These two things have nothing to do with each other except that they occurred within a week of whirl-wind activities. Yolanda had a trade show in Chicago, so we made a long weekend of it with our good friends, Marianne, Jeff, Matt and Cindy (who is from Chicago). This is our second year and we hope to do it again. Chicago is my kind of town, as Frank so aptly crooned.

The first thing we did on arrival was to make our way to a Cubs game at Wrigley Field. Wrigley is snuggled into a neighborhood where stadium seating is built on top of the buildings so people can watch from the comfort of their roofs. This was my second baseball game ever, and was it a cliff-hanger! The cubs were leading, 3-0 at the bottom of the 9th when we decided to head out to beat the crowd. By the time we crawled out of the subway, it was tied 3-3. We rushed back to our hotel and watched as they duked it out into the 13th inning. Two men on base and the Cubs hit it out of the park for a 5-3 win. Pretty exciting stuff!

Wrigley Field, Chicago

And about that wedding band…haha!

Our friends Cal and Alex recently tied the knot in The Plains, Virginia on their amazing country estate. They were going all out and were in need of a killer band for the reception and something small for the recessional. My partner, Jeff Bonk, happens to play in a brass quintet as well as a show band called Bittersweet, so I arranged for them to hook up. The family of both grooms proceeded to Bonk’s arrangement of Sister Sledge’s “We are Family,” and they all receded to a rousing chorus of “Happy Together” by the Turtles.

Wedding Site

Brass Quintet with Jeff Bonk playing bass trombone

After the ceremony, we had drinks by the pool and ate an amazing dinner for 250(!)  on the lawn, and then kicked off our shoes to dance the night away. Sorry – no photos!