Charleston

Our good friends Julie and Brady got married this weekend in Charleston (that's where she's from). Back in the fall, they had asked us to do their pre-marital counseling, and for Josh to officiate the wedding this March. We were thrilled to be a part of this with them, and what a bonus to get to go spend a weekend in the spring in beautiful Charleston, SC!!

We made the most of our short time there...did some legwork on the front end to make sure we ate at great restaurants and got to see some cool stuff. We chose Toast for breakfast.

This was Josh's breakfast, as described on their menu:

"Deluxe French Toast: Hand-cut currant bread stuffed with peaches

and topped with peach cider syrup".

Ridiculously good.

That's mine...a bacon, egg and cheese biscuit. A true classic.

(Yes, we were those people who were totally taking pictures of our food.

And not caring either.)

Next stop: Kudu. Super cool, local coffee shop. All fair-trade, organic coffee.

Funny magnet on the cash register

Hands-down the best mocha I've ever had.

How appropriate that the barista would put a heart on it : )

Love.this.guy.

Did I mention that we got to spend the weekend in Charleston,

just the two of us?! Ahhhhh.....

Strolled around a bit afterwards, taking in the coolness of the city.

We hit it just right too, because EVERYTHING was in bloom.

I'm a garden-lover, and it was gorgeous.

We toured some historic homes. They wouldn't allow cameras inside, which bummed me out because they were beautiful inside, especially the first one. It had the coolest staircase and was exquisitely restored, down to every detail. The second house was not in quite as good shape as the first, but was still really neat to tour. At that one, we got to see many of the outbuildings and former slave quarters as they were still intact.

Funny story: I had been researching places online before we went, and came across a sandwich shop called "Butcher & Bee". I was intrigued because the link I found for it mentioned a General Tso's Chicken sub. You don't see that every day, so I dug a little deeper and come to find out that it is owned by a friend I graduated high school with!

That sealed the deal that we would go there for lunch.

It's a cool place. It's one of those 'farm-to-fork' places that are popular now. They get everything local and organic, and their menu is different everyday, depending on what they have/get. So it's written up on a big chalkboard, and changes even over the course of the day as they run out of certain things (you can see where one has been crossed out with an '86' over it)

Cool old-fashioned cash register, and in the background is where most of the food prep takes place.

Bonus to get to meet up with Brandon and Emily Garrett for lunch as they were in town for the Plunk wedding too!

Here I go taking pictures of my food again, but I wanted to document it.

Josh and I each got a sandwich and split them so we could try more than one thing. That hamburger (on the right) was one of the best I've ever eaten.

Pimento cheese on top, with bread and butter pickles on brioche. Stop it.

I didn't even put any ketchup on it, which is amazing for me.

Usually my burgers are drowning in ketchup. Not this one though.

Perfection.

The restaurant's garden out back.

That's my friend, Mike, on the far right. He's being interviewed by Southern Living magazine (they actually sat next to us while we ate at the big community table!!)

How cool is that?!?

Fun to see Mike and surprise him!

A perfect way to spend the first part of our day in Charleston : )

We left here after a phenomenal lunch to go back and get ready for the big wedding...!!!