January 4, 2004 • So here we are. 2004!

What a year this last one was. Full of both challenges and delightful treats in so many varieties

I hope everyone is starting this next year in a solid place.

Nickel Creek has been off the road (with the exception of one last show in Park City, Utah) since the week before Thanksgiving. So, in classic Sean-Sara-Chris form, each of us has made every effort, and with terrific success, to fill our independent time with individual projects in the studio, playing with other people, lots of driving, lost of planning and writing..
It's all self induced of course, and we are grateful and excited to have the opportunity to explore and learn so much and have such blast - but we're all a bit tired I think.

The gig in Park City was special. We did the entire show around one microphone. This was the first time we'd ever attempted such a thing as a four-piece band but I think it worked well.

The stage had two wings stretching forward and out into the audience and we invited anyone who wanted to come up and sit with us to sing carols. Our roadmanager Fielding made a special Christmas appearance in our instrumental version of Sleigh Bells by taking care of the whip sound in the song's third part by clapping two perfectly selected two-by-fours together.

Once again Fielding - excellent work.

So of course we had to stay a couple extra days in town to hit the slopes. I hadn't snowboarded since our last visit to Utah two years ago and had plenty of brushing up to do. Gosh that was fun.

Home has been great. Wonderful to see my family and friends, go to concerts, get back into a regular practice routine.

We're really excited to start working on a new Nickel Creek record this winter.
This is going to be fun people. Really, really, really, fun.