My Crazy Beautiful Life: 79 Hours. . .

I'm so glad that "time marches on". I can't imagine getting stuck in a period of time and re-living it over and over and over. Like the movie Groundhog's Day. That movie made me nauseous. Time on the Internet is very limited for me these days but I've been working on a post about our Big Event that is, thankfully, beginning to fade in my memory. I will never be able to block it out totally and it definitely had some redeeming qualities so if I post it here I can process it and put it in the past where it belongs!

It really begins with the building of the stage trailer which you can see here.

But it all came down to the wire on Thursday morning. We left the shop late on Wednesday night after painting the plywood that would be installed on the trailer for our Big Event on Saturday. . .

When I went to bed on Wednesday, I had every confidence that we would finish up the trailer early in the day, load the two trucks with everything we would need for our Big Event and head out of town by 4:00 p.m. Last year it took us 2 days to set up for the Tracy Lawrence concert in the same place so I knew that leaving town at 4:00 would still be pushing it. . .

I hired Tyler to help with the event had asked him to be at the shop at 9:00 a.m. to help load the truck. Little did I know that he would be helping with the stage trailer LONG before he would help load the truck. . .

Everyone had a job. . .

It was frustrating, to say the least. . .

But we really didn't have a choice since we had to have the trailer for the Big Event. . .

Even Lucy helped. . .

The day took on a surreal quality as time progressed. It was as if it was never going to end. . .

There was always something else that had to be done. . .

It went on and on and on and on. . .

In the back of my mind I just kept thinking that we should be setting it up in Vale, not building it. . .

Somehow we managed to load the trucks and finish the trailer. . .

. . . at 4:30 a.m. on Friday morning.

We were all in shock, I think, but we had to keep moving. We pulled away from the shop- 2 trucks, 2 stages and pretty much everything we owned and headed in the general direction of the Big Event. . .

Vale is only about an hour away but we didn't arrive there until about 7:30 a.m. It's all kind of a blur but there was a shower and a bite to eat and a few stops along the road to shake it off. Somehow we still got there in one piece. . .

Kurt arrived shortly after we did but we told the boys to sleep for a few hours and meet us there when they woke up. . .

We must have all gotten a second wind because we went right to work putting the two stages together. . .

Thankfully they had a forklift and driver available for us. . .

This event required a HUGE stage which is the reason we built the 2nd stage in the first place. Besides putting the two trailers together, we also added 12 individual stage decks along the back bring the total size to 64' by 28'. It was huge. . .

We had one day to set up a huge stage, the canopy, 10 bars of lights and all of the audio. I think I can honestly say it was the longest day of my life. It was like moving through quicksand and we couldn't stop. But we could hardly move. But we kept moving anyway. And I don't have a single picture to show for it. There just wasn't time.

We finished up the set-up around 3:30 a.m. and still had some unfinished details that would have to wait for daylight. In spite of the uncertainty of the next day, I slept like a rock. For all of 3 1/2 hours.

Saturday, Event Day: We were back on site before 8 a.m. and knew the tour bus would be arriving at noon. Believe it or not, we were ready before they arrived. Just barely, but we were ready.

The tour manager put his stamp of approval on everything and we began to relax just a little. . . It's nice to hear a tour manager say, "These guys know what they're doing."

The concert started right on time with the opening band. . .

The main act, Diamond Rio, took the stage and put on a great show. . .

They were very entertaining!

I found myself thinking, "Do they have ANY idea what we've been through??"

Dick and Jeanie came out to the concert and brought Steph and Gloria. . .

They were a bright spot . . .

This guy was funny. . . And talented. . .

All of the tour guys were very happy with our set-up. . .

I'm glad Tyler is 18 now and doesn't fall under any Child Labor Laws! He and Zach worked their tails off. . . He was also the only one who used the word "fun" to describe the weekend. . .