thing. Now at least we could try to remedy the issue!
Before we left RF, we bought a pulled pork sandwich for Liz and an apple juice for Cora. Then when we got back to the Contemporary, we bought some Milk of Magnesia. When we got back to the room we gave Cora ½ of a children’s dose of MoM and the apple juice. Then she sat at the table and played with her figures. A little while later she was able to go, and it made a huge difference! She was a happy girl again!
Later that evening I took her for a walk around the grounds again. She really enjoyed being in her stroller looking at all the sights…the Mickey topiary, the monorail, and once we were inside the Contemporary she loved all the pictures of the characters from Fantasia on the exterior wall of the Fantasia gift shop.
The CMs from the community hall put on a great Halloween party for all the guests. Liz and Cora had gone down while Jeff and I were at RF. They had different activities for them to do, popcorn and other treats, a costume contest, a dance party and several characters who appeared in costume. They were just finishing up as we were walking around.
After a nice walk we headed back to the room and everyone settled down for bed.
At some point we decided to change our breakfast ADR for Thursday. We’d planned on Garden Grill, but decided it was a bit far to go just for breakfast. So we cancelled it and were lucky enough to get an ADR at 1900 Park Fare instead.
Glad Cora was finally feeling herself again after some needed intervention!
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October 6, 2017-Enjoying an amazing dinner at Victoria & Albert's with PP's Dot and Drew
My TR from my most recent trip is now underway. Includes: Universal Studios Florida, Disney World and Sea World Orlando Trifecta TR -Updated December 10th! TR is now COMPLETED!
Great updates, but poor Cora. You all seem to be able to go with the flow and adjust very easily to accommodate that sweetie pie. I so love her character interactions. They are the absolute best.
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Glad you got some time to yourselves in the MK for a bit as you probably needed it. 
Riding the People Mover or WDWRR would have been other good choices with minimal waits as I like to do on my trips. 
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Sorry Cora didn’t like the theater!
I realized that Cora hadn’t pooped since Sunday! (Sorry, no other way to say it!) Of course she was not herself! Why it took us so long to figure out, I don’t know! 
: I texted Liz and she replied that she had just been thinking the same thing. Now at least we could try to remedy the issue! 
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