Kelsea Ballerini with CMT Next Women of Country

Friends and family always make comments to the parents of a baby about how they've grown since the last time they saw each other, and that is exactly how I felt on Tuesday night.

Tuesday night, Kelsea Ballerini, headlined her first show! Never the less, it was in Nashville, too!

After following Kelsea's career and getting to know her more and more over the past two years, I have seen the many ways that Kelsea has grown as both an artist and a person, and seeing her go from Soundcloud demos to artist parties to headlining her own show was so incredibly cool.

Right now, Kelsea is out with Jana Kramer on CMT's Next Women of Country Tour, an all women tour promoting the up and coming female talent in country music. 

At the Nashville show, Jana was not able to preform, but she did make an appearance when CMT's SVP of Muisc Strategy came out and announced the 2016 tour, which is including (L-R) Brook Eden, Cam, Clare Dunn, and Ruthie Collins. 

The show opened up with Carly Pearce and Hailey Steele, who both have loads of talent. Carly Pearce can belt like nobody's business and her rendition of Dolly Parton's "9 to 5" was cute as can be. Check her out for yourself and see what you think. Here is her on Tuesday singing "Just Another Girl."

But finally, my girl took the stage.

With teal guitar in hand, she began to rock. She did crowd pleasers from her EP like "Dibs" and "Yeah Boy" to kick off the night but also sang from her new album, "The First Time," as well as two that aren't on the album, "High School" and "Graffiti." 

One of the other girls in the audience videoed them, so if you're curious, you can check out "High School" here and "Graffiti" here. 

High School always has been a personal favorite of mine, so seeing it live was more wonderful than words.

Turns out Kelsea had more than just the surprise of "High School" and "Graffiti" planned...Maddie and Tae came out and sang "There's Your Trouble" by the legendary Dixie Chicks. Purely acoustic and raw, Kelsea, Maddie, and Tae all proved their talent. 

In honor of her first album coming out this Monday, Kelsea had to do some from there like "XO," "Stilettos," and "Peter Pan." 

I can not tell you how excited I am for this album to come out. It is so Kelsea and so true to who she is. I can't wait to watch the world fall in love with her like I have.

"The First Time" is available starting May 18th on iTunes, and you're really missing out if you don't get it. It does have upbeat songs for jamming like "XO" and "Peter Pan," but it also has very vulnerable and relatable songs like "Secondhand Smoke" and "The First Time." 

To end the show, she sang "Love Me Like You Mean It" (which is currently #9 on the country charts!!) and the entire venue sang along. I had tears in my eyes as she stood on stage with tears in her eyes and listened to everyone sing it back.

Coolest moments ever.

Kelsea most definitely lived up to all expectations I had on stage, but she far surpassed all expectations off stage.

As soon as she came off, I was greeted with "Lauren, I'm so glad you're here! I love you a lot for coming!!" and a hug before I could even open my mouth. 

Kelsea is on her way to do great things, mark my words, friends. She's going big places and I'm so thankful to be along for the ride.

Be sure to follow her on Twitter, Insta, like her on Facebook, and download "The First Time!"

Jacob and Esau

For those of you who aren't familiar with this story, in short, it's about a Jacob, Esau, Isaac, and Rebekah.

Jacob and Esau are twin brothers, Esau being older and hairy, and Jacob the younger and smooth skinned. Isaac is their dad, and Rebekah is their mom. When Isaac is old, blind, and dying, Rebekah tells Jacob to go get his older brother's blessing. To trick Isaac, Jacob wears a fur coat/pelt/hide thing to feel hairy like Esau is naturally.....and that's where we get the craft. 

Super simple and a great way to engage their sense touch, which helps them remember it much easier.

Here is the coloring sheet we used.

To save it, right click and click "save image as"

We also put a verse from the passage, Genesis 27, at the top so the parents could help talk to their kids about the story at home.

We used Gensis 27:11, but any from that chapter would work.

"Jacob said to Rebekah his mother, “But my brother Esau is a hairy man while I have smooth skin."

To enhance story time, we brought in a piece of fake fur and let the kids close their eyes and feel it, like Isaac did.

Since Jacob fed his father soup, we served "soup crackers" (more commonly known as oyster crackers).

At first, I thought this would be a hard lesson to teach them, but they understood it and the touching of the fur/pom poms really made an impression on them. Though we couldn't explain the significance of the blessing in full, they understood that Jacob lied to his father and that we don't want to do that. They also understood very well about how Esau (eventually) forgave Jacob and how we need to forgive each other,

 I'm forever amazed at the many things we can learn in just a short story.

xo,

Lauren