we had a great day. cool beans!

lilcee and i had been talking about taking the girls to see the fresh beat band together for months, but hadn't actually pulled the trigger on tickets.  of course, the two shows in l.a. were long sold out (go figure), but i've always had great luck finding tickets on ebay for things like this.  and usually i end up paying less than i would've had i gone the ticketbastard route, so it's a total win.

happily, ebay didn't let me down.  i managed to find a set of four tickets in the orchestra section that weren't too tremendously far away, and after conferring with lilcee, we secured our seats for the show.  i'm not sure why the seller felt the need to black out prices, but whatever.  they worked, and he included parking too, so it was all good.

i didn't tell the bean about it until just a few days before, and the first thing she said was "do i get to wear my kiki costume again?" followed closely by "can i take a picture with marina this time?"  d-oh.

so i went to the FBB website to see if tickets were available again for the afterparty and meet-and-greet.  i found nothing, so i called the number and was told that they weren't available at that time, but to keep checking.  and then i did a bit more google sleuthing and ended up finding the upgrades - to the tune of $90 apiece.  ack!  i knew the hub would shit a brick (especially since she's already met them twice), and i was pretty sure lilcee wasn't all about shelling the cash out either.  so i just told the bean that a lot of other kids were going to get the chance to meet the band this time, and just played up the idea of going with mini cee, her BFF.  because my kid is pretty pragmatic, she brushed it off and asked for a cookie.  yup.

a pre-concert snack - a peppermint brownie cake pop from starbucks.  is this my kid, or what?

happily, she hasn't grown out of the costume since february's show.

and i die a little every time i look at this.  kiki twins!  i'm not gonna lie, when i saw them together i was ready to fork out the cash for them to take a picture with the "real" kiki.

our view was pretty good.  the girls certainly appreciated it.

kiddie shows pretty much kick ass because 1. there's no opening act, 2. the shows don't last too long, and 3. they start on time because kids kind of demand it.  so right at 5:00 the band hit the stage to a scaled-down version of teenybopper cheering.

during one of the songs, "shout" jumped off the stage and ran up the aisle right towards us.  of course, he was instantly swarmed by parents and kids alike and we stayed right where we were.

intermission!

mini cee wasn't really having all of the noise and screaming and such.  she spent a few minutes curled up in her chair under a jacket, but she emerged and managed to have a good time anyway.  i die at the bean in the background, rocking out with all she had.

when the last song had been played and all four band members had waved their goodbyes, we made our way out of the arena and joined the fast-growing line for souvenirs.

i'm such a sucker.  she got a shirt, two bracelets, a fun cup with a twirly crazy straw, and this:

behind us was a giant christmas tree, plonked right down in the middle of the ice skating rink.  the girls loved watching the skaters.

for dinner, lilcee had made a reservation at the farm.  very kid friendly and consistently good.  while we waited to be seated, the girls made friends with fellow FBB fans.

silly girls.

and it turns out that our show was the very last one on this tour for the fresh beat band.  i can't even imagine - with only a couple of months off (during which they taped episodes of their tv show), they pretty much spent all of 2012 on a tour bus, performing at venues all across the country.  i found this, tweeted by tara perry, who plays "marina":

thanks for a great tour, indeed.