71 Toes: Taylor Swift

When we were in China we had our kids largely to ourselves. They had a few lessons, sure. Max was on the basketball team, Grace and Claire took gym, Elle took taxis to tennis lessons and Lu had a Chinese tutor.

But we were together a LOT.

One Friday night when we were out all together cruising the city we went out to our favorite restaurant. The kids wrote all their latest Chinese characters on the backs of their menus and we talked through the week (this sounds like a movie, not real life, when do you get three teenagers to hang with their parents and talk about life on a Friday night? Not ours I'll tell you that). Anyway, as we were leaving we ran into a guy selling all kinds of DVDs on the street corner (just like every other street corner in Shanghai). He had the brand new Taylor Swift CD hot off the press and Dave plunked over a dollar for it.

We popped it into the CD player in the car and there it began:

Our love affair with Taylor Swift.

Everywhere we went in China, Taylor came with us. Through little mountain towns, to and from early morning seminary, to the grocery store, she was there.

She sung us through our China experience.

There was this one time when we parked the car, T. Swift full blast, and everyone in our family got out and had a dance party in the underground parking lot (except for me, because I have a little dancing problem in that I can't do it). But as I watched that family of mine dance their little hearts out with huge smiles across their faces my heart swelled up with love for them.

And for Taylor of course.

So when we found out she was coming to town back here in the desert for her 1989 tour we were determined to get there.

Elle got the tickets for her birthday, but they were really for all our birthdays :) When she opened the gift, everyone's eyes popped out.

This is how Claire felt as we got ready to go:

(Complete with the Taylor Swift red lipstick that you apparently must wear.)

We had to pick up Grace at Cheer on the way, but this is how the rest of us looked as we got ready to head out the door.

Max, maybe not quite so sure...ha!

Here's a little of Grace's excitement:

We are not much of concert goers, so this was pretty exciting for all of us.

It was a packed crowd.

Everyone had bracelets on their chairs that we were supposed to wear and they lit up different colors at different times.

...and the stage was so cool. It lifted up and turned around.

Lucy has most of the Taylor Swift songs memorized so she was pretty darn excited, but we were a little bit worried it would be too loud so Dave packed her some headphones.

They worked perfectly.

We were also worried she wouldn't be able to see very well but she sure seemed just fine:

Ha!

We all came home with stars in our eyes.

That was an experience for the books.