Ignite Chicago!!

Soooo, in case the title of this post didn't already give it away,

Crik, Dad, Rach and I got to go to Ignite Chicago on Saturday!!

For those poor uninformed ones of you, Ignite Chicago

is a big Christian Concert/Event. It's held at Alexian

Field (minor league baseball stadium) in Schaumburg, and

they have 10 different bands that play on Saturday and Sunday.

We only got to go on Saturday, but it was SO much fun!

The bands we got to see perform were: Lightswitch, After Edmund,

Remedy Drive (who Crystal and I had gotten to see at a different

concert the night before) :D, Rush of Fools, Leeland, Sanctus Real,

Matthew West, Barlowgirl, Jeremy Camp, and Third Day!

It. Was. Amazing!

Of course on the drive up there Rach and I were getting a little

bored in the backseat... I started getting carsick so I had to

stop reading my book, so I started snapping mindless pics...

Just be glad I'm not posting all of them :)

Dad drove and Criky was co-pilot... See, Stevey (the gps) and

Mapquest had a bit of a disagreement so we just used a mix

of information from both of them...

No, we were not excited.

Haha, Rachel's little addition to our entertainment :)

Rachel's bracelets...

Oh! A rain poncho! ...yay??

Hi there!

Why are you taking my picture???

Wahoo! We made it! Even with Stevey and Mapquests

little disagreement :P

Our "fancy" wristbands...

With these super important pieces of paper we were able to

get in and out of the stadium without being beaten up by the

security guys :D

So, after waiting in line for a while to get our super important

"fancy" wristbands we got to wait on the stairway leading into the

stadium for a while. So we took more mindless pictures...

Because it was calling for so much rain and was so cloudy in the

morning not a ton of people had shown up by the time we arrived.

So that means we got some pretty great seats! :D

Dad occupied himself by singing Tenth Avenue North songs

(no matter how we tried to convince him, he just couldn't believe

that with all the other bands T.A.N. was not going to be there),

and reading all the little pamphlets we got :P

The concert finally started!!

Unfortunately, because of all the rain we weren't allowed

out on the field because everything was so saturated. So even

though we had great seats we were still pretty far away from

the stage... The bands all played great though!

I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it! :D

Lightswitch was the first band that played.

I'd never heard of them before, and was surprised because

they are really good!

So yeah... All these pictures look the same, but for real,

its pictures of different bands! You just can't tell because

the pictures are so small on here!

This was After Edmund.

They put on a really fun show!

:D And Dad used the title of one of their songs for a sermon

illustration on Sunday! Lol, the song was called

"Dance Like You're From The Future"...

Yes, Dad comes up with some 'unique' messages :D

(I mean that in a good way!!!)

And Remedy Drive!!!

It was really fun seeing these guys perform two days in a row!

:( But I didn't get any "headstand on the piano" pictures...

Rush of Fools!! I've been wanting to see them in concert

for quite a while, so it was really cool that we got to see them there!

Aaaannnd they even played my favorite song of theirs! :D

Me and Mitch, the singer from After Edmund!

He decided that pictures needed to be more fun

and was trying to come up with different poses do do with

whatever person came by :D

Hahaha, this is what he came up with for me...

Sanctus Real!

Ahh I like this band...

It was cloudy for most of the day, but the sun still

managed to keep everything bright and very warm...

Very warm.

Leeland.

Crystal and I were out waiting in signing lines while

they played... But we "watched them from afar" and could

hear them quite well :)

As the day went on, more and more people braved the

worrisome weather report and filled up the stands!
Hmm, why do they call them "stands" if they are really seats??

Oh look! Traffic cones! :D

In Sanctus Real's signing line...

The other Sanctus Real's signing my shirt.

I guess you'd probably call them Sanctus Real "members"

but just saying The "other" Sanctus Real's sounds so much funnier!

Eric from the KLOVE Morning Show was there,

so I went to say hello and ended up getting my picture

taken too :o)

Judson University was the main sponsor for the

event, so during some of the intermissions they came

out and talked and did advertising for their school ;)

Even though it was partly cloudy most of the day we still ended

up catching quite a few UV rays... Rach got some pretty
"ouchy" sunburn on her legs... Ouch!

Emily and Matt were there with a few of their friends,

they were sitting on the other side of the stadium but came

to visit during one of the soundchecks!

Me and Crystal goofing off during one of the soundchecks...

It's just what we do... :P

Matthew West!

I'd never seen him in concert before either, so that was

pretty fun! He even made up one of his "original"

'it doesn't rhyme but talks about whatever event he's at'
verses to one of his songs :)

In the signing line for Leeland!

It was neat getting to meet all the artists and their bands!

And my shirt looks pretty great with all those autographs too...

Matthew West!

Lightswitch didn't had too many people coming by their table

that they ran out of room, so when they were signing autographs

they were using peoples backs...
It reminded me of that game where you tape paper to somebody's

back and then they have to guess what you just wrote from

what they felt.

Barlowgirl!

They are probably my favorite all-girl band so I was

really glad that they were there!

And they announced that it had dried enough so that we could

finally go out on the field!!

There was just a ton of people who RAN to get there!

The 4 of us must be pretty fast runners because we got there

really quick and got great spots by the stage!

We were only 3 rows of people back from the barriers

they had set up around the stage!

Since we were so close to the stage I got some pretty good

pictures! Heh, I got a lot of bad/blurry ones too.

I think the main thing is I got a LOT of pictures...

It was hard just picking out a few to put on here!

Its normally really hard to get a good picture of the drummer

in a band becuase they are ordinarally positioned right behind

the singer, but Barlowgirl had the stage set up differently

(I guess there are perks to being a 3 person band), and I got

a couple of cool, very clear pictures!

I wonder if they practiced turning around at the same time

or if it just happened like that?? I'm guessing they probably

practiced beforehand...

:D I love this picture!

Ah Ha! Multitasker! Keyboard and Guitar!

Hmm... I think I might be a little envious of her awesome

red guitar...

We were so close to O'hare airport that there

were planes flying over ALL day. Thankfully they were

high enough up there that you couldn't really even hear them.

This guy was from Judson University.

I think he said he was the leader of the Worship Arts program.

He sang a couple of songs while Jeremy Camp's stuff got set up.

Gotta love Dad's face in this one...

Emily and Matt were just a couple rows of people behind us.

We got to have a couple of "stand on tiptoe and yell back and

forth conversations". It was fun getting to have other people

that we knew standing nearby!

Jeremy Camp singing "Give Me Jesus".

Love that song...

It sounded so pretty as a piano song too!

:) Crowd involvement...

I'm proud to say I was hoarse on our way home!

Once it started to get dark the lights made everything look

even cooler! Especially when they would have lots of colors!

Short message.

It was a good one too!

I thought it was neat how easily they switched

from rock show to worship. And it was really great

to hear all those voices of all the people singing out

praises to our Creator and honoring Him!

It made me wonder what our Enemy was thinking, and

so I smiled smugly down at the little bit of ground I could

see around all the feet and said hahaha :D

I liked the lights in this one!

:P More crowd involvement...

The pretty pink sky!

Somebody brought bubbles! :D

Another Multitasker! :)

:D And another good 'drummer picture'.

We really were lucky to have such good places to stand...

And it was really dark by the time these guys got

to play so their lights looked awesome!

We were also lucky that the camera battery lasted throughout

the whole day! 10 hours and 400ish pictures later it started

getting tired though... But it finished out the rest of the night!

Ha. Ha. Ha. I really like this picture!

I love the whole red smoke thing!

As the night wore on and the crowd shifted somewhat

I was able to move up to the stage barriers!

So let's rephrase that... GREAT place to stand!!!! :D

Yes, I know... I went a little in to overkill on the pictures, but

when else might I have the chance to be so close to stage at

a concert?? So you'll all just have to "suffer" by looking

at all of them.

Third Day!

We even got to hear a couple songs off of the new

album they are working on! :D

Singing "Gone For Now"...

Quite a good song to finish off the evening :)

All done... Headed to the cars...

Sort of sad that the day had to be over, but It was

a wonderful one!! :D

And I got to drive the second part of the way home.

Great way to end a day! (or actually, in this case it was "start"

a day... Because it was Sunday already) :)

Late night ramblings of this aching heart...

So yeah, this is just some musings... Probably none of this will
make too much sense. This blog post is more for me than
anything else. For some odd reason writing a little of the stuff
that's going on in my head just seems to make me feel a little
better.
Tonight I've got far too much rumbling around inside this head
of mine... Its all charging around bouncing into other stuff and just
about to drive me nuts! Of course I'm more than tired, but I'm sure
you all know that rumbling brains aren't very conducive to sleep :/
I'm laying here in this dark room, listening to Lifehouse and trying
to sort through a little of the mess running through my mind.

I can't believe it's been 8 days already... I'm not sure I want to either.
I know it will pass, but I keep expecting to get a phone call from
Grandpa and he'll be telling me some odd random piece of information.
It's amazing that life just keeps plugging away. I know its a good thing
that it does, but every once and a while I get that sort of wish that it
would just stay still for a while.
Grief is such an odd process. It's crazy hard to try and figure out how
to work through this kind of stuff. It's hard to be alone, but it's hard
to be around people. It feels as though everything I do has to be
processed through a thick fog. Stuff doesn't feel like it's penetrating
to my brain yet. Which is probably okay because my brain feels like
that cornstarch-water gloopy slime stuff...
We "prepared" ourselves for this. We all knew it was coming. We
knew the day would come when Grandpa would no longer be chained
down to this mortal life and that he would slip into his transformed
immortal body. We knew it. We watched the "signs" of the time
coming closer until it was upon us. Now that time is up, and I'm still in
a sort of almost disbelief.

I enjoy this silent part of day. Night is peaceful. In the quiet things
rest. Spilling all this stuff onto here my head is even getting a break.
Order is coming and eyelids are getting heavy.
Silence is really a wonderful thing. In fact silence is probably the best
gift I've gotten lately. Whether it's me getting to be silent with myself,
or other people sitting close, being silent themselves and also just
letting me be silent. Not staring at me or having to fill time up with
talk, but just being there. Being a hand to squeeze or shoulder to lay
my head on... Or if you're Rachel, someone to give me a punch on
the shoulder ;)

I'm really glad that God lets me be silent. When I can't thing of a way
to express what's in my heart or mind I can feel his presence just
there. And he waits. So patiently. I'm glad he can hear the silent pleas
as my heart cries. He doesn't ask anything of me. And through
everything just gives and gives. Peace, comfort, strength. I know it
time he will restore full joy too. It's so neat how he reveals himself too.
I love how when I'm not even looking (or even wanting to see) he
shows me I'm special to him and that he's stickin' close to me.
I'm glad the sun keeps rising in the morning. Last Sunday morning I
didn't really want it to shine. It almost felt as if the weather was
mocking the pain we were feeling and I just wanted it to leave me
alone. But the sun is still rising. I'm glad for it now. It shoves off the
dark, and illuminates all the wonderful things that day brings. It
glimmers with the joy I know is coming.

Life's happening again. Last week was packed with cleaning and
getting stuff ready for a funeral and being with family and... well
everything. This week that is all over. Crystal's going back to work,
all the regular weekly activities are going to start again. It's weird
though because the main thing that we spent all our time doing is no
longer here needing us. What do we do with all the time that had been
spent in with Grandpa or anything that went along with that?
We've got some long days ahead.

But I'm giving my burden over to God though. I KNOW that he has very
capable hands and that he's here guiding us through this. I'm keeping
my mind fixed on the promises he's given about "joy coming", or
"his mercies being new every morning", or "his strong right hand
supporting" and all that kind of stuff.

Whew! That felt good. Sorry that this was a dumb post. And I've bared
heart and rambled unintellegibly for long enough. My mind's now
settled to somewhat of a dull roar so I think that means it's going to let
me get some rest now...

Thanks to you all for being good friends and "listening". And for being
there for us in person or in thought this last week. You're helping make
this easier.

Well, here's to a decent night's sleep. G'night all...