There was a very sleepy marathon hula hooper, a bed of nails, snake charming, tap dancing, burlesque, a breakdance battle, and a very sneaky magician…

Visit Red Riding Photography for lots more photos!

Saturday night was our biggest Weird Sisters show to date at Theatre Bizarre: The Initiation. After weeks of rehearsal and preparation by the TB family over at the Masonic Temple it was amazing to see everything come together. They built stages, hung banners and huge art pieces, switched out hundreds of light bulbs to give all SEVEN floors a spooky glow.

The morning of the show – we met at the Masonic for one final run through and wandered through the building as the morning sun crept through the halls.

At 7 p.m. the doors opened and cleverly costumed pledges began to filter in. People get really creative with their costumes – store bought is just not an option for Theatre Bizarre.

Mae, Mandy and Nate came to show their support.

The zombified Detroit Party Marching Band wandered through the halls, stopping in the middle of the lobby for an enthusiastic breakdown, complete with clapping, dancing and silly string.

Pants was a well dressed horse for the night and was stopped multiple times by random people for photos.

There were multiple stages, spooky lounge singers and burlesque dancers, the Odditorium full of magicians & sideshow freaks, suspensionists hanging in glass boxes, undead elevator operators manually moving the cars between floors, a ghost train (which I never managed to locate).

The Detroit Fire Guild, painted like steely-abbed devils, were positioned throughout the building and on the columns out front spinning fire and flipping on stilts.

Only way to drink wearing the horse mask :) Pants was one sweaty mess once he took that thing off.

My mask for the party, which I made a few nights before. I threw on my ‘target for a knife thrower’ outfit in between shows.

There aren’t many people in these pictures, but I assure you the place was packed. I saw a ship full of pink-horned vikings, a sexy female Elvis, a space girl wearing a lighted bubble helmet, far too many black swans, Maurice from Little Monsters, the Wizard of Oz w/his hot air balloon, multiple yip-yips, and my favorite of the whole night…the priest from Beetlejuice.

Last two photos are from Detroit photographer Joe Gall, so you can see how freaking cool the place looked :)

Photos and video from our performance are coming soon :) And thank you to Mae and Irina for the pictures as I was running around most of the night and only had a couple on my iPhone.

A few weeks ago on our little Detroit date, Mandy and I stopped at the Heidelberg Project. I have a talent with directions and can sort of wander into the area I think something is located and magically find my way there. After a few twists and turns we look to our right and there it was, the Heidelberg Project in all its junk covered glory.

The Heidelberg Project is an art installation created in 1986 by Tyree Guyton and his grandfather Sam Mackey. In the 25 years since the project’s creation there has not be one act of violence on a street previously riddled with drugs and crime. It’s a bright spot in a not-so-great area on the east side of the city and a grand statement on taking things into your own hands to make your neighborhood a better place.

Many of the painted houses are still occupied – Guyton’s mother lives in the Dotty Wotty house. Last year they collected hundreds of shoes and covered the entire street. Even one of those giant shoe chairs showed up. Now there are piles of discarded and painted shoes throughout the property, along with a towering stack of stuff animals in a boat, a half-buried pink Hummer, and (somehow) three shopping carts on the top of a tree.

First was dinner and unfortunately Cadieux Cafe is not terribly vegetarian friendly except for their delicious fries. Bill downed a giant, GIANT bowl of muscles. They smelled so good I was tempted to try one, but the smell could not over power the way they looked.

After dinner it was time to learn the delicate art of feather bowling. There is an actual feather stuck in the dirt on each end of the trench and you take a ball that resembles a large wheel of cheese and chuck it toward the other side of course trying to land it as close to the feather as possible.

I only managed to come close to the feather once and was much better and throwing it slightly short and blocking the other team.

If balls from both team land close to the feather then you use some sort of stick thing to see who is closest.

The stick thing also makes a great guitar.

And if you’re terrible at feather bowling you can just enjoy their wide selection of Belgian beer (ignore the PBR there :)

A group of children took over the row of cornhole games, running and jumping over the boxes and stealing the bags mid-game. We had pumpkin beer, steamy pierogi (almost as good as mine :) and McClures spicy pickle chips.

Pants even bought me a comfy Tashmoo tee :)

Today I’m over at Bucket List Nation talking about some of my favorite spots in Detroit.
Click here to read the article!

Saturday was date night. We had dinner at the best pizza place in town, Supinos. Their scarlet margarita always worth the hour wait. With time to kill before the show we wandered over to the east side, winding through streets until we found the Heidelberg Project. Pants had never seen it in person so I was excited to take him there.

I’ve got a whole post explaining this giant art project coming soon!

Pants took my outfit photos for this post, so I made him pose too :)

After the Heidelberg we drove around a deserted Belle Isle – the best place from which to see the beautiful lights of the city at night. Pants serenaded me with the oh so romantic Turbo Negro before heading over to St. Andrews for the show. I’d seen MCS the night before with my sister when they played their first two albums and was lucky enough to get into the second night too.

Tank, sweater, jeans: F21, Boots: Olsenboye, Bag: Matt & Nat, Sunglasses: Kohls

Sunday was for sleeping past noon, eating leftover pizza for breakfast, taking the piglet on a long walk and mowing the lawn with my new reel mower. That thing is hard to push sometimes, but when my dad and Pants both say they don’t think I’ll be able to do it I sure as hell am going to bust my ass to cut the grass all on my own :p Ended the day with spicy super veggie soup, snuggles on my tiny couch and bad TV. <333

Tucked away on the edge of Mexicantown is La Gloria bakery. The air is soak in sugar and an entire wall is loaded with cookies, cakes, biscuits, and buns. Mandy and I ooooh-ed and aaaahh-ed in a completely inappropriate way as we stared at the wall of treats before loading our trays and heading for the register. The second we parked our asses in my car we each crammed a cream puff into our mouths and began another round of moaning and cursing the deliciousness.

After spending the day gallivanting all over Detroit, Mandy and I met up with Mae at Dally in the Alley, a street fair in Cass Coridor started in 1982. The streets were full of drunken college kids, hippies, hipsters and straight-laced looking adults. Vendors selling everything from hand-made soap and hula hoops to Detroit-themed t-shirts and vintage. Mandy and I had our eyes on the tent selling homemade potato chips slathered in nacho cheese. There are very attractive pictures of us stuffing our faces, which I will not be posting :p

This is one of my favorite street fairs in the city because it’s centered around a block of apartments, partially rented by students. There is a party on every balcony and stoop with twinkle lights strung everywhere.  There are multiple stages, some tucked away in the alleys, with all kinds of music from techno to rock and soul.

As we were leaving Dally we passed by the Detroit Party Marching Band, a rag-tag group of musicians in vintage uniforms playing some semblance of marching band music, parading through the crowd.

On Saturday Mandy and I went on a romantic date, running all over Detroit, taking photos for a travel blog post I’m working on. We stopped at a bunch of old faves and found a few new places we’ll have to go back and visit. Per usual by the end I was all teary-eyed over how much I love this city. There is a hostel now, right near the train station and the best barbecue in town. So if you want to come for a visit I’d be happy to show you around!

We had lunch at an artisan deli called Mudgies, which I’ve heard rave reviews from multiple people. It’s hidden on the edge of Corktown next to a cute little park. Most of their produce is locally sourced and they had a bunch of delicious sounding veggie sandwiches and McClure’s dill chips (!!!), so I’m definitely going back.

Of course we stopped at the train station. It’s rare that I’m driving past during the day and there were only a few other people there taking photos. I don’t care if it’s “ruin porn,” it’s still my favorite building in the city. Magestic and creepy at the same time.

I’ll be posting about a few other places we stopped by in the next couple weeks. We’re starting a list of places to visit, so except more Detroit love in the future!