Well, at practice tonight we learned of several performances that are upcoming. I will be posting those on the "Isle of Dreams" page as soon as I sort them all out.
We also discussed the various things we are/will be doing that will lead us up to the performance in Rolla on April 15th. Tracy has stated that she feels led to go down to Rolla to pray over the theatre and hearts of the people once a week until the performance. We gladly send her with our prayers and love. A group of us will be going down to a pastor's luncheon on Tuesday, March 8 to sing a few songs. The idea is that we will allow the power of God to move through the music, lyrics and our hearts and touch these ministers of God, prompting them to promote the performance to their congregations. It should be a great 20 minutes or so, and a great preliminary sneak peek. We will also be going down several times to sing at different Sunday morning services at various churches.

This will be the most prepared location that we will have performed in since I joined the group over three years ago. Usually, we only have the opportunity to sing at the morning service of the church we will be singing at later that afternoon/evening. It works out okay, but this allows us the chance to sing for several congregations and connect with hundreds of people prior to the performance. It also gives us the chance to pray over the performace venue multiple times in advance of the day we will actually sing in it. I believe that God is going to move powerfully in Rolla, and I believe He is giving us the opportunity to prime the city and pray over it while we are in it.

Michael O'Hara (our director and one of the co-writers) also informed us that we will be learning a new song next week. So we will learn the song next week and possibly implement it in the upcoming Easter Sunday performance at St. Alphonsus Rock Catholic Church.

We spent the morning of our final day in Chicago visiting the Art Institute. We arrived a few minutes early, so we walked a few blocks over to see the lobby of the Palmer House Hotel, which is quite beautiful. We then grabbed a bite to eat at the Corner Bakery and spent the time watching people pass. We took the almost obligatory photos of each other outside with the Lions of the Art Institute. We worked our way around the museum quite quickly, since we only had an hour and a half to spend there before we had to go catch our plane. The museum had a huge collection of art, from many different styles and time periods. It also had a textile section (which I haven't ever really thought of as art before), a paperweight collection, and a room filled with suits of armor and swords. It was quite the collection of various forms of art. We probably could have spent a considerable more amount of time there, but we just didn't have it. In retrospect, we should have skipped the Museum of Contemporary Arts on Day 1 and visited the Art Institute instead. Lisa and I have decided we aren't huge fans of "modern art". We live and learn I suppose.

We rode the bus to the hotel to grab our bags. We rode the Orange Line back to the airport and made our way home safely. All in all, it was a great trip to a fascinating city that has tons to see. We talked of how we hope/plan on going back someday to see more of it. It was the perfect way to spend the holiday weekend and the perfect chance to spend time with each other learning new things and experiencing them together.