Warning: This is long
End of School
So I know I have not posted in a long time. The end of school was busy and there was not much that was worth writing about. I will miss all my kids. I will also miss being a kindergarten teacher. I LOVED that I was the one to teach them to read and write. I LOVED watching them make friends and mature. I loved all the little furniture and knowing how special kindergarten was to their families. However, it has been a hard three years and I am ready to move on.
My room had to be all packed up and moved down to the second grade hall. That was a HARD long job. We also had to use our staff development day as a snow day in January, so we didn't get an extra day after school was out. Everything had to be done by Friday at 4:00. We watched a lot of videos an did many things the last week that did not require any of my help so that I could pack. I was very tired everyday.
I am very excited to go back to second grade. I taught it for two years and loved it.I am going to lots of workshops this summer to get ready for the transition.
CMA Music Festival
As many of you know, I took a vacation right after school was out. Last summer I saw the CMA Music Festival (formally FanFair) on TV and decided that I was going next year to celebrate my recovery from surgery. It was easy to convince Katie, my roommate, to come with me because she is a big country music fan like me. I got all the tickets for Nashville in January and looked forward to it all year.
It was absolutely wonderful!!!!! During the day there some smaller names I kinda knew performing on a riverfront stage and lots of names that I didn't know performing on other stages around downtown. There were also activities for families and an area to meet the artist and get info on all kids of things. Night performances were the biggest past of the event. Everyone (50,000+) went to the Tennessee Titian's stadium and watched 6-8 big name performers. Everyone had about 30 minutes to play then another performer came on. We had the same GREAT seats every night. We were right in the center an a little up. There were huge screens to watch everything.
So now you are wondering, so who all did you see? Who was the best? Well I will tell you how each day went. Get ready, its kinda long
Thursday
We were scheduled to fly out at 7:45am but because of big rain storms we sat in the airport until 4:00. Ugggg. Long day
We arrived in Nashville at 7:30pm and drove straight to the big nightly concert. We had planned to eat lunch with my dad who was there on business and then spend the afternoon at small concerts.
We walked in right after the first performer started - Brooks and Dunn. They were great.
Then Reba sang 3 songs before the lightning arrived in Nashville.
They called a delay and everyone went under the stands.
After waiting a hour an still no rain, we left at 10:30 and made it back to the hotel right before the rain hit.
We figured they would not restart the concert after midnight, but we were wrong.
We missed seeing Darius Rucker, Julianne Hough (sad), Dierks Bentley, Rascal Flatts (very sad) an Brad Paisley ( the most sad about)
That night lasted until 2:30am . Wow, glad I went home.
Friday
We started the day around 11:00. First we took the shuttle to the riverfront stage and saw John Anderson and Jamie O'Neil. Then went to another stage and saw Kate & Kacey (2nd plane in Can You Duet) and Julie Roberts.
Then we went back to clean up before the big show. This was a great night of performers.
We both wore our boots with our dresses .
Luke Bryan
Little Big Town (A little disappointing)
Rodney Atkins (very fun)
Jake Owen (Katie thinks he looks like Mathew McConaughey)
Zac Brown Band (Lots of fun)
Lady Antembellum (wow, I loved)
Jason Aldean
Surprise performer Kid Rock and Martina (wow) Katie was very excited.
Saturday
We started at the riverfront stage and saw Bill Anderson and Emerson Drive. ( They were great)
Then we headed over to the acoustic stage and saw John Arthur Martinez. He is from Texas an played a lot of great original songs. Watch for him an go see him if you get the chance.
That night we saw lots of great performers. I was super excited about this night for one reason.
Josh Turner - My favorite. I turn into a 15 year old girl at a Jonas Brothers Concert.
Jamey Johnson
Lee Ann Womack - so beautiful and graceful.
Wynonna and a few songs with mom Naomi. (wow, what legends. The stadium was very excited)
Trace Adkins (He is not my favorite but he had a lot of energy and put on a good show)
Martina McBride was so fun and put on such an energetic show.
Sunday
We spent the entire afternoon at the riverfront stage and enjoyed the sunshine.
Joe Nichols
Jessica Harp (half of The Wreckers)She is very skinny
Eli Young Band - great
Darryl Worley
Joey + Rory - adorable and so much fun. They are very sweet to each other.
That night was the best concert
Jack Ingram - great
Montgomery Gentry
Miranda Lambert- My new favorite, she was very fun and energetic
John Rich with Cowboy Troy - this act seem to have a lot of show and silliness. John Rich came out in a full fur coat and then a midget was dancing at one time. Kinda all just weird.
Taylor Swift was very 19 and kinda dramatic. She did a lot of skipping and hair flinging. If I was 16 I would love her.
Kenney Chesney closed the show and sang all of his hits. I don't quite get all the hype about him, but he has some fun songs.
We ha so much fun and loved our seats and the people around us. Everyone was so nice and there was never a time when I felt like things were out of control.
I will say that we saw lots of different kinds of people. Lots of old, young kids, and all sizes of people in not a lot of clothing. I guess when some are on vacation they don't mind if everything hangs out.
Monday we did a little shopping then headed home.
