I don't know too many newlyweds who'd want to meet up with all of their family for brunch the morning after their wedding...but like I said before, Christy & Steven are stellar kids. There was family from Virginia, Rochester NY, and Toronto. All in one place.
One of Christy & Steven's favorite places for brunch is Stacks Pancake House in Dana Point, so that's where we headed...
Being a Gresch, one of the things that I was incredibly excited about when I joined TJ's family was the Gottschalks' enthusiasm for card playing {and card trickery from Uncle Jeff}. You can count on him to have a deck of cards in his pocket and a few tricks up his sleeve. It was so refreshing and comforting to have a little card-playing-fun in sunny Southern California, but oh how it made me reminisce about Upstate New York and Papa's basement.
I mean, who has this much fun the morning after their wedding?!
Caleb and Grandma played about a million rounds of "Ready Set BYE". If it encourages smiles like this, well he can repeat it as many times as he wants...
Quite the contrast from the night before, Lilly Belle was having a sweet time at breakfast.
Let's just have a moment for this masterpiece I absolutely demolished.
If I'm going to a hip/new place, I'm going to Google the heck out of it. And I'm going to Yelp it. And I'm going to find hashtags on Instagram. Call me shallow, these things matter. A few people recommended the eggs benedict {which TJ pointed out i always order}, a few recommended the macadamia nut pancakes with coconut syrup...but what grabbed my attention was the Spicy Chicken & Bacon Waffle. Holy heck. It was like Sriracha & buffalo sauce made a happy baby and poured everything over a cheese sauce, bacon, and chicken, AND WAFFLES.
I digress.
Even TJ's dad had a few tricks up his sleeve for Uncle Jeff.
After brunch we made our way down to Doheny State Beach for a little sun and sand.
Wait. Is that Angelina Jolie + Brad Pitt??
Caleb had to test out his new Morey boogie board from Uncle Matthew.
It was a much more overcast day than we're used to this far into the summer. But I wasn't complaining! I'm currently sweating, so I'll take overcast any day, but I just really want California to shine when family is here from out of town.
On Sunday we had a late dinner/early lunch at Old World in Huntington Beach. If you've known the Gottschalk side of the family for any amount of time, you know of their love of their German heritage; specifically their food and brews. Uncle Jeff took us to a German restaurant in Rochester around five years ago and Caleb chowed down on sauerkraut as a ten month old baby! I grew up with a lot of German style food, so I was so excited to head to Old Town.
My dunkelweizen {maybe?}.
A few of the coasters at the restaurant reminded us of our very sweet Uncle Paul {who was undoubtedly there with us in spirit, cracking jokes, and grinning from ear to ear}. Miss you, UP.
I had...pork? Haha. Sauerkraut, and spaetzle. It was amazing.
Who better to get in the cut-out than Uncle Jeff.
The Gottschalks, ladies and gents {minus a few}. Loved chatting with Aunt Karen and Uncle Jack.
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