Suburbia Music Festival

We drove to Ennis to take pictures in the bluebonnets on Easter Sunday.
About a week later, my husband saw a commercial for bluebonnet trails in our city and told me I should check out the website. While doing that, I happened upon a photo contest, and when I saw the theme, I knew I had the perfect photo to enter. I posted it shortly after midnight and before noon the next day, I received notice that it won the weekly contest and was eligible to win the monthly contest. WOW!

A couple of days later, it won the monthly contest as well...
...and I won 2 tickets to the 2 day Suburbia Music Festival!!

2 tickets...and 4 in my house who wanted to go...hmmmm, what to do?!
Being as my son was the subject of the photo and I took it, the two of us went!!

We'd done our research on which bands we wanted to see and were excited to go! Parked and ready to board the shuttle, we got sent back due to my Canon camera having a removable lens. Bummer! I had looked for my point and shoot, but couldn't find it. At least they were checking at that point, so we didn't ride all the way to the park and have to ride all the way back. After the shuttle ride and a long walk to will call, we found out my name wasn't on the list. Darn! It was a nice, sunny day in May, with clear skies and no clouds. It was also hot...and pretty boring to stand there and wait. We did see an entertaining and not so nice exchange between a 'misplaced vip' out of his element and a security guard. About 45 minutes later, my son opened one of the two 'factory sealed' water bottles we'd brought (they were supposed to be factory sealed to get in) and we had a much needed drink! I was getting really nervous that we weren't going to get in. I'd been trying to save my phone battery since it was the only camera I had...but I finally decided to post a plea for help on the winning photo and kept a check on it. Nothing. I popped back into the will call window again to see if they'd heard anything...letting them know it had been an HOUR! This time I gave them the name they needed to hear (after seeing it on the winner photo) and a phone call was made. I was so relieved when it was answered. Not only did we get our tickets...but we were also upgraded to V.I.P. for the weekend!! Even the will call guy was excited and said, "SCORE!"

I was VERY thankful.

By the time we got in, we'd completely missed The Rocketboys. We explored, trying to figure out the layout...and did I mention it was hot? and we were hungry! so we shared a smoothie!! Then, it was time for Echosmith. There was a pretty large crowd, so we took advantage of the V.I.P. section.  :)

Afterwards, we stood in line...

 (^ screenprint taken from video on Echosmith's Instagram ^)

  ...so Brenton could meet them. He got their autographs too!!

We found a nice shady spot to sit and listen to Surfer Blood - too far away for a picture.
Then, it was on to the main stage to get a good spot in V.I.P. to see the next 3 bands. We bought two 20oz. Cokes and a nice lady gave us two large cups of ice to go with them. And, let me tell ya, they hit.the.spot...and.should.have for $5 a piece!! It was worth every penny after drinking water all day.

We'd found the free tap refill, but it didn't really taste very good...
...didn't look so good either...lol.

Delta Rae put on an excellent performance!

We stayed in our spot for Need to Breathe...

...and moved back a bit to sit & watch Third Eye Blind.

After that amazing lineup, it was time for FOOD! We shared 'chicken on a stick' and 'twisted fries'. Big Gigantic was interesting. It was neat to see the movement of the crowd as they danced in the dark amidst the smoke and lights... Music fest became smoke fest - as many decided to get high as the sky. We left that show early and headed back to the main stage for Alabama Shakes. Phone died...no pics. We left that show early as well to make the long walk to the shuttle line. Once on the shuttle, we had a traffic free ride back to where we parked and a traffic free drive home. We were totally amazed to get home within an hour of leaving the stage. Plano has it together when it comes to traffic flow!

Sunday morning, we headed out in plenty of time so I could figure out how to park V.I.P. and save the $20 parking fee! Piece of cake...we showed our wristbands and got right into the parking lot where we needed to be. I parked strategically so we could get right out without having to pass the shuttles. After watching Veridia set up and warm up, we found out their show had been moved back an hour and a half - so we took our chairs and found a spot in the shade to sit and share a smoothie!! We took notice of much more security than the day before...they were definitely making their presence known. Then, Brandon, the guitarist for Veridia stopped to introduce himself to us and chat for a few minutes. How cool is that?!

Veridia was amazing! http://www.veridiamusic.com
Later in the day, we ended up meeting the whole band and they were kind enough to find a Sharpie to autograph their cd for us. I have no idea where my brain was...i never even thought to ask if we could take a picture?!

  Reignwolf was next on our list and he put on quite a show!

 

   {^Definitely one she'll never forget!^}

We got 'chicken on a stick' and 'twisted fries' to share and literally sat our chairs IN the middle of a little tree grove to catch some shade and listen to the sounds of NONONO while we rested and ate.

Spoiled to shade, we put our chairs next to a drink tent for The Wild Feathers.

 

They were really good and I walked up close for a couple of songs and some pics.

 We headed back to the main stage...

...and caught the end of Twenty One Pilots.

We did stop to refill our water bottles, but bought two refreshing & expensive 20oz. Cokes!!
Again, they hit the spot while we waited in the sun to have a good view of Blue October!

 ...the band Brenton really wanted to hear!

Next up was J. Cole...

(security...looking for tokers)
 
...and company.

 Complete with symbolism...

...turning off plenty...

 ...but not too many.
I was not the least bit impressed.


Last, but certainly not least...

Patiently waiting on:

 David Guetta!

 He had a lot of fun!

 And, so did we!!

After we left, I asked Brenton if I'd just attended my first rave. He said something to the effect of 'anyone who doesn't call it that wouldn't know what they were talking about'. I guess I did. Ha! Never would've guessed I'd do that.

...and that's a wrap...kind of. On the way out, a drunk but nice guy tried to get us to play volleyball. We politely declined. We saw a guy dressed up like Jesus as we were walking out the gate. And then, as we got into the van, a young man approached and proceeded to ask if I would be willing to give his friend a ride. After asking lots of questions, getting some peace about it, and making sure Brenton was okay with it, I decided to give her a ride. It was kind of weird, and we had an interesting ride to say the least. She was profusely encouraging with her words, telling me I was glorious and a gem, and how it was so motherly of me to help her. After finding out how we won tickets to the festival, she said she felt like she had met somebody really famous...lol. Getting to where we needed to go wasn't quite so easy this time - as we were driving and they had everything blocked off for shuttles. We got her fairly close to her destination and headed home with ringing ears & lots of fun memories!!

If you made it to the end, I should tell you that you can click on the pics to see them better!!