Summer Worship Nights

Our favorite concert came within driving distance again this year so we had to make the trip happen. This year we put the youth pastor up to making it a youth group event with the caveat being that Jeremy and I be the chaperones and drivers. He made it happen and we took 9 teenagers and Isaiah with us. 

Summer Worship Nights is the combined effort of Phil Wickham and Brandon Lake. We were at the Capital One area in Washington DC. There were 12,000 in attendance and we were at the top of the arena. Sometimes I think how fun it would be to have the children experience a concert with much closer seats, but I'm afraid they would be forever ruined and never be willing to sit at the top of the arena!

We all ate packed lunch at the church and then drove to DC. I was a little afraid we would get stuck in beach traffic (beach goers returning to the western shore), but there was no traffic backups. We arrived in DC in plenty of time to make a stop at the merch truck that was parked a few miles from the arena, eat supper and get to the arena in plenty of time. 

 

Let's talk about the merch truck stop though. The merch truck was called "Poppy" (I have no idea why) and was parked on a seemingly random street corner. I did not see the church that that was referenced with the address. I thought that it was pretty clear that, since Jeremy and I were there along with our kids, we were going to have to buy. The only thing was there were no prices on the merch. So I said Yes and knew that it was going to be big, but it was also memorable. The cashiers didn't even say the total, just took my card, but I saw the total on the ipad and it was bigger than I thought big was going to be. lol. 

In the parking garage, we parked 3 levels below ground and it felt like we were sitting 5 stories above group. That made my brain spin for the minute.

This may be the one nanosecond that Aliza and Anna were not moving! They had so much fun. We were at the opposite end of the group from them and we could still hear them at times.

Isaiah knew a lot of the songs too. It was fun to watch him participate and sing. He asked me every 20-30 minutes what time it was, but he stayed engaged almost to the end. Isaiah also really enjoyed getting to ride with the boys in Taylor's car. I drove the girls in our van.

When we walked in to the arena, there were buckets of wristbands with a QR code on them. At first I thought it was a marketing gimmick, but when the concert started the wristbands lit up in coordination with the stage lights. Sometimes all the wristbanks would light up at the same time and other times they were randomized so that it looked like twinkling lights. The blue lights in the picture below are wristbands. Being at the top of the area, we could see the full effect of those lights. It was really fun.

I knew I had to drive home and so maybe I saved a little energy for that. We got home at 1:45am. I'd do it again!!