Marissa's World: the dirty 30!

i'm a bad wife. oh man! i am a few days late on giving the update on brian's 30th birthday this past weekend (1/25/2009-which he just LOVED the newhope t-shirts to compliment his day!ha!).

let me start from the top. john white, our friend and small group leader (with his wife kylie) owns the renaissance chickfila behind supertarget. we practically live there, love the food, the kid's night, and the good times! so just at john's store, you can become part of their membership club, just by visiting 10 times and having the card filled out.

i did this a couple months ago and received a welcome packet with lots of goodies, etc. but the most amazing goody was an invitation for you to bring 50 of your friends to chickfila for a party, and they all get a free combo! at first, i thought it was a joke. i mean, 50 people eat for free?? brian immediately says that's what he wants for his 30th birthday party. if you know brian, you are not surprised by this....

so we set the date on saturday the 24th, since chickfila is not open on sundays. we got black balloons, a cake, and gifts and just had a blast! the family came down too! it was a fun and wonderful time. so our thanks to john, chickfila, and their generosity for giving bri a 30th party he'll never forget!

the kids at chickfila

birthday boy blowing out his candles!

since i didn't think his birthday celebration should end at 7pm, we had a small group head over to the Red Room in raleigh. you guys know me and my sisters love to dance, and since shelley was in town, we had to go! i've never been to red room, but we chose it because it is a restaurant (not that clubby feel) and we could eat even more! hahaha. the median age was probably 42 years old, a more mature crowd (except for my sister's husband jason-who is more than enough entertainment!!!!). but it was fun, filling, and tiring. we were home by 1am since we had a big day at church the next am!

my sister shelley and jason

kim and steve and holly and david to dinner #2 and some dancing!

we celebrated vision day (the church's 7th anniversary) on our new campus in a tent with worship led by the UNC gospel choir. it was awesome!!!! i sometimes forget that brian and i weren't even married when we started with newhope. i still have very vivid memories of the very first sunday in the high school. i pray God continues to use this church!

we hustled home and threw a little family party for chase's 5th birthday (although it is next week), but we wanted to take advantage of having the family in town. it was batman themed and he had a blast with all of his cousins and a couple preschool buddies. i can't believe my baby is 5, seriously.