T is for "Tour" ...as in the Keith Urban tour of course!

So back in SEPTEMBER.... (yes I am slow but nothin' ya'll didn't know!) my girlfriends Crystal, Anne and I went to see Keith Urban in concert on Friday the 15th and then on Saturday the 16th went up to Seattle and saw him again. What fun!!!! The Portland show was so great....our seats rocked! I think we were something like 17th row on the floor and we were near enough the "runway" that he has going down the middle of the crowd on the floor that we could get right up front. Such a cool experience! The Wreckers opened the show (and I admit I knew very little of their music but they were entertaining) and I was still figuring out my camera when I took the picture of Michelle Branch and Jessica Harp.

Most of the time when Keith Urban was on there was a giant screen in the background that basically showed what was going on .....in other words it made for a trippy picture!

The next morning was a bit rough in trying to head for Seattle. We were all still quite tired and yet jazzed up for the coming evening and we also planned a little bit of shopping in between. On our way up to Seattle we stopped in Olympia to visit a mall that had a Steve and Barry's store. Since we do not have one in Portland, the point of this visit was to check out the new Sara Jessica Parker line of clothing titled Bitten. What can I say...we were girls with no children with us and felt we needed to indulge in a little fashion! Actually, the line of clothing is affordably priced although it seems what we ended up buying the most of was the accessories. Lots of earrings, cute sunglasses, etc. Then it was off to Seattle to get dressed for our evening! We stayed in downtown which was of course expensive but splitting it 3 ways helps. At this concert we didn't have as good of seats, although they weren't bad either. We just weren't down on the floor.

The amazing part of this concert was that while it was really good, it wasn't as good as the Portland show! Which really shocked me...I think I just assumed that for some reason they would either be about the same or that Seattle would be even better. I guess it was just a weird notion on my part. In Portland, the band and Keith actually played a bunch of improv stuff. Not original music but just covering some past hits of various artists. If I remember correctly, they played Billy Joel's "You May be Right", Steve Miller Band's "The Joker" with all the band members taking turns at verses, Tommy Tutone's "867-5309/Jenny, Jenny" and Violent Femmes "Blister in the Sun". Which I loved, since I was impressed that a country artist would even know who the Violent Femmes are! We got all of that on Friday in Portland and then on Saturday in Seattle we got almost none of that and about a 25 minute shorter show. But it was still all good!

Sunday morning (or very early afternoon by the time we were with it!) was for shopping and shop we did. Lots of retail in downtown Seattle and plus there was Pike Place Market. I love this place. A food lover's paradise. I could go back daily for weeks just to try all the different foods and eateries. And I had to kind of keep my purchases to a minimum, because whatever I bought I was going to have to haul around with me since we left the car at the hotel until it was time to go home. Pike Place is just amazing...even on Sunday afternoon(with typical Northwest drizzle) the place is packed full of people and food and street artists and performers. I very much enjoy the vibe there!

We didn't buy or eat anything at the "Three Girls Bakery" but we enjoyed the sign! The one very important thing to do while we were there was to visit the original Starbucks (opened in Pike Place Market in 1971). We do like Starbucks and the 3 of us girls have done quite a bit of bonding over coffee! It's actually quite different inside from all the other Starbucks, dark wood paneling and floors and very tiny. But very busy and worthy of a picture outside!

So not the best shot of me and who knows who the guy is in the pic but I did say it was crowded! :) A very lovely trip with very lovely friends....

And coffee/Starbucks makes everything better!! This is according to Zoe, Meegan's daughter who is one smart girl when she told this to her mom. I can't quite remember the exact story but I heard about it today, and now I may have to force Meegan to blog about it because it was really cute!