we had a great day... it was a super way

... to spend some time together. La la la la la laaaaa, are you singin' along yet? What, you don't know the Fresh Beat Band? Then you obviously don't live in my house. Because Jessica *loves* the Fresh Beat Band. When she watches the show (the photo above was from September, 2009), she lays out a scarf as her dance floor, puts on some boogie shoes and sometimes dresses up, and starts doing all the arm gestures, the poses, the spins, and sings along. When she gets tired, she'll sit down, pull out all her markers and start drawing them.

And by chance, on Saturday night as I was searching the internet to find out if who was going to be at the Los Angeles Festival of Books (which I was totally planning on not attending on Sunday but decided to look it up - just in case), I discovered The Fresh Beat Band was performing live at 10 in the morning. So my husband and I totally rearranged our plans (him much more so than me) and got the kids up at 6:45 am the next morning to make the hour drive.

Except for Mr. I'm-a-Completely-Selfish-A** who insisted on standing up to videotape the concert even though he already had an unobstructed view, and Ms. What-Can-I-Do-I-Can't-Ask-My-Child-to-Sit-Down who seemed so apologetic that her child was standing up on a seat directly in front of my baby but who was somehow unable to physically pick up her four year old and move her the eff over, or, gee, maybe have her sit down... aside from those two clueless individuals, we couldn't have asked for more. It was a surprise, but the instant Jessie saw the instruments on an empty stage, she screamed "The Fresh Beat Band?!" and freaked out.

They sang all her favorite songs, Bananas, Loco Legs, Stomp the House. Fabulous. And ended with Great Day, of course.

And then we waited a little over thirty minutes to see them in person, and get their autographs. They were so friendly, energetic and gracious, really made my girls feel special. And my little one was star struck. She couldn't speak at all, couldn't say a single word. Rebecca kept telling them Jessie was their biggest fan, but Jessie barely blinked, didn't move except for my prodding her onwards. They personalized little postcards of the band, and all four of them also signed these little backstage passes I printed off of the Nick Jr. website the night before, and laminated with packing tape.