Not a Lot Going on at the Moment

So here we are on the day Maddie has been waiting for since Christmas, or possibly before that even, although Christmas morning was when she first discovered that she was in fact going to a Taylor Swift concert.  We'll start with the latter portion of the day, as that was pretty epic.  You can see Maddie above, posing in front of the merchandise trailer - there was a really big line just to pose in front of the merchandise trailer, as it had the repeating pattern of the Eras Tour imagery posted on it.

Maddie was all dressed up and ready to go this afternoon.  It was already a long morning, but the enthusiasm for the evening's big event was fueling her on.  She was ready to go and ready to get there early.  Being the overly cautious people we are, we did leave pretty early, listening to Taylor Swift in the car on the way down, and arriving at the MARTA station to discover there were plenty of other people there also getting there early.

We were at the North Springs station, although above you can see us at Lindbergh, and the funny thing was the amount of pink, glitter, and white t-shirts that said there wasn't a lot going on at the moment.  That wasn't entirely true:  we traveled in pink herds, large migrations of Swifties amongst the urban grays of Atlanta.  The weather was perfect outside, a little windy and cool, but sunny compared to the pouring rain of yesterday. 

We had such favor on the way down, finding seats easily on MARTA, which is actually Maddie's first experience on MARTA.  This was also our first time at Mercedes Benz stadium.  We walked out to the lawn there in front of the stadium, arriving about an hour before the doors opened to the stadium.  Our first destination was the merchandise line, so we went there.

We got a t-shirt, and ordered a long-sleeved shirt as well, one Maddie was eyeing earlier.  One thing we noticed on the train was people trading friendship bracelets, which was pretty fun.  Once we picked up the t-shirt, we hopped in a line for about twenty minutes just to take a picture behind the merchandise truck...

After our picture there, we walked to the line to get into the stadium, because the doors were about to open.  We went to the line, and we thought we'd just hop on the back of the line and follow it in.  Only... the line was really, really, really, really, really, really long!  We walked from the stadium, and just kept going... this image below shows how long the line was, and this is no exaggeration!

But it was okay, because we had two hours to get in there, and that was just before the opening act starts, and really, the line moved along pretty quick.  Soon enough, we used our tickets to get into the building without any trouble, just moving with a huge crowd and all straight into the stadium.

We were pretty early, and that was okay.  We found our seats, and they were perfect.  When I got the tickets back in November, I wanted to make sure Maddie could see, so we went with something towards the front of a section and at the aisle.  Maddie had a great spot where she could see really well, although we were surprised by the size of this place.  It was huge!

We got some fries and drinks and had plenty of time to eat that before the opening act, and we even had time for a few pictures.  Look at all the seats there.  Yes, those are going to be filled tonight, and each one in the upper section - if you were to look online over the last month - was well over a thousand dollars per seat.  Many were more than that.  Anyway, we saw the few opening acts there, and they got swallowed up by the enormity of the stadium, but they were decent and filled the time well until suddenly we saw the countdown show up on the stage.  The noise was so loud here, the crowd was so excited!

Maddie had her cell phone with her taking pictures and videos throughout the night, and she had a great, great, unforgettable time.  She was singing along, screaming, taking pictures and just having a wonderful time.

Maddie took most of these pictures, although I inserted a few found ones online taken here in Atlanta.  This thing was massive.  The giant screens placed all around really helped with the distance, but wow.

This is a shot of our wristband, which glowed and blinked periodically with different colors, timed with songs or moments.  Thousands upon thousands of these went off to simulate a whirlpool or waves of leaves or seas of red - whatever.  Speaking of "Red"...

Some of Maddie's favorite songs are from "Red," and many audience members were dressed in that style tonight.  There were plenty of songs from that era represented.  One wonderful moment came from another album though, and how great to hear her call it an "album."  Anyway, she traditionally does a couple of "surprise" songs each night, which are ones not on the set list any previous night.  Tonight, Maddie was really hoping for one from a song list she had in her head, and to her delight, that's when we heard the song "How You Get the Girl."  It was a wonderful moment for her - I'd steal looks over at Maddie, and there she was, singing and gesturing and just having a great time.

It was a fantastic concert.  When we left, we managed to get ahead of the crowd to the MARTA station where we had no problems whatsoever getting home - we had such favor!  Last night it took our friends two hours to get through the MARTA system because of all the crowds.  But we were there racing ahead of the red tide, and that's when we ran into an old friend from church!

We haven't seen Lauren in ages, as she's moved over to Acworth, but there she was in the train, all dressed in red and leaving the same time as us.  She was bringing along some sisters, and here's a blessing:  they gave Maddie friendship bracelets to commemorate the concert.  She loves them, immediately putting them on her wrist.  

So in the end, it was a super long day.  We left at 2:15pm and got home around 1:00am or so, with Maddie still wired and talking away with Mom about the day's adventures.  Eventually after recounting as much as we could, it was time for sleep of course.  We said our prayers, grateful for a really memorable time, and then got to sleep right away.

I did lose the t-shirt on MARTA, and I have no idea where.  That stuck with me.  But we ordered a new one when I got home, along with another shirt that she wanted even more.  We're really proud of her, and this was her first big concert experience too.  I remember seeing all kinds of bands in the 90's - some of the great tours back then, big and small.  This was right up there with them.  Maddie's seat was perfect, where she didn't have to worry about anyone to her right, and she had plenty of room and could see just fine.  She was singing along all night, and it didn't matter if she missed a word, because you couldn't hear anyway - our ears are still ringing afterwards, and various songs still stuck in our heads no doubt for quite some time.

As for our morning, it was part two of our Weird Science theme, where Maddie and I were on stage with the other actors, working through the next part of our KidPak series.  There it is, the Van De Graaff generator!  Things went generally pretty good, but as you might suspect, we were anxious to get home and get ready for the big day ahead of us.  It was an unforgettable and very full day.  We fell asleep pretty quickly tonight, and might need to seriously rest up tomorrow!

Pretty Full Day!

We saw another play tonight, "The Little Mermaid," and this one was done by students over at what used to be the Georgia Mountain Center, although the theater is now part of the Brenau College system.  

I think the last time we were in this theater was in 2010 to see "The Gift."  So it's been a while!  But it was a good production, and we knew some of the students involved, including Prince Eric there and next to him Scuttle!

Before that, it was a little over an hour of photography.  Not of Maddie though - she's acting as a test here for some photos I was taking tonight of some prom students.  I know a KidPak dad with an older daughter, and I had a camera, so I took a lot of pictures - and so did Maddie.  We were both photographers snapping solo and group shots of the students getting ready for the prom.  In just a year or two, I'll probably do the same thing for Maddie and her friends.  In the meantime, here's a few other shots of Maddie as she acts as a test subject for some shots at the church.

It was a full, full day.  We did release two squirrels during the course of the day - if you're keeping score, that's squirrel number 12 and number 13.  Still have a few to go.  We started out with practice and training at Team Edge, and then we were off to visit with Nana in Dawsonville.  We stayed with her for about an hour and a half or so, as there was plenty of work to do there getting things cleaned up and so on.  We were sharing pictures and giving a call to England too.  It was a pleasant visit, but man what a day.  We went from one thing to the next!

We closed it out with reading a short bit, and then prayer.  It started raining again, and that's okay, another rainy night in Georgia.  Tomorrow's going to be a much fuller day...