All right, get ready for a freaking long post.

I've got 6 amazing Chicago-filled days to talk about, don't I? Haha.
So, the first day, we went back after school to load our stuff into a trailer, because we drove to SLC in a school bus. Then we practiced a couple of songs and headed off into the sunset! It took us almost five and a half hours to get to Bountiful, because the bus drivers have to go slow, and also we stopped for dinner. I roomed with Shari (the student president of Bonnevaires), Taunalee (who has the most amazing soprano voice I have ever heard) and Tiffani (my octet leader). It was such a fun group.
We got up early in the morning on Thursday to load our stuff again and get to the airport on time, which we did. Happy day! We played this game which was kind of like Mafia there and it passed the time really well. Haha. I sat by Joe Johnson, who is one of my Bonnevaires big brothers, on the plane and I had quite a fun time talking to him. He's a funny kid. My first plane was SOOO cool! The generator on the plane wasn't working at first so it took a while for us to get started, so we got there a little late. I was sort of freaking out as we took off. I probably drove poor Joe crazy with all my "'Oh my gosh's." It was so cool to look out the window and see everything so tiny, but only for a little while because it was really cloudy and had bad weather and stuff. Apparently it was really turbulent, but I had nothing to compare it to. We got to Chicago safe & sound, but it took forever to get our luggage for some reason. So we had to rush to try and get to our hotel, but the tour bus driver got lost. So instead, we just went to dinner at Portello's. It was delicious, and they deliver to anywhere in the U.S.! Haha it would cost a fortune though. And then, WE WENT TO WICKED!!!!! Oh my heck. It was better than I could have expected. It was the first professional show I have seen, and school shows are like nothing compared to that. Haha. So after Wicked, we went back to the hotel.
Then the next morning, we went to Denny's for breakfast, then we went to the zoo! It was super fun. And I got to see polar bears. That was pretty much the best part. After the zoo, we did a little bit of driving around and sightseeing. We got to see Lake Michigan, and it's HUGE. Then we went to the museum of science and industry, and got to see how cow manure was turned into energy. Yay. There was also a scale model of downtown Chicago, complete with mini cars, cows sitting on benches, bears eating children, kayakers drowning, and a guy getting shot in front of a church. All in the model. It was pretty funny. Then we went to Giordianno's for dinner. They had this amazing stuffed pizza. SO yummy. We went back to the hotel. The honor choir kids had to leave for an extra rehearsal, and since Shari and Taunalee were both in honor choir that left only half of our room. Tiff and I were really bored, and so were some of our friends so they came into our room and we watched "The Road to El Dorado" and had a massive pillow fight. Tiffani and I lost really badly, mostly because we were fighting against guys haha. Then we went to a rehearsal for our choir so we were ready for the next day, when our adjudications would be.
So, on Saturday we went to Denny's again for breakfast, because our hotel didn't provide it. A bowl of cornflakes was $4.50, and sugar was extra. Haha it was a very upscale *cough*snobby*cough* hotel. Then we went to this beautiful church. It had the most amazing stained glass and ceiling designs. I'm going to post pictures. We were 3rd to sing, and so we only had about 20 minutes to warm up and rehearse. Then we went in and performed. When Dr. Armstrong, the main clinician, got up to talk to us, he didn't mention a single thing that we did wrong. In fact, he told us that he had heard choirs sing ugly, mugly and bugly (that is, mucho ugly and butt ugly) and we were none of those. I was really proud of our performance. This will come into importance later, I promise. We then went to lunch, and it was all rainy and cold, but my lunch was really good. It was at a local sandwich shop and it was super yummy. Then we went to a Blue Man Group performance. It was really funny. Then we went back to the hotel and changed, and we went to a banquet at another hotel. The food was free, and by association good, but the atmosphere was not. There were all sorts of girls dressed nasty and dirty dancing, so basically we finished eating and left. They gave us iced tea and water to drink, and one of the kids in choir was making a scripture mastery video, so he gathered up all the iced tea cups and put them into a large mass on one table and then wrote TCIT (the Church is true) on the back of the Bonneville High School card that was on the table. One of my friends got interviewed for a video the Festival was making, and we saw him on the big screen at the concert! That night, me and my roomies had a very soul-searching conversation. Haha it was pretty cool because we talked well into the night about just everything.
On Sunday, we got up and had breakfast at McDonald's. I kind of felt guilty for spending money, but I didn't really have a choice other than to not eat, and I was starving. Then we went to a combined rehearsal for all 600+ choir kids there. One of our combined pieces was "Thou Gracious God, Whose Mercy Lends" and it was actually originally arranged for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. It gives me chills every time I sing it because it invites the Spirit so powerfully. After the rehearsal, we went to an LDS ward in Naperville and sang that same song as a special musical number during sacrament meeting. It was really cool. Then we went to dinner at Bennigan's, which was kind of like an Applebee's or something. We got to go to the Sears Tower that night, which was amazing. We went to the observation deck on the 103rd out of 110 floors, and it was literally like being on top of the world. Then we went back to our hotel and had cheesecake from The Cheesecake Factory next door to our hotel. It was delicious. Then we had our traditional little discussion about what we thought about our performance and Bonnevaires in general really. At the end, Mr. Dresen related a story to us about how he had learned to listen with his spiritual rather than his technical, professional ears as his ward's choir director. He said that those two different sets of ears don't usually get to unite in harmony, but that they did in the ward that day. He said that he was really proud of our adjudication performance the day before, regardless of where we placed and whether or not we got to perform individually at the concert on Monday. Again, this really will come into importance. ;)
On Monday, we went to Mickey D's again for breakfast. Then we got to go to the Magnificent Mile. More expensive than I had seen on the websites. Haha. Afterward, we did a little sightseeing and saw the U.S. Cellular Field, the home of the Chicago Bulls (I'm not sure what the stadium's name was) and then we went to Navy Pier. We did a little shopping there, then dropped off our honor choir people at Orchestra Hall. On the way to the Hall, Mr. Dresen told us again that he was proud of us. (Here's where my little hints come into play). He said basically the same thing, that no matter how we did, we had progressed a lot and had done awesome. Then he added in that Dr. Huff, the director of the Festival of Gold, had phoned him that afternoon and WE WERE SINGING IN THE CONCERT! We placed FIRST among all the concert choirs in the competition, which included 2 from places where you had to audition twice: once to get into the school, then again to get into the choir. It was really amazing. We had a waste-of-money dinner that night, kind of ruining the moment. Haha it cost $14 for an all-you-can-eat and the food was NASTY. But then we went back to Orchestra Hall to prepare. We found out that the Hall is the 2nd oldest continuously running performing arts center in the whole U.S. We were also 2nd up this time, after the top scoring women's choir, and we did amazing. Not to brag, but it was a beautiful performance, and I think everybody could feel that. The concert didn't get over until 10 (it was SO long) but then we went back to the hotel.
A couple people pulled an all-nighter, and I almost did because by the time we could get to sleep it was 2 in the morning and we had to get up at 4 to be ready to get to the airport on time. So I slept for 2 hours, then we got everything loaded again and had a much less turbulent flight to SLC. I also slept for 45 minutes on the flight, so right about now I've gone 36 hours with about 3 hours of sleep. Wahoo! Haha the drive home was nice, and I'm glad to be back. I missed my family, even thought I had a lot of fun. Well, that's about all I've got to say. Sorry for the super long post. :)
♥/The second soprano now home from Chicago