Tuesday: The Unclouded Day

I know by now I don't need to tell you, but...

So that was delicious. When I mentioned on the blog yesterday that we did hairdressing down in the breakfast area, I wasn't aware that was an actual ongoing thing. And yet, this morning...

Morgan and I aren't the only ones that eat breakfast, though! Sir Trots a Lot also gets hungry from time to time.

As I was looking for senior pictures for Mariann, I realized I have a picture of her with her mom nearly every year. Here's one for this year!

Our concert today was at Stonebridge of Gurnee. It's a home for lower income people with physical disabilities from ages 22 to 65 (though if they age past 65, they are still able to stay in the home). They put up a lovely sign to welcome us!

We sang outside on what was indeed an unclouded day. And it was cool, too! Very pleasant to be outside, even if it's not the best for singing.

I was proud of the choir during this concert. We contended with a number of challenges and distractions. It started with a test of the City of Gurnee emergency notification system. So we started a little late. Then the yard crew was working in our area for most of the concert. But that led to a couple of fun and interesting moments:

1. The lawn mower was producing a fairly constant B, which was in the key of one of the pieces and made an interesting pedal tone for the whole song. Music theory dorks will understand.

2. During one of our more sensitive selections, we did battle with a weed eater. About half way through, the music swells, and in all honesty the choir's sound grew enough that it drowned out the weed eater. Triumph of art over the din of daily living! 

One of our selections is Unclouded Day...and it was absolutely and unclouded day! The choir rose to the challenge and offered a great concert outside, with yard implements and airplane traffic competing. And for each song, Sir Trots-a-Lot found his way to a different shoulder to sing. It was a bit like finding Waldo.

Most of the time our visiting looks something like Meryl and Vivian here. Cheerfully chatting with our audience. Sometimes it can look more like Ben below, playing basketball with someone from the audience. He said he was a street ball basketball coach, and he was showing our guys some of his moves. Watching them play one-on-one with him was deeply moving to me. He doesn't have a lot of opportunity for that, and they were so good with him.

Is this blog dragging on? Do you wish you had something to break of the monotony of me droning on about our youth choir and how we are singing and visiting? Then allow me to give you a picture of an insanely cute baby.

After the "soda" debacle at Giordano's (where they served a ridiculous excuse for a soft drink, Pepsi, because we're in the North), it was good to be at a place that knows what a real soft drink is. Taste the feeling, indeed.

I don't have a lot of pictures of different folks. Once we turned loose in the park, I only saw people every now and then. I was riding roller coasters with some of the chaperones.

I was really proud of this picture. I don't know if it will work on the blog, but on the original picture you can zoom in on the third row from the back, far side of this image, and see Rachel and Taylor inverted together. Honestly that's a pretty good analogy for marriage sometimes? :)

Oh my gosh so cute! (And Nancy and the baby are cute too, I guess).

Camille had AI summarize our chaperone group chat today, and after it covered the logistics and what not, it said this: "The vibe here is organized chaos with genuine care--a group that moves fast, communicates clearly, and keeps things humorous even when juggling logistics." I'm actually a little mad that AI wrote that, because I don't want to admit how accurate it is. Literally could not do this without these fine folks.

We were waiting on some late arrivals at departure time, and we had set ourselves up to take a picture. So while we waited, Elle led the choir in a few tunes.

Once everyone was there, we took our picture. Such a great group! Love these guys.

I didn't realize how close we were to Wisconsin, but it was like 8 miles away! So after a bite to eat, we headed up there to check another state off the list. Greetings from Pleasant Grove, Wisconsin!

Back to the hotel for devotional time and then bed time. Not a terribly early morning tomorrow...we'll be going to sing at First UMC of Chicago for their noon service and then another action packed day on the Music Mission!