Nov 3, 2010

Bridge School Benefit Concert

Ashlee and I just recently made a trip to attend The Bridge School Benefit Concert. The concert is a 2 day event put on by Neil Young that has been held for the past 24 years in Mountain View, California. It's unique from other music festivals in that all bands play strictly acoustic sets, and with it being a benefit concert they let all the kids who attend The Bridge School up on the stage for the best seats in the house. All the kids in the school have severe speech and physical impairments, but in-spite of being limited in their movements you could often see them in the back with big smiles dancing in their own way.
The weather for the weekend was very wet. They announced in 24 years this was only the second time it had rained. You can imagine how thrilled we were to have had that luck. Specifically Ashlee... who does so well in the rain. During the first day of the concert we more or less froze after the sun went down. It started raining so hard at one point the group of us were huddled up on our soaking wet blanket taking shelter beneath a child sized umbrella.

The second day of the concert we came much better equipped. We stopped at Home Depot and stocked up on some ponchos and a couple tarps. We were glad we did because when we made it to our spot on the grass it was raining even harder then it was the day before. We used our tarps to create what ended up being some sort of makeshift bed since we all just hopped in between the tarps and hid inside them. We looked like the grandparents from Willy Wonka and The Chocolate factory with all of us sharing what looked like a big bed. I'm sure we looked ridiculous to everyone around us but we did stay warm. Our friend ended up buying an industrial strength rain suit. So while the rest of us were hiding under the tarp, this is how he took his nap....
(It may sound strange that we all took naps but during an all day festival full of excitement you do what you gotta do.)



The actual bands and music were fantastic. The lineup was incredible with the most notable act being Pearl Jam (most notable according to me). Some other notable bands were Neil Young, Elvis Costello, Elton John, Jackson Browne, Modest Mouse, Billy Idol, and Buffalo Springfield who played their first show in over 40 years.

Here is Ashlee's favorite song of the night:




And here is a video we found on YouTube of some highlights of the concert:


Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to this handsome guy.
I am so lucky to have such a wonderful husband. He is my favorite person in the world and I am so happy he is mine forever.
I love you Nick!