Universal, Here We Come!
My wallet was bulging with 25 Universal Dollars and we were hung-a-ry! Someone pointed us in the direction of the Universal entrance and we hurried off to see what else this amazing place had in store for us!
Elsa was slowly melting down by this point and couldn't understand why we weren't already eating. *folded arms and a slight foot stomp* We stopped at the first counter service we came across, the Beverly Hills Boulangerie. Apparently this was too fru-fru for the kids and we had to move on and find a more "classic" eatery. Thankfully Mel’s Drive-In wasn't too far away and we happily ate our burgers and fries.
As soon as Elsa's belly was full her grumpiness melted away and we were ready to soldier on! We even found an
almost Hidden Mickey:
ET was the first ride for us in this park and we thought it was great fun! I'm not sure I have ever seen the movie the whole way through. It was super fun to "bike" in the ski and save the day! We exited the ride and kind of got stuck in Woody Woodpeckers Kid Zone. Unbeknownst to us it was a dead end. I couldn't help but think of how much C and E would have loved this part of the park! I missed them terribly. Every time I called home the first thing C (2 years old) would say was "Cookie?" Hahahahaha! At least he knows what he wants!! E would jabber about his day and it was very clear they were enjoying their time with the respite family. Knowing they were being loved helped quite a bit.
We left the kiddie section and entered The Expo, which held Men In Black, Alien Attack. Sooooooo much different than Disney!
Michael and Elsa both decided they loved their guns that weren't fixed to the ride. It was a lot of fun!! Again, so different then WDW...
Off to see Jaws. I was hoping this wouldn't be too scary and it wasn't. It was pretty goofy. Extremely goofy!
DISASTER! was up next and a weird, weird thing happened. I was sure I have seen this show before, but today was my first time setting foot in this park. Many times during
DISASTER! I had deja vu!
I would put money down on the fact that this wasn't my first time seeing this, but I'm not sure how this could be. It was a great show and Elsa was the first to be picked from the audience to be a part of the filming. My only complaint was the 2 very obvious drug references in the pre-show. I just find that kind of garbage unacceptable for a place that kids visit.
Anywho...
All of the people picked for the filming:
Elsa doing her scene:
It was hilarious! My only regret is they were very clear about the fact that there would be no video taping of the actual "film". I wanted to sneak and tape it, but I follow the rules and I didn't do it. I really wanted to do it, though. *pout*
Next up was Revenge of the Mummy:
I'm gonna be honest and admit I am a bit of a sissy when it comes to dark and scary rides. I feel unsettled for a while even after riding The Haunted Mansion, which makes me a big sissy. So the stone faced stares by the workers while we walked through the line was freaking me out! I was holding tight onto Michael (what was
he going to do to save me?!!!) when I made the mistake of telling one of the blank staring people that they were freaking me out! The line took us down a dark corridor and when we rounded the corner that same worker jumped out and scared us! I screamed so loud! Boy was I on edge after that! We really enjoyed the ride, but I am thankful Disney CM's don't jump out and scare you! Hahahahaha
Twister was closed (boo) and the only ride left was Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit. This one looked like so much fun, but sadly it doesn't have the correct harness and I was going to have to sit this one out. Michael wasn't sure about it and Elsa begged and begged for him to ride it with her, but he wasn't convinced and she had to ride it alone. She hates riding alone, but she only had to do it once because Michael rode it on her second time around! They thought it was fantastic that you get to choose your own music and then you get to watch a video of yourself after it's all done! Pretty clever!
We hurried back to Island's of Adventure with three different agendas; I was excited to return to WWoHP, Elsa wanted to ride the water rides and Michael was eager to head back to the Suess ride. We let Elsa lead us back towards her precious water rides but not before she convinced Michael to ride the Hulk coaster. He loved it!!! We promised him we would ride the Spiderman 3D ride if he did the Hulk and we did just that.
Scooby was quite impressed with Elsa's funky shoes:
These guys never stopped bobbing up and down...so cute!
We finally made it to Dudley Do-Right’s Ripsaw Falls and Elsa was in heaven. I ride these types of rides because my kids want me to, but I gotta be honest; I do not like it when my head gets wet. Probably won't surprise you, but we got soaked...my head too. Hee hee hee
I figured because we were already soaked we should ride Jurassic Park River Adventure, and this made Elsa really happy!
We made it back to the WWoHP and rode Flight of the Hippogriff. It was great to get to see Hagrid's Hut during this ride, but I didn't do my research and thought this was more of a kiddie ride. It was rough and didn't have a pull-down shoulder harness. I walked off with a stiff neck, hoping the dreaded migraine would not return. We rode the Forbidden Journey one more time and then decided to get our souvenirs. I chose the collectable mug full of wonderfully delectable frozen Butterbeer:
Elsa decided on a chocolate frog and Michael got a jar of Sherbert Lemons:
We also bought a jar of U-No-Poo for a dear family at home:
We rode The Cat in the Hat one final time and that ended our whirlwind of a day at Universal. We enjoyed it so much more than I wanted to. I guess it was OK to cheat on Disney, just not all the time!
We returned to POP, ate some pizza for dinner and filled an arcade card with $20 for Michael. He decided this would be his Disney souvenir. I wasn't terribly surprised!
He arcaded while Elsa swam and I filled out postcards. It was on the Jurrasic raft ride that I came to this conclusion:
Universal is definitely something to experience, but Disney is something to treasure. And I treasure it greatly!
UP NEXT:
Bracing For The Blizzard
Our only disappointment was that Michael didn't join us. We hoped we could talk him into it later!
Chiro work has always been beneficial for my migraines. I just hate that you have to keep going to see the extended benefit. I hope they settle down for you! 
. Elsa and Michael really liked Universal! I thought it was great, but don't really see the need to go back (unless I need another HP fix 
Today was Elsa's big wish and she chose Blizzard Beach. This girl is basically a fish. She loves the water and can't get enough of it! It worked in our favor that Blizzard Beach doesn't open until 10am. This allowed us to sleep in and helped keep my migraine at bay. That Hippogriff ride really wack-a-doo'd my neck. The extra sleep sure did help! 
We hung out for a while (waiting for Michael's movie on the lawn to finish) and somehow we ended up back in the arcade. Before we knew it, Peepa filled an arcade card and we had tons of fun trying to win the big 1,000 ticket jackpot! Elsa had her eye on this:
