Palm trees in the desert - coming into Lake Havasu City, AZ
At the London Bridge - in Arizona!
With Faron and Debbie Eckelbarger at KNLB
Stopping at a Diners, Drive Ins and Dives spot on Route 66
At the Crystal Cathedral - I'm the little black and teal dot to the lower left of the choir
The Crystal Cathedral
Mom and I hiked up near the Hollywood sign
Me and my cool mom on the set of Friends at the Warner Brothers Studio
This weekend I headed out of town with my mom for the West coast. I haven’t been out there in a while, and I was so glad my mom could come with me. We had a little issue with our flights, and ended up landing in Los Angeles about midnight their time (which was three in the morning for us!) where we waited for an hour for our rental car (another mix-up!) and finally drove about an hour and a half to our hotel. Sheesh. Then we had to get up early to head out across the Mojave Desert, since I was supposed to be at KNLB in Lake Havasu City, AZ, just across the California border, by 11 that morning. Not our best planning ever, but we made it.
I’ve never been in the Mojave Desert, and it was such a surprise. It was just gorgeous! I was thinking of a flat, sandy desert, but it was full of mountains and plantlife and colors – it was stunning. I was so glad we had to get up early to see some of what the sun was doing to the vistas. God is so good, and in a place like that, you just can’t miss His work at every turn. Unfortunately, I couldn’t stop and take pictures since we were in a time crunch, so my mom snapped a few through the window. I’m so glad she did since I was thinking I would take some on the way back, but we ended up driving back through the dark (and basically a monsoon!) so I wouldn’t have gotten a chance.
We got to KNLB at 11 and met the station manager Faron Eckelbarger and his wife, Debbie, who is also the afternoon host at the station. We chatted, and then went to lunch where they asked me if I would go live that afternoon on their Treehouse One show. Mom and I took a quick detour to see the London Bridge (yes, the actual London Bridge. I guess when they replaced it, they sent the original to Lake Havasu City piece by piece – you can still see some of the numberings on the blocks where they were marking how to put it back together), because you can’t miss that!!
Then we headed back to the station, and I went live on air with Debbie for the rest of the afternoon. We took calls from quite a few kids and adults, and it’s a really neat ministry – kids would call in and say Scriptures they had memorized and ask for music or ask a question, and I couldn’t believe how much Scripture these kids knew!
After that I recorded a few liners and things for the station and then we went to dinner. By the time we left there, it was starting to rain just a little and it was dark. By the time we got back to the desert, it was pitch black and gale force winds and buckets of rain. In the desert. Yep. Faron told me that happens once every year or two. Glad we got to experience it. 😉 And since our body clocks were off, mom and I drove in that until what felt like four in the morning. I was never so happy to see my hotel room!
Fortunately we had the next day off, so we slept in and only had to drive a couple of hours. We went to a Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives place we found on the L.A. side of the desert, and it was really fun, although definitely not health food. We drove a bit on Route 66 just because we could. Then we went shopping since I really needed a new outfit for the Crystal Cathedral. Have I mentioned that I hate, hate, hate shopping? I would much rather do just about anything else. That might explain why I was looking for my outfit the day before the service!!
The next morning we got up early and got to the church for sound check before the early service. It’s really quite a production. There were several stage managers and we had to check all our marks for the television cameras and obviously we had to sound check too. I haven’t been there since I sang there in college, and it was just as beautiful inside as I remembered. All that L.A. sun just poured in.
I did about a 10 minute interview and then sang “Before the Throne of God Above.” Then they took me out to sign books and CDs between services and then back to do it the second time. It was a gorgeous day, and I had a lot of great conversations with people afterwards. The service will be broadcast on “The Hour of Power” in two weeks.
Since this trip seemed to be full of mix-ups, we had one more. We were supposed to do another radio visit up north, but the dates got switched, so mom and I found ourselves with a couple of free days in L.A. Hey, worse things have happened. So we decided to be kids and go to Disneyland for a day, and on the Warner Brothers tour. Had a great time, and it was fun just to get that downtime with my mom! She’s pretty cool. 🙂