Jamie and Laurie – BFFs!

Last summer I was scrolling through Facebook while Jamie and Ri watched a show.

I came across a post by the Laurie Berkner Band. If you haven’t heard of them, you’re probably living under a rock and probably not reading this right now because you don’t have wifi under said rock.

The Kids’ First Concert!

I got the idea to see if they were going to be anywhere near us now that we live in the big city. I went on their website and found their tour dates. And lo and behold, they had a show scheduled for October in St Paul! I immediately booked tickets for the 4 of us and my mother-in-law to go to Laurie’s concert. Turned out it was for a synagogue fund raiser so it would only be Laurie performing, not the whole band. I figured it would still be an awesome day. LBB is Jamie’s all-time favorite band! We have all of her CDs, all of her DVDs and have watched all of her videos on YouTube.

When I booked the tickets, I then emailed LBB on Facebook and told her how much we loved her. How we’ve used her music to calm Jamie when he’s had a bad day. We’ve used her music to wake him up after surgeries, to celebrate a happy occasion, to just keep him happy and occupied almost every day of his life! She (or someone on her staff) quickly responded saying they would love it if Laurie could meet Jamie. How awesome is that?! They gave us free backstage passes to the meet and greet.

Meeting Laurie

When the big day came, we loaded up our minivan and drove down to St Louis Park in St Paul to the synagogue. We got into line with all of the pre-schoolers and finally we were shown to our seats. We waited anxiously for Laurie to take the stage and when she did, we were not disappointed! Jamie wasn’t quite sure what was going on but he kept looking at us and not paying any attention to the stage. About the second song, Joel got up and took Jamie to the edge of the stage and they stood there the entire concert. When Laurie left the stage after an amazing performance, she gave Jamie a high-five!

High Five for Laurie!

We waited a few minutes and then they sent for us and we went backstage with a few other families. We ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches while we waited. We got a free CD (we already had it but you can never have too many copies!), and a goody bag for each kid. Then we were called into the room where Laurie was. Riley ran ahead so she got to meet Laurie first. Then we walked in with Jamie and her face lit up! She was so welcoming and just the sweetest person ever. I started crying, because who doesn’t cry when your kid gets to meet the person he loves the most besides his family? We have pumped LBB music throughout our house almost every day since we learned about her from Jack’s Big Music Show on Nickelodeon Jr way back in 2003. This was the culmination of a life-long friendship with Laurie for Jamie. We’ve listened to her on long road trips (13 hours!), we’ve listened to her CDs sometimes back to back. LBB has been part of our lives for over a decade. This was such an amazing day for our family!

The pictures really don’t do it justice, and the pictures are awesome. Meeting Laurie, was something we will always remember.

She really is Jamie’s BFF.