Over the last year Alicia and I have become fans of Chris Botti and were excited to find out that he was coming to play in the Deer Valley Music Festival this summer. As soon as tickets were available we picked up a pair and looked forward to the concert.

The concert was last night and he didn’t disappoint. I played the trumpet in Jr High and High School and wondered if the higher altitude of Deer Valley would affect his range at all. He calmed my fears pretty quickly in the opening song where he played a very high note very loud and for a very long time, at least 30 seconds. It was awesome!

He played very familiar songs that he’s had on his albums, and had a few special guests in a great singer and an amazing Violinist. It was definitely not a disappointing evening.

Near the end the drummer did what all drummers do and threw one of his sticks out to the crowd. They then brought that guy that caught it up on stage and told him he’d have a cymbal solo in the next song, which was Nessun Dorma (one of my favorites). It was pretty entertaining when, at about 3 minutes, the guy just went monkey crazy on the cymbal, hitting it as fast and as loud as he could. He’s in the blue in the photo above.

We love going to these concerts! Last year we saw the Tabernacle Choir and the Utah Symphony, and are anxiously waiting to see who will come next year. It’s a fantastic event in a beautiful place.

It’s been quite a while since I did any kind of consistent updating on here, so I figure it’s time to talk about what we’re up to.

Alicia is happily working at Roberts Crafts in American Fork. She gets about 30 hours a week and they can’t get enough of her. They love her. Already had a few promotions, they treat her well and give her time off anytime she’d like. It’s a great job.

Joel is doing great working for himself. He’s got a few clients that are consistent and then a few one-off projects to keep him busy. Finally got his car back after 3.5 months without it, only cost $2500 to fix the transmission, put in a new front axle and a new radiator. Now, the biggest problem is the cracked windshield and Check Engine light that need to be fixed so he can register it – been expired since February. Once that’s taken care of it’ll be a few hundred more to get the AC fixed. It’s been problematic for a few years and at some point during the 3.5 month downtime it just decided to stop entirely. And all this needs to be done and paid for by July 31st so he can go on a motorcycle trip with his friends.

Not really sure why I wrote that in 3rd person. Oh well.

Life is good here in Lehi, we love it. We’ve planted a little garden in what little dirt we have and are looking forward to some tomatoes, peppers and zucchini later this summer. I’ll get some pictures up of that soon!