More pics from the sibling visit

These are a few of my favorite pics from Darrick & Alyssa's visit last week. Being with your family 24/7 for over a week is not an easy thing, but I did have so much fun and I do miss them already.

Darrick played the open mic at the Westville Pub. The crowd was kind of lame until he get's on stage and starts singing the "Free Credit Report dot com" commercial. Hilarious.

Alyssa: "I'm bringing big eyebrows back!"

Haha...my little brother has a beard. Beards are cool.

Darrick: "Lyss, you look just like mom in this picture."

Alyssa: "Shut up, bro!"

Happy Birthday, Dad!

Today is my dad's birthday! I just got back from Florida with my brother and sister, where we stayed with him for three days. He's living in Georgetown, FL, rural community surrounded by rivers and lakes, palm trees and sunshine. (Random fact: the closest river he is living next to is the St. Johns River, which is the only river that flows north, aside from the Nile). It is a beautiful area and I am happy to see my dad so happy! :o)

Citizen Cope!

My friend Larry did some sneaky detective work to get me one of the sweetest Christmas gifts this year. Knowing that I was going to be in Asheville in February, he saw that Citizen Cope was playing at the Orange Peel and got me a couple of tickets. Oh my, I love, love, love Cope! (And I love the Orange Peel too- such a great venue to see any act!) I have been listening to him since Jim turned me onto the Clarence Greenwood Recordings last year, and any of his CD's are such all-occasion, feelgood music. So I had been anxiously awaiting this show for a while and when it finally got here, I was ready! I had the two tickets, and we were able to score an additional one for my brother Darrick on Craigslist. I'm not going to lie and say that it was the best show I have ever been to. Truthfully, Cope seemed exhausted; it was the second to last tour date. But his vocals were amazing, and well, despite stepping in a giant puddle of vomit, I was able to make the best of it by squeezing up to the front row and snapping some great pics. Oh, and I got to meet him, too! Post-show, my sister pointed to the corner of the room, where he was signing body parts and t-shirts. I shamelessly pushed my way up to the front of the room, held out my arm and tried to use my 6 second platform to say something compelling to him. Was it compelling? No. But hey, I got to meet him and we had a great time! (And sorry for the tons of pictures...but I had to step in puke to get them, so I take great pride in them!)
Cope's swirly tour bus!

Mardi Gras, part two

My brother and sister came to visit me for a week; they made the roadtrip in one day from New Hampshire and were just in time for Fat Tuesday, the official day of Mardi Gras celebration. First thing was first: we needed costumes. I took Darrick, Alyssa and their friend Richie to the Goodwill Clearance Center, my new favorite place. We spent about an hour and a half rummaging through the bins of clothes, in search of colorful digs for our night of celebration. Here, Darrick is showing off his costume getup: some fancy purple velour pants, complimented by a retro polyesther shirt and a way-too-tight gold vest, topped with a vintage Reebok running jacket, circa 1989 and a fine selection of beads and pendants. Oh, and a sweet fishing hat.In true Lucas fashion, we made an event out of it. We got all gussied up and went in search of cool spots to have a photo shoot. We drove Janis down the railroad tracks in the River Arts District and found these great old buildings and murals for our shoot.

Lyss sewed her own dress out of an old nightshirt and random scraps of fabric...so pretty! :)

And, here is just some of our silliness:

Promo shot for VeggieArtGirl.com? Hmmmm.

Oh yeah, that's Richie. We made him join in, too. He was a good sport.Buttt...since it was Fat Tuesday and all, we enjoyed a fabulous sushi dinner at the Stir Fry Cafe. Tuesday nights: half price sushi. Seriously. We rocked out our crazy clothes in the fancy schmancy restaurant. I thought because Asheville is an alternative kind of place, that it would be full of people in costume. Nope. Just us. My brother kept asking me if it was a trick, as if I was finally able to get him to play dress-up with me after all these years. :)

I absolutely love this picture of my bro:
Post-sushi, we enjoyed some tradional Cajun tunes at a bar downtown, and wound up at an after-party for a burlesque show at Modaddy's, where there was a couple of musicians playing accordian. What a fun night!

Mardi Gras, part one

So, in sticking with the Mardi Gras theme of "Riches to Rags," this is what I came up with from my pile 'o random junk I got from Goodwill. Kind of a Madonna meets Punky Brewster meets Boy George thing going on. But the skirt was fun to make and swirled around when I spun. :o)

I met up with Jen, Jeri & Kim at the Thirsty Monk, for a couple pints o' porter. Mmmm. Just enough brew to not really know it was as cold as it was! :o)

The Mardi Gras parade went all through the city, and ended in Prichard Park.

Me: "Hey man, I love your costume! It's kind of like Alf meets the Wuzzles. Do you know who the Wuzzles were?"

This dude: "Sure do. I'm a Fervert."

The colors, the music, the energy...it was all so alive!

Drummers in Prichard Park--made for some sweet dancin' and hoola hoopin' tunes!

The sun was shining bright, but it was still a pretty brisk day--a good one for dancing!

Woot! Woot! Look at my skirt and my beads!

Beads, beads, everywhere! (My BFF Anna would have had the time of her life!)

So this dude was like, "give me your camera so I can take a picture of you, so you can prove you were here. Don't worry...I'm a professional." Haha!

A parade display for Budha Bagels on Merriman.

Post parade, I went to an after party at the Grey Eagle. They had a tradiational cajun band and cooking. And thought the food lines was awfully long, it sure was tasty-- fried green tomatoes, red beans & rice, shrimp gumbo...mmmm!

This was the queen of the ball-- she made her entire dress from old plastic bags!

Weee! It was so much fun! Did I mention that I love this place?