Messages from The Isaacs

From Lily

Well, it seems as if another year is almost here!! Where did 
2008 go? I am so blessed to have had such a wonderful year. Just 
getting to know many of you in our concerts has been a highlight! We 
pray that you all have a healthy and happy New Year. Please pray for 
us whenever you think of us, and please come visit us often. God 
Bless you,  Lily and all the Isaacs

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From Sonya

Hey everyone. I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and managed to find some time to relax! I was busy shopping and wrapping right up till the last minute this year but caught up on my rest this week in style! Let me tell you about it...
Most of you know my sweet lil Jewish Grandma still lives in the Bronx, New York.  After some tender Tennessee Christmas memories with friends and family,  Nate and I took an early flight out of Nashville on the 26th to spend a few days wth her.
We spent the whole day in Manhattan, enjoying the beautiful holiday decorations and the hustle and bustle of the crowded city pace. We stood at Rockefeller Plaza and admired the 60 ft tree while Jingle Bell Rock serenaded hundreds of bundled up ice skaters below. Beautiful!!!  I ate sooo much good food.. my favorite being the NY cheese pizza and hot dogs with spicy mustard and sauerkraut sold by the street cart vendors (I know, not too healthy, but deeelicious!!) I love New York City at Christmas time. It really is amazing! 
Then we took the $50, 30 minute taxi ride to Grandma's. She was so excited to see us! She is 89 years young and lives alone there... We had a great time, and even got a good laugh when the lock to her apartment door broke leaving us stranded in the hall of the apartment building for an hour! Have you ever had to pay a locksmith on a Sunday evening to break into your house and then replace the lock? Ouch! $255 big ones.. But at least we were here together! She has a friend, June, from health services who keeps her company a few hours a day and helps her run errands and such. The two of them are so cute together. June is a middle aged Jamaican woman, and Grandma, well she's still fun and vivacious and hard to keep up with... :-).  We really did have a blast and returned Mon night to get ready to head out today for New Years Eve in WV. Please keep Grandma Faye in your prayers as we continue to trust the Lord for His light to be revealed to her in a miraculous way!!

We are going to be singing in the New Year this year...  I hope that wherever you are when the Big Apple drops, that you will join me in thanking God for another blessed year. He is reliable, and faithful and we don't have to fear or fret what is to be as long as we know He is in charge.. And He most definitely IS!!!!

Love and Blessings this New Year!
Sonya Isaacs

Spend New Years Eve with The Isaacs

CHARLESTON NEW YEARS EVE!

Municipal Auditorium

Charleston, WV

December 31, 2008 6pm

 

*Featuring*

Doyle Lawson and Quicksilver

The Isaacs

Brian Free and Assurance

Roy Webb

Tony Gore

 

All seats are reserved

For tickets or more information call 304-419-2410

2009 National Quartet Schedule posted......

The Isaacs will be appearing on the main stage on Wednesday night and Thursday night at the National Quartet Convention in 2009.

Click here to see the full lineup:  NQC 2009

Recap of Christmas Tour

***Photos are in the website Gallery***

To recap The Isaacs Christmas tour......it was a long, exhausting but great trip. The concerts were awesome! It was so much fun to see friends and fans all over the U.S. Thank you so much to all of you that joined us in concert whether it was an Isaacs concert or a Gaither event. So many of you brought gifts and treats to the bus and we enjoyed every bit of it.

We started out on December 3rd from TN. Our first concert was on the 4th in Toledo, Ohio for a Gaither Christmas show. We then moved on to the 5th in Indianapolis, Indiana for another Gaither event. On Saturday night the 6th we were in Roanoke, Virginia with the Gaithers and on Sunday the 7th in East Stone Gap, Virginia. The church there is always so good. They fed us a wonderful Christmas meal before the show. We had turkey and dressing and all the trimmings. That night we headed back to TN for a few hours. We did some laundry, grocery shopped for the bus, loaded back up and headed back out on Monday evening. On Tuesday the 9th we appeared at a Civic Center in Lebanon, Missouri. That night when we came out to board the bus everything was icy. Brrrrr it was sooooo cold. The next morning we woke up in Sioux City, Iowa to snow covered everything. We sang in a beautiful church there that was so beautifully decorated for Christmas. On Thursday the 11th we were in Sioux Falls, South Dakota for a Gaither event. Friday the 12th found us in Moline, Illinois and Saturday night the 13th we ended with a Gaither event in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Here we saw the most snow. We were in the Resch Center right beside the Green Bay Packers stadium.

Special thanks to Ed for some great food. The oreo balls rocked! The Lafollettes for the Witey's ice cream YUM!, Gina & Randy for the Neosporin lip ointment (Lisa thanks you anyway!! LOL Lily's experience with it wasn't so good!) Beth Endean you are one awesome new blog buddy! The church in Sioux City for the great gift baskets, yummy fruit, cereal bars, cough drops and more!! Lynda Randle for the awesome pancakes for breakfast on the last day out!! AND everyone else! I'm sure I'm forgetting someone. You all are awesome fans of The Isaacs and you are loved.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Happy New Year!!
Remember the Reason for the Season!!!

Christmas Memories by Southern Gospel Artists

If you haven't done so yet, check out the Christmas Memory feature on SoGospelNews.com.

THE ISAACS SISTERS WRITE #1 SONG FOR 2008!!

Becky and I are so thrilled that our song "Your Cries Have Awoken the Master" is the #1 Singing News Song of 2008!! This song was born out of a long trial, and only God knows how rewarding it feels to have something so good come out of something so bad. Words can't explain how deeply honored we feel when another group, especially one as great as Mike and Kelly Bowling, records one of our songs. No one could have possibly sang this any better or with any more anointing than they did. We are thankful to God for the gift of music, and for every song that he allows us to pen. Thank you, Mike and Kelly for sharing it with the world, thank you Singing News and Rick Hendrix Company for teaming up to take it to the top, and thank you Southern Gospel Radio Stations for deeming it worthy enough to play on the air. We love you all!
Sonya I.

Merry Christmas from The Isaacs

Our Charlie Brown Christmas

By: Sonya Isaacs

It was winter 1979 in our home town of Morrow, Ohio. We lived in a quaint 1200 sq ft, 2 bedroom house about half way down Lake Road.  Ben, Becky, and I were just children, ranging from 4-7 years old.  We hadn’t begun travelling and singing full time, and Dad had a good job working at Morrow Gravel Company.  We always looked forward to Christmas, but this year, especially, it would be challenging to make it good.  A few months earlier, Dad became suddenly ill and had to have an emergency appendectomy, which led to a hospital stay of almost 2 weeks due to complications.  Having missed 2 months of work to recover, we were struggling just to meet the bills and didn’t have money for nice Christmas things. But we were determined not to let money stand in the way of a special celebration of our Lord’s birth. 

 Dad took us down to the gravel pit where they let us walk through the woods and cut down our very own Christmas tree. I think we must have chosen the scrawniest one of them all; it looked  like the one Charlie Brown picked in the Christmas movie; but to us it was beautiful and we were just as proud as if it were the 80 foot spruce tree lighting up  the Rockefeller Center!  We found one string of old lights up in the attic and Mom suggested we make hand-made decorations to fill it up.  I remember painting long macaroni noodles and stringing them together with thread.  Then we took some aluminum foil and made silver balls.  We took construction paper and cut out stars and angels and pasted yarn and pictures on them creating such delicate works of art!  We worked and worked until we finally filled up the little tree with love and care. 

Spending all that they could, Mom and Dad managed to get each of us a few gifts to put under it.  We didn’t have much, but we had each other, and as we gathered together in front of that little homemade tree on Christmas morning, we had a sincere prayer of thanksgiving and felt more than ever before the truest gratitude for Christmastime and for the gift of having each other.  God has blessed us a little more every year since that humble holiday, but we always take time to remember the Christmas of ’79, what we now refer to as our 

Charlie Brown Christmas. 

 May you find the true joy of the season this year, not just in the beautiful lights, or the bow-tied presents, but in the simplicity of love and in the precious gift of our Lord Jesus’ birth.

 

Merry Christmas and a Blessed, Peaceful New Year!

 

The Isaacs

Twitter

Are you following Twitter on the sidebar? I've discovered that for some reason my twitters and Becky's twitters looked mixed up when using any browser except Mozilla Firefox. I tried Internet Explorer and Google Chrome and my twitters are under Becky's twitter header. Oh well, just know that we both are twittering. You should be able to tell the difference in what is said.

Lisa

Moline, Illinois

Greetings!!! We're in Moline Illinois today. Again we have snow on the ground and it's bitter cold. It was about 20 degrees when we got up this morning. The Gaither crew is busy setting the stage for tonight's concert. The Isaacs are enjoying lunch together in catering.

We had a great time in Sioux Falls, SD last night. It was snowing when we got dressed and went in for the concert. The concert was fabulous. Jason Crabb was filling in with the Gaither Vocal Band last night and he rocked!! He's here again today. He's really doing a great job. He came to our bus after the show last night and visited and ate chicken soup with us. He's such a super nice guy!

After tonight we have one more stop to make before heading back to Tennessee. Tomorrow night we'll be in Green Bay, WI. I just received an email from a fan there and she said they have snow on the ground. That means every single state the Isaacs have performed in since we started out on the 4th has had snow. Wow!!

I have lots of photos to post in the gallery on the website. I may not have time to do that until I'm back home, but I promise I will do it.

Blessings to all! Happy Friday!
Lisa

Last night's concert.......

The beautifully decorated sanctuary

It was so good. The church was beautifully decorated with multiple Christmas trees and wreaths. The concert was extra good and the Iowa folks loved it. Many people came to the table before the show and told us that they had never seen the Isaacs in person. They had only seen them on Gaither videos. They were sooooooo excited to have them at their church. They were hungry for the music. After the concert started I went in to the auditorium to enjoy the concert myself and man those people were really into the music. They jammed to the bluegrass songs and raised their hands in praise to the slow tunes. After the concert they fed everyone a great meal of pasta, salad and yummy cheesecake. We had a great time!!!

Lisa

Oops! They are short one beautiful
glass ornament now!

Snow City, Iowa

The bus across the snowy parking lot

Outside the hotel lobby window

Not really.....we're in Sioux City, Iowa but it really looks more like snow city.  I took the pics above with my cell phone out the hotel window.  We arrived here around 8:00 CST this morning.  The temperature outside is -0-!!!! Yes, that's ZERO.  It is soooooo cold.  There is several inches of snow on the ground.  Thankfully the roads were clear.  

I'm sitting in the hotel lobby by a cozy fireplace, having a cup of java and watching the folks slide trying to get into the hotel.  We're looking forward to a great concert tonight at Cornerstone World Outreach church.  They had left beautiful gift baskets filled with goodies in the hotel rooms which we found this morning.  What a nice sentiment!  I guess I better get packed up and back out to the bus.  I wouldn't want to be forgotten : > (

Have a happy hump day!!

Lisa

A few pics from Roanoke

Here are just a few pics from the Roanoke, Virginia Gaither show.  We will be posting more in the online gallery on The Isaacs website.

Click on photos to enlarge....

The Isaacs Family

David Phelps

The Isaacs on the Gaither stage

The product workers

Gina, Robert Isaacs, Lisa, Randy

In Beautiful Virginia

We've arrived in Big Stone Gap, Virginia.   There's just a dusting of snow on the ground and a few flurries blowing.  It's beautiful, but bitter cold.  The Isaacs are singing here today in a church where they are invited back almost every year.  Everyone is looking forward to it.  

The three Gaither shows this week have been amazing.  Everyone has been  dressed in their Christmas colors and the music has just been magical.  When Ben, Sonya and Becky sing Away in a Manger you could hear a pin drop.  It's like angels singing.   Last night's program was really special. The Lord showed up and we had church right there in the arena.  It was such a great feeling.  

We have about a half day off and leave out again on Monday night for Lebanon, Missouri.  We have a long trip up north this week and probably lots of snow.  Prayers for safe travels would be appreciated.  

Love to you all!

Lisa

Ohio Buckeyes?

Have you ever had them?  They are delicious round discs of peanut butter dipped in yummy chocolate.  They are an Ohio favorite it seems.  Before we left Lily's house on Wednesday a package was delivered from Lily's sister-n-law "Martha" and when it was opened it was Buckeyes for the whole family.  Martha makes these every year.  I got to sample a couple and mmmmmm they were so yummy.  Since we got to Ohio this morning I've heard Buckeye talk several times.  Not only the confection, but you know, Buckeyes as in Sports!!! 

We got here sometime during the night last night.  Thanks Skip for a smooth ride from Toledo Ohio.  I sat up front in the buddy seat with Skip for a while last night.  We were travelling in a caravan of buses.  Jeff & Sheri, Signature Sound and Ivan Parker were in front of us.  Not sure who was behind us.  I woke up sometime in the wee hours and the bus wasn't moving.  I got up and looked out and we were at a Travel Center gassing up and there was a slew of Southern Gospel artist buses there.  Quite a sight!

We have the product tables all set up.  Yes, I said table(s).  We have two for tonight.  We're ready for a crowd.  Did I mention that the Isaacs cousing Robert Isaacs is traveling with us this weekend?  His dad and Ben, Becky and Sonya's dad Joe are brothers.  He's been a huge help.  He worked at the product table with me last night and he's been helping load in and out.  He's a very nice guy and it's been really nice to get acquainted with him.  He's from Kentucky and I love listening to him talk.  I'm a country girl from NC but he's more country than me I think!!  LOL

Well, I wanted to touch base with everyone and let you know how things are going.  We're having a great time.  I'll have more news for you later.  Don't forget the twitters on the side bar!!

Blessings

Lisa

Ben Isaacs Producer of Great Music!!

Ben received some exciting news this week and we'd like to share it with you all.   He recently produced another great project for Cherryholmes.  It's called Cherryholmes III "Don't Believe". This week they found out it has been nominated for two Grammys.  Ben not only is a great singer/musician but a great producer also!!

We'll share more information with you as it becomes available.

Christmas lights and Snow!

We're waiting for a group practice at 4pm and then sound check for The Isaacs. Can't wait to show you pictures of the stage. They have bunches of Christmas trees with white lights and pretty wreaths hanging over the stage with white lights. I bet it's going to be really pretty with all lights out. OH! It's snowing here now. Just flurries, but it's pretty.

The concert tonight will include lots of beautiful Christmas music, but not all Christmas. There will be a lot of other music too. They must really be expecting a crowd because they keep adding more and more chairs.

I'm sitting in the lobby and they are playing Christmas music LOUD! Kind of got my toes tappin' and my head bobbin' to some bluesy Christmas sounds right now.

Just discovered when unloading product.......a brand new Isaacs Hoodie!!!  Two of them to be exact. One is salmon colored and the other is graphite gray.  They are pretty cool!  Designed by Ben Isaacs.   

Be sure to get you one while they last.  

We Made It!

Well we made if safely to our first concert venue of the weekend. We pulled out of LaFollette close to midnight last night and arrived here in Toledo, Ohio around 9 this morning. We have a full bus this weekend. All of the regular Isaacs crew including Becky's children Levi and Jakobi as well as Steve Chandler, handling Isaacs sound this weekend and a special guest....Robert Isaacs who is Ben, Sonya and Becky's cousin from Kentucky are on the bus. Talk about a full load, we have one. It will be fun though. It's very, very cold here and very windy. Skip said he did see a little snow and rain along the way last night.

We're getting ready to set up the Isaacs product table as soon as the guys get the product brought in. Don't forget to check the side bar for Twitter updates. Becky wants to twitter too so she'll be sending some news your way as we go along.