What a night!

Conditions at 10:00 am - pouring rain and 21* (although the weather network states we're having light rain showers at the moment!)

Expected later: 22* and more of the same

Well, Meghan has just survived her first music concert, and was she a happy camper!
I was very proud of her and how well she handled the many long waiting times.

Yesterday we just kind of hung around the house until about 3:00. I cut the lawn in the morning while she did arts and crafts (Meghan's favorite thing to do), then we just sort of did not much, while waiting for time to go. We didn't want to leave too early as it would have made for a long wait in Cavendish as well as a very long day for the dog.

It looked like it was threatening to rain and sure enough, on our way to Charlottetown, the skies opened up and it POURED. Not to worry, we were on our way to the dollar store anyway to pick up some disposable rain ponchos. Unfortunately everyone else had the same idea, and they were sold out. They were also able to help us out by letting us know that all the other dollars stores in town were also out. So, we picked up some emergency blankets (essentially just a big piece of crinkly foil but large enough to cover you if needed, and they do a wonderful job of keeping in the heat if it's cold) and some large garbage bags. We were prepared for anything.

When we got to the Cavendish area, it was bumper to bumper traffic crawling up Route 13. Not being really familiar with the area, when we got to Route 6, there were no signs directing you to any parking lots so we followed the entire line and turned left. This eventually brought us to the concert sight, and we realized we should have turned right on Route 6. So we turned around and headed back. All in all, by the time we got to the parking lot and took the shuttle bus to the drop off point, and walked to the concert site, it was about 7:15, so not too long of a wait. We only took one chair with us, and in the end, that turned out to be a great decision. We found a spot to park the chair then took a walk down to the front area, where everyone was standing. There was a young woman singing but Meghan was too short to see anything, not even the screens and she's way too heavy to lift up for any length of time. She was the one who stated she wanted to go back and sit in the chair.

Of course our first stop was to buy a cowboy hat. Unfortunately they were all out of Taylor Swift T-shirts, so we had to make do with a face painting in honour of her favorite artist. (Too bad neither of us thought of the face painting later in the evening when she was applying bug spray. She wanted to do it herself so after she sprayed her hands, and rubbed it all over her face, she ended up with paint smeared ALL over her face and hands!)

After a gourmet dinner of - are you ready for it ??? --- Poutine (which I've never had before, but Meghan assured me was great) we settled in for the evening. The wait by that time wasn't long and as it got dark the excitement was mounting.

Of course once the show started everyone stood up for the entire thing, so sitting on a chair didn't work for a short person, as she couldn't see the screens. We were pretty far back but the screens provided a good view of the show.

I know she's been truly indoctrinated when Taylor suggested everyone take out their glow sticks or cell phones to wave during one song. So there's Meghan, standing on the chair (with me behind it to hold it) and swaying to the music and waving my cell phone. Only trouble with cell phones is they don't stay on, so she had to stop every so often and push the button to turn it back on. But there was sufficient woooo-hooooing going on, so I know this one will be fine - I think she's got it!

When the show was over, we slowly filed out of the area. The entrance gate was fairly small and everyone had to leave the same way, creating quite a bottle neck. But eventually we got out and walked back down to the shuttle pick up area. The show finished at 10:45 and I jokingly said to Meghan that it would be 1:00 before we got out of the pick up area when I saw the number of people waiting for buses. Turns out I was right - it was 12:55 when we got onto the bus. By the time we got to the parking lot, walked to the back of the parking lot, waited to get out of the lot onto the road, and drove home, it was 2:45 when we pulled into the driveway. It was indeed a long night but I think she'll remember it for a long time.


One thing I can't believe is we had rain on our way to town, but then it stopped and I don't think they'd had any out in Cavendish as everything was still nice and dry. Just as Taylor was coming on stage we had huge black clouds come rolling in, and gusts of wind and we all scrambled for whatever we had to keep out the rain, which never materialized! We had a beautiful night and by the time we got to the car, as we were waiting to get out of the parking lot, it started to rain, and it continued half way home. It could not have been timed any better.

This morning I woke up about 8:45 and it's now almost 10:00 and Meghan is still sleeping. She might as well, it's pouring rain, the kind of rain that's just settled right in and looks like it just might last all day. Sure glad we're not going to Cavendish tonight!