Life Lately | December Holiday Parties

I realize that this post seems a tad bit delayed, but I couldn't not share a look back at the holidays. 

I started the month off by attending an awesome event featuring guest chef William Dissen of the Marketplace in Asheville, NC. You can read a full recap of the event here. 

The food was so amazing! Pictured above is an heirloom pumpkin soup and below is braised beef brisket on top of a carolina gold rice cake, topped with smoked chili crema, pickled ramps, and a radish & herb salad. 

Our sweet friends always invite Whit and I to go with them to the Christmas Candlelight service at the Citadel every year. It's always such a beautiful service and a good reason to get together with friends that we don't see as often as we like.

Dinner and drinks afterwards at Little Jack's Tavern...the baked eggs are a must!

Monster thoroughly enjoyed the Christmas tree being up. She only tried to take down a few ornaments. How can you ever be mad at that cute face?!

This photo may gross some of you out, but I think it's a beautiful thing. Our company Christmas party was at Leon's Oyster Shop and of course oysters were on the menu, among several other things.

We celebrated my friend Cayce's birthday with a delicious dinner at Fat Hen. I ate there a few months ago and had the best beef short ribs, so I couldn't resist ordering them again.

A few of us got together for a little Christmas party at my best friend Megan's house. Holiday parties are a great excuse for cheese plates like this one. Am I right? I could make a meal out of this.

My contribution was a batch of these super simple no bake oreo bars. 

We also did a white elephant gift exchange. I was the lucky recipient of a fancy track phone.

We celebrated Christmas a week early with Whit's side of the family since we typically spend the actual holiday with mine. Whit and I treated his mom to dinner at Xiao Bao Biscuit. No visit to this restaurant is complete without ordering the okonomiyaki!

A new brewery opened up in our area. It has a super chill laid back vibe. The perfect spot for a casual beer with friends.

Not too far down the street from the new brewery is a dessert bar and cafe called Gala Desserts. I've been wanting to check out for a while now and finally found the time to give it a try over the holidays. The vanilla cappuccino is amazing!

We celebrated my husband's 31st birthday with dinner at our local hibachi restaurant. This has become somewhat of a birthday tradition for him. It's the only place that can seat a group as large as we normally have. This is the best photo we could get..and still not everyone was in it.

I put together the mother of all cheese boards on Christmas Eve. I went a little crazy at Trader Joe's and bought all sorts of different cheese and crackers. It was well worth it!

We also did our annual holiday baking. It's safe to say that there was no shortage of cookies or cheese.

It was so nice to spend Christmas at home with my family.

We had lunch at Minero one afternoon and I decided to branch out and try something new by getting the Torta del Dia. Zero regrets! This sandwich was sooo good!

More December birthday celebrations...

We ended 2016 with a casual evening spent with great friends, pizza, champagne and Mariah Carey's interesting New Year's Eve performance. How cute are these Polaroid pics that we took?!