Brad Paisley, Rodney Atkins and Chuck Wicks

For Christmas, I gave Toby tickets to see Brad Paisley. Rodney Atkins and Chuck Wicks were the opening bands and I knew that it would be awesome concert. We went with Tory and Elizabeth and it was such a blast! We had dinner at Texas Roadhouse and of course, we got to wear our cowboy boots! We don't wear them that often since we don't go country dancing anymore. :( We had great seats, we were in the second section on the floor in the second row. You could see their faces and it was great to be so close. I love going to concerts when I can be as close to the stage as possible. Of course, I forgot to charge my camera battery so I got no photos! That's so not like me---I'll blame the pregnancy.

Chuck Wicks--He's a new artist and his song on the radio is called "Stealing Cinderella." Very cute song and he did a great job. He's quite the looker too. I am sure he'll be a big hit someday. You could meet him after the show, but we were too tired. It was a 3 1/2 hour concert! Still, it's always fun to hear a new artist and I hope he does well.

Rodney Atkins--I was almost as excited to see him as I was to see Brad Paisley. I love his songs. The best songs were "Watching You," "These are my People," "Going Through Hell" and "Cleaning this Gun." Actually, all of them were great. I really loved hearing him tell stories about the songs. He wrote the song "Watching You" about his son and even had him in the video. Then, he had to write a song about his two daughters, so that's where "Cleaning this Gun" came in. He told us that going on dates with the girls can help make the boys behave. I think I would've died if my parents came on any dates with me when I was in school! Rodney doesn't wear cowboy hats, he just wears baseball caps and someone from the crowd gave him a Boise State hat and he wore it while he sang. That was pretty cool and the crowd went wild. It was nice of him to wear it.

Toby caught a clip of Rodney singing his Hell song. You can see him wearing the Boise State hat in it. He did a great job.

Brad Paisley-- He did such an awesome job! What a great entertainer and singer. I really enjoyed his music. He sang all the new songs and a bunch of his old ones too. One girl ran up on stage and kissed his cheek--she was quickly escorted off the stage and booted out of the concert. Oh well, guess she really wanted to be up close and personal!

One of my favorite songs of his is called, "When I get Where I'm Going," a duet with Dolly Parton. This song always makes me tear up. Well, during the song, he has pictures of famous or well known people who have died. President Regan, Elvis Presley, Military Personal, John Ritter, Dale Earnhardt, Johnny Cash and his wife June Cash, Steve Irwin and many more. At the end he showed a picture of Heath Ledger (1979-2008) who had just passed away on Tuesday. He also showed a photo of his grandfather, who he mentions in the song. It was quite touching.

I loved hearing his song "Letter to Me." What a great song to hear about being young. I always think of my brother who's 16. Very sweet song.

I love going to concerts. There's nothing like hearing music you love being sung live. It's like they are singing just to you. We had a fabulous night and as we were driving home, we tried to think of all the concerts we've gone to together. Here's the list (at least what we could come up with). You can tell we are BIG country music fans! The list trys to go in order. There's more, but I can't remember!

George Winston

Collin Raye

Anna Nalick

Kelly Clarkson

Lifehouse

The Bangles

Keith Urban

Chris Cagle

Gary Alan

Toby Keith, Scotty Emerick, Pat Green and Phil Vassar

Blaine Larsen and Gretchen Wilson

Reba McEntire

Jason Aldean and Rascal Flatts

Josh Turner

James Taylor(my favorite)

Chuck Wicks, Rodney Atkins, and Brad Paisley