Like their marketing:

Thought this ad was cool... It's from a company I am working with in Canada.

Who knew???

As promised, there are lots of stories to share from our Chicago celebrations honoring bride-to-be Roxana Bargoz. Two overarching points before I get into any of the juicy details...

1. I am awed by the fact that a cross-section of friends can be brought together for a weekend, and despite not having known one another previously, leave feeling like long-lost sisters. What a testament to Roxy and the company she keeps... Her friends from childhood, high school and Georgetown Law are all amazing!

2. I have new-found respect for all "mature" 20-somethings. (Mature being those of us who are on the crest of leaving our "2's" and heading into our "3's".) Who knew we still had the cocktail capacity to carouse until after 5:00 in the morning, not one, but two nights in a row???

That being said, let the recap begin...

We kicked things off with Mexican Fiesta meets lingerie party. Some of Rox's friends from high school managed to import food from her favorite restaurant in Munster, Indiana and the rest of us brought the lace and toys needed to "spice" up the night. Let's just say the following phrases sum up our evening: Victoria Secret, Hanky Panky Dirty Santa, Yoda receives a new leash (that or Rox has a new pilates tool), a quite unique donkey, plastic clip-ons, beer shower, a cave bar, a rocking scavenger hunt, broke ass keys, and some serious El Tac action.















After a lot of laughter and recap-ing on Saturday morning, we managed to get dressed and make it over to Wrigley Field in time for the Cubs game that kicked off at noon. As you would probably guess based on the pictures below, the 9 girls in "This girl can party" t-shirts were a "home run" (apologies for the cheesy pun). We managed to shove our way into a sold-out bleacher section, giving us prime stadium seating. Rox and Carolyn were serenaded by a group of bongo players. (I think the song of choice was "Sexy ladies, sexy ladies, sexy ladies," which despite the lack of creativity was actually quite good.) And we even did some chanting of our own, cheering our way into Tom and Dave's private party at the bar across the street where we were welcomed with (yes) more alcohol and free food. After our ballpark escapades, we T'ed over to Lincoln Park and wandered around the Taste of Lincoln street festival for a few hours.

All of this would have been enough to make a girl's day memorable, but believe me when I tell you this was just the beginning. By 9:00pm we were enjoying tapas (thanks to Allison, the flight attendant turned waitress) and a bottle of wine that Cat said, "made her taste buds go ballistic!"

After dinner a bar hop ensued... Bucktown was the neighborhood of choice and our stops included a swanky lounge, a run-in with some old high school boys, and a house party with the Dave and Tom crew. (Honestly, I'm not completely sure how we even managed to reconvene with our ballpark friends, but the rooftop dance party that ended with a Journey rock-out was little short of spectacular.) Intermixed in all of the excitement was some serious love-texting, several random make outs, coo-coo-ing phone calls and Rox's great pizza search. Wow, I am exhausted just reminiscing.









Needless to say, I paid for my involvement in Roxy's festivities heavily today - seeing as I did not make it into the office until noon. Still I am both proud and nostalgic of our impressive display of youthful energies. Girls, I can't wait to see you in September!!!

Cat and Heather, this last picture is for you... Documenting Cat's 5-hour plane search and Heather's ridiculously close encounter in our hotel lobby with true love.

Verizon Wireless Rocks

I am on a train heading from O'Hare to downtown Chicago right now and (believe it or not) had absolutely no clue where I was going when I first boarded this thing... Taking the "head to the city and figure stuff out when you get there" kind-of approach. But thanks to V-Wireless I was able to power up the ole' laptop and rock out a full transit map. I love technology!

So why Chi-town? My dear friend Roxana Bargoz is having her bachelorette party this weekend and we are all headed to the Windy City to partake in the fun. I have not escaped for a girls' weekend, much less a b-party, in a long time so I'm excited to see what adventures we have in store.

Don't take the above comment in the wrong way. We are all good Southern girls!

Pics and stories to come. Stay tuned...

Hello Houston, TX

The Bucy family has arrived in Houston. Mike got in last Monday; Addie and I followed suit Sunday afternoon.
Holy heatstroke this place is HOT!!! I have only made it 6 square blocks in mid-day heat so far… Weak, I know! That’s why an (indoor) gym membership was a must and the tunnel systems are great.

Mollie will be jealous – I drive by Joel Osteen’s church at least two times a day. Rumor is that he’s building a 25,000 sq. ft. house in a neighborhood called River Oaks, just around the corner... (He should connect with the Edwards family. Apparently domestic compounds are “in” thing, regardless of how politically or spiritually incorrect they may seem.)

We are staying with Mike’s brother and sister-in-law. Poor Courtney! The boys probably did a little scheming on both of us in order to orchestrate this whole cohabitation thing... I’m used to living out of a suitcase and in new environments. But Courtney is juggling a full time job, an almost 2-year old, a second child on the way, and playing host to a string of out-of-town guests all summer long (sometimes more than one set of visitors at a time). I wish I could bring her a bottle of wine every night. Unfortunately the whole preggers things throws a wrench in that option.

Random Houston facts:
- 4th most populous city in the US
- Has 2nd lowest cost of living out of all the major American cities
- Known for young population (apx. 40% under 24 and apx. 35% between the ages of 25 and 44). My guess is that the heat take a good number out, especially once they reach a certain age. Poor gramps.
- Known as the “eating out capital” of the US. Random tid-bit from my hubby but seems legit based on the ridiculous number of restaurants!
- No income tax. Too bad we can’t claim residency for a couple weeks.

Adrienne and Will's Wedding

Mike’s A-1 boys (or the “Volare Boys” as some of you may remember them from our wedding) all managed to find their way to Asheville, NC last weekend where they (we) celebrated the marriage of Will and Adrienne Lloyd.

From Natasha flat-lining down the stairs and an evening at Pepe’s Mexican Grill, to Ironman training and a frantic search for a teal tuxedo vest and tie, we had a fabulous weekend.

By Sunday, an A-1 Ladies club had formed. Watch out boys; we’re working on a song and dance routine of our own!

Wow!

Technology is amazing! Not only are the Globetrotters blogging as they travel across Peru, but the Academy (where they have been volunteering) is blogging about their adventures as well.

I was reading some of the DGH blog comments this morning and found this link (and picture above): http://www.peopleofperu.org/index.php?option=com_na_content&task=view&id=248

It's very surreal to open a Peruvian website and find your family and friends' picture on the homepage!

Follow the Globetrotters... They are blogging from Peru!

http://www.dustinsgreenhouse.org/dustin_s_greenhouse_blog.html

Goodbye Cali

I am sad to report that my California life is coming to an end. On Monday, Addie and I will head east. I have some traveling that I have to do for work and then we will be relocating to Houston, TX for the remainder of the summer.

I'm not sure if it's having done this whole law school summer thing before or if it was just plain luck, but I have truly embraced the past two months in California (much more so than I did in New York last year). From Napa visits and city nights, to day-long hikes and Giants games by boat it has been an amazing experience. The pictures below capture a few memories outstanding from our California adventures. Arnold, I'm sorry we never had the chance to meet while I was out here but for the record you have a wonderful state.

We adapted to living lean on the west coast. It's incredibly rewarding to realize that (even in the United States) you can be so happy with so little. Just to put this "lean" lifestyle in perspective, here is an inventory of what we had in our one-bedroom apartment:

- 4 pieces of furniture (two barstools, a futon frame, a futon mattress
- 6 additional pillows that could be used to turn the above futon frame into a couch
- 4 plastic plates, 4 plastic bowls, 4 plastic cups, 1 box of plastic (disposable) utensils. Because these items were so limited they were used for a variety of means including eating, cutting, serving, pouring, etc. Let your imagination get creative because we sure did!
- I tried using the blue cups for vino purposes, but being this close to Napa, just could not do it, so we splurged and bought 4 additional wine glasses.
- an iron and ironing board











The view as you step outside our front door. The Santa Clara University baseball field with the mountains in the distance...



We spent the 4th of July on a friend's boat, watching the Giants game from the bay. Mike served as Grill Master and while no home run balls ever managed to come flying over the stadium wall, we had a fabulous afternoon.

Worn out from a day of sun and liquid pleasures, we took the evening of July 4th easy. We rented a movie and watched the fireworks displays of 5 different cities. (Crazy, I know, but there truly is about 1 city per 1 mile traveled on The 101.)







If you have not heard about the Berkeley Tree Sitters, well; we saw them too. What a strange experience... I think they have been there for almost 570 days straight now. They are protesting to save a group of old oak trees that sit directly in front of Berkeley's football stadium. When the city sued the university on the grounds that their stadium needed to be renovated/relocated because it sits on a major fault line, the school proceeded to make plans to cut down the old trees. As you can tell from the pictures below, there is a group of students (and towns people) who are not about to sit back and let these tress go without a fight. Their peaceful protest has taken on many different forms. At present, the "tree palace" has been torn down by the university and a fence with armed police officers has been set up around the perimeter. But three remain! They used to be able to come and go, but now if a protester touched down, they are arrested and not allowed back up. The university has also introduced a mild-starvation technique. (Obviously, the University is not referring to the food delivery in this way. But, because all they are allowing to go in the protesters' food-box pulley are granola bars and water, I am choosing to call it a starvation technique.)

The first few pictures below show what is left of the tree sitters' protest. When we got there last week, a guy at the base asked where we were from. Mike told him North Carolina and he proceeded to scream up to a camouflaged pod-looking-thing in the tree, "North Cakalacky in the house." A single head popped out of the well-hidden fort and screamed back, "woooo Carolina, hell yeah!" The other three pictures are ones I pulled from CNN in order to show you what the scene looked like days and months ago.



















Christie Cunningham also sent me a few more pictures from our weekend in San Fran... As you can tell, the first two are from our bike tour around the city - one at Alcatraz and one at the bottom of the Golden Gate Bridge. The picture with Mike was taken at our hotel just before dinner (wasn't he a lucky dude that evening). And the last one was taken during our visit to the Stanford campus.

DGH heads to Peru

The 5th (Dustin's GreenHouse) Globetrotter team left for Lima, Peru this morning. The group is comprised of ten high school students, two teachers, and three community volunteers. While in-country, the team will volunteer in an orphanage for abandoned girls in Iquitos (www.onesouladay.com), take a boat up the Amazon River to meet some of the locals and help out in their Peruvian village, explore Cusco's Sacred Valley and the ruins at Macchu Picchu, and fight the challenging terrain and altitude encountered on a three-day trek (through the Andes Mountains) to an old Incan city called Choquequirao.

Please keep this group in your prayers as they embark on this once-in-a-lifetime experience. I will do my best to keep all of you updated as I live vicariously through their journeys.