happy monday everyone! hope you all had some nice weather to enjoy

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and free time to do so! we finally had a pretty uneventful weekend planned, and then work piled up leaving me to pick up the slack on our days off. and actually, i'm totally okay with it because i really enjoy what i do. but, sometimes you just have to pull yourself away and carve out some time for family and friends, and that's exactly what i did. i decided it's been a little too long since we hosted a simple brunch, so i pulled out my simple entertaining tricks to prepare an easy spread that would bring us all together.

i teamed up with

yellow tail

for this gathering. they have a

new blend of sangria

they recently released, so with a few bottles of that and a few bottles of champagne, my table was basically set. i always recommend making one signature cocktail for your parties to decrease the stress of mixing cocktails all day. but this takes it one step further

…

all i did was put the bottles on ice and guests served themselves. i recommended mixing a bit of champagne with the

yellow tail sangria

, but also put out some oj. we started off with mimosas, then tried the mix, and eventually just enjoyed the sangria on it's own as the day progressed. probably the easiest cocktail i've ever served!

 to set a simple table, i try to stick with one color. since i knew i was going to serve the sangria, i wanted to stick with the wine + pink color palette. i picked up an amazing dahlia plant at lowes, chopped a few off for the table, then paired all of that with lots of white. always have white on hand! it goes great with everything and can look amazing on it's own.

instead of using traditional drink buckets, i grabbed some glass vases for the cocktails. i love that they don't compete with anything and really let the flowers and other details on the table shine!

i placed a few early morning appetizers out for guests while they waited for the main course. scones, muffins and donuts are the perfect finger food while mingling.

ryan and i decided on a few simple variations on the waffle. i've been wanting to make some waffle sandwiches for a while and finally had my chance! i didn't want to spend too much time in the kitchen though, so we prepared the bacon, chicken, fruit and cheese before hand. meat went in the oven to keep warm and the others went in the fridge. then as guests arrive, set it all out for a diy waffle bar. we did cook the waffles and eggs fresh, but they were simple and quick which didn't pull me away from the party for too long. here are the combos we tried:

- fried chicken with maple syrup

- eggs, bacon and cheddar

- strawberry, blueberries, bananas, powdered sugar and maple syrup

it was such a great day getting to lounge around for hours with people we love and don't spend nearly enough time with. i really think the table was key. for a small gathering, i loved having the snacks and drinks displayed on the table in a casual way

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it kept us all in one place chatting much longer than usual. what tricks do you guys have for a simple table setting?

[ i want to thank

yellow tail

for inspiring and making it possible for me to get everything together for this meal! you can check out their

new sangria here

]

oh, and just for fun

…

some

real life

pics from after the "photoshoot" :)