By John Goodspeed

Martina McBride expects a lot of fun for everyone — and especially herself — at her performance capping the first day of the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo on Saturday.

After almost eight years of constant touring, she trimmed the show dates last year when her oldest daughter, Delaney, 6, started kindergarten.

"It really makes me excited to go out for a show; you really gear up after being off for a few months," said McBride, known for the singles "Independence Day," "Wild Angels" and "I Love You."

She plans to mix hits with album cuts and have a blast.

"My thing is to really connect with the audience and draw them into the show. It's not about singing every note perfect — it's about having a great time and doing a spontaneous performance. We just have fun."

The time off from the road in the fall and winter is allowing her family — including Emma, who will be 3 in March, and her husband, John, who owns a sound business — to follow a normal schedule before touring hard this summer.

"Up to this point, they've been on a tour bus all their lives and never had any extended time at home," McBride said in a phone interview from her Nashville, Tenn., residence. "Now Delaney has playmates and friends and they're used to sleeping in their own beds and eating at our own table.

"It's a lot of things that people take for granted that we consider a luxury," said McBride, a Kansas native who moved to Nashville and worked her way to opening for Garth Brooks in the early 1990s.

Her second album, 1993's "The Way That I Am," was her breakthrough, spawning the No. 2 hit "My Baby Loves Me."

She hasn't looked back since.

"Evolution," her fifth album, sold more than 2 million copies, and her latest, "Emotion," also is approaching double platinum status.

"I'm ecstatic with the success I've had. I'm at peace with where I'm at in my life professionally and personally," she said. "Anything that happens from now on is just icing on the cake."

McBride is working on her seventh album, due for release in the fall, and continues with TV appearances and other aspects of her business life.

"But being a mother is the most important thing I do and my first priority — everything else just has to work around that," McBride said. "Once I had children, my whole world changed."

Just don't think she's leaving her daughters home alone Saturday, though. They'll be right here with her, along with her husband.