Uncooked Rice: My 27th Birthday

My 26th year was my best year yet!!! And it came to a close with a wonderful celebration of my 27th birthday!

The idea was born a few weeks before during a leisurely weekend breakfast with Mandi. We were discussing how we wished experiencing God through creativity was a more common practice and how we would like to spend more time doing it as well as invite our friends into it as well. That idea quickly turned into a party plan, and what better time to throw a party than on my birthday? (This also meant that people who don't consider themselves to be creative had to come, because it was my birthday! Ha!)

Mandi, the master decorator put together the invites.

Goodwill gives employees their birthday off, so I took Friday off to prep for the party. We ran our errands, had great Pho with Candace at my favorite restaurant in Atlanta. The afternoon was spent baking and prepping for brunch.

Here's the final show.

We had stratta, blackberry bundt cake, banana chocolate chip bread with a cream cheese middle, homemade granola with yogurt and fresh fruit, coffee, tea, oj, and mimosas! No one left hungry, and the boys even got to eat leftovers! (The boys celebrated my birthday at Dave and Busters, leaving the house to the women!)

Once everyone arrived, we ate for awhile and started the project. We left the invite very cryptic so no one knew what we were doing until we explained it. (Another attempt to lure people who don't get excited about being creative!)

Mandi and I spoke briefly about our identity in Christ, but then we let Graham Cooke do the talking. (The video is definitely worth the listen...but not the watch.)

During this talk, we had people close their eyes and pray about a word, or picture, or phrase God has for them to let them know of His love for them. After the talk, we decoupaged mirrors to symbolize what Christ sees when he looks at us. It was wonderful to see everyone's individual expressions because each was different and beautiful! Here are the final creations! (Sorry about the sideways pics--I don't know how to fix it! The flash also blocks out some of the mirrors. Oh well!)