Happy (One Day Belated) to Robo!!

Yesterday was Robin's 24th birthday. Since I was busy blogging about our party (and cleaning and partying!) I didn't get a chance to do her super fabulous special birthday post. So here it is, one day late.

Just a FEW Wonderful Things About Robin...

1. She loves EVERYONE and appreciates EVERYTHING.
2. Christopher and I consider her family, the guest room is "Robin's Room" because we ask her to stay over so often (even though she just lives across the road).

1. She's bouncy. Really bouncy.
2. She has an enormous stuffed animal collection. It's so big it's actually frightening - and they all have names and back stories. And you're not really allowed to play with any of them because she doesn't take the tags off. They also are not allowed to be placed on the floor without some type of blanket underneath (floors are dirty).
3. She has a princess bookcase (and princess hi-de-hole).

1. Obsessed with Tinkerbell.
2. Works 9,000 different jobs for zero pay just because she loves helping others and teaching kids.
3. She's the brain guru. She's freaky about brains.
4. She can devour a whole loaf of holla (sp?) in like 20 minutes.
5. Koalas make her squeal in a super-sonic tone.
6. She's a work-a-holic and loves office supplies (not as much as me, but she's getting there).

1. She's two inches too tall to qualify for midget status - bummer. As Matty says, she's "wee."
2. She's funny, especially when she's had a few drinks.
3. She is so super loving and so excited for Christopher and I to get married.
4. She WANTS to walk with my brother in the wedding party. Sweet. Apparently they're going to practice their "walk" this weekend.
5. WE LOVE HER!!!

So happy, happy, happy 24 years to our little Robo. Thanks for sharing your b-day with me for the second year in a row!! xoxo

Our Birthday Party

Tonight, Robin and I had our annual birthday party. Just a few friends over at our house to celebrate my 27th and Robo's 24th. (Robin's special birthday post will come soon, I just wanted to get party pictures up tonight).


The party was a lot of fun, we had a BEAUTIFUL spread of peanut butter & jelly triangles, string cheese with trivia (Joe was disappointed that he was outsmarted by cheese), veggies, chips, dips, pop, beer, and Matty and Robin made strawberry margaritas. I won't even begin to explain THAT disaster in my kitchen...


Joey made us this AMAZING cake - a double-decker this year! I couldn't believe it. It was absolutely delectable and everyone was so impressed. Well done, JoJo!


And I wonder why people think Matty isn't my husband. :-) A true Matty/Mins shot.




Steph and Regev -- SO sweet. Rosie came to the party too! I'm so excited for Stephanye to move in with Chris and me in July. Her and Rosalind need a place to crash for 6 weeks before they move to Israel so they're going to stay in our spare bedroom. Steph is SUPER excited about the "window seat" and Rosie pooped in our yard within the first 10 minutes so I think she felt at home.


This is what we call Christopher's "Matthew Perry" shot.


Robin and I's friends from grad school - we're all graduating on Sunday! Hip hip hooray!! :-)

Birthday Wrap-Up

So, today wasn't quite what I had in mind; everyone tells me that the older I get, the lower my expectations need to be. Maybe it's just because school just finished and I've been so insane or because graduation is coming up - I don't know. I didn't have the "Kristi Minsterman" birthday I'm used to having. Maybe next year. Or Wednesday when Robin and I have our joint party.

Speaking of Robin... She took me to Ben and Jerry's for dinner (HA!) and then Boston Market for a mashed potato dessert. Robin knows my deep love for giraffes so this is what I got...


Holy cow, please tell me that is not the cutest darn thing you have EVER seen?? Swarovski crystal giraffe. Apparently his name is chit-chat - whatever the heck that means, so I renamed him Jorge. The hispanic sidekick to Georgie the giraffe. Speaking of Robin - send good thoughts her way, she has a job thing tomorrow. Oh, and her b-day is Wednesday!!

Some photos of Christopher's office transformation. I wish I had before shots but he would have NEVER let me share them. For those of you who have seen it previously, enjoy. It's the only room in my house that is clean right now. But that's ok, he was COMPLETELY surprised and LOVES it. :-)

New dresser, neatly packed with perfectly folded clothes.

Scanning right...

Hooray for it no longer being just a storage room!!

Desk - I cleaned the top and set up his computer things.

This may just look like a drawer, but it was 10 years worth of crap paperwork. It took hours for me to get it to look like this.

Even organized and cleaned out the bookcase.

Diploma and some random books.

I'm still working on organizing his files. I have most of them done, but a huge pile to shred and it's going to take a few more days to get through them. Plus, I have people coming to my house on Wednesday for a party so it'd be nice if the rest of the house was at least PICKED UP since C's office is now spotless. I must say, I'm pretty proud of myself. :-D

Thank you to everyone who sent birthday well-wishes through phone, text, mail, Facebook etc. Every single one made me smile. Sorry I couldn't get back to everyone today, but I'll work on it this week.

Happy 27th to Kristi Leigh!!

YAY - IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!

Hip hip hooray! Today is my birthday! Instead of hiking with my fiance in the expected beautiful Charlottesville weather, I'm hanging in jammies because of rain. Oh well. Laziness trumps exercise anyhow, especially the older you get. ;-)

I'm so excited to be 27 - I heard it is a fabulous year. (No one told me that, I just keep telling it to myself!) Since so many people dislike turning one year older, I make it a point to appreciate the fact that I survived another 365 days. So, looking back - let's see what good came out of year number 26...

Year 26 Happenings & Accomplishments

1. I finished grad school - FINALLY! After 9 years of higher education I am FINALLY DONE! Graduating this coming Sunday with a 4.0. :-D
2. I got rid of the Acura (oh, I still mourn this decision) and bought a more wallet-friendly car. The sleek, the sporty, the boy-magnet, the Volvo station wagon. Aptly named Victor after the Lone Ranger's nephew's horse.
3. I GOT ENGAGED!! What an accomplishment. I remember being little and mama telling me about her wedding. She said she had just turned 21 when her and daddy wed and I remember thinking... "wow, TWENTY-ONE?!? I could never wait that long to get married." :-) Well, the marriage will come one month before I'm 28.
4. We got our house. A controversial decision, but the right one for us. We rent, don't own yet obviously, but it is SO nice to not have to worry about cranky apartment neighbors.
5. I got my main man Georgie. Sidekick to Fluffy, Tubby, and Leo Lionni, Georgie joined the crew as the baby this past fall.
6. I bought a wedding gown. YAY!!
7. I applied to 8 school districts for teaching jobs only to hear back from ZERO. (Maybe this is a 27 year old thing).
8. I CLEANED AND ORGANIZED CHRISTOPHER'S OFFICE. Sadly, this may have been my greatest accomplishment of my 26th year. He loves it though so I'm happy.
9. Did I mention that I finally FINISHED SCHOOL!?!?!?

There are obviously many, many more that I can't think of currently in my whirlwind of birthday excitement, but let it suffice that some really great things happened during my 26th year and thank God I made it to 27 to see what that holds in store. (Christopher says your hips start to hurt at 27....)

And a LOVELY photo of me at 9:11 am, when I technically turned 27 years old. Don't I look gorgeous??

I Should Have Been a Lawyer...

Let me begin by saying I am so tired. So so so so so tired. This is my last night as a grad student after 5 years. And I am just so tired...

Don't worry, I'm not changing careers AGAIN. But for the past few nights I've been doing work in the law school library because 1) the education library is one depressing room with no electrical outlets, 2) the law library is open until 2:00 am during finals, and 3) law library is PRETTY.

Now seriously, for my program being ranked 5th in the nation, one would think we would have nicer facilities. Yeah yeah - I know we're getting an additional building next year and it will probably be wonderful, but there is absolutely ZERO reason why the lawyers get to study HERE.

And these aren't even good shots (I didn't actually want the hot law school boys to see me taking dorky photos). Three floors of literary bliss.

Looks like it's going to be another all-nighter. I was up until 8:00 am yesterday (well I guess today), slept til 2:00 pm, went to the library at 6:00 pm and just got home at 1:30 am. Final paper is due at 4:00 pm today. 14 hours to go and I'm currently at 35 pages. I just need to keep on keeping on!

P.S. Thank you for all the prayers for Lindsey. We got some more information last night and today, she has surgery scheduled for the 18th. Please keep her, Tommy, Lori, and Jakey in your thoughts.
P.P.S. I love you Linds. :-)

So This is Six AM...

I had no idea. I have lived here since August and I don't think I have ever seen what 6:00 am looks like. Well here you go ladies and gentlemen. My front yard and back yard in the wee hours of the morning. Yes, I realize this is two blogs so far this morning, but I've found that blogging is a good paper-writing break.

Just brewed some coffee. Hoping to get at least another hour or two of work in before I crash (and crash I will). Come on Thursday night.

Yikes! It needs to stop raining so we can cut our grass!!

Dear Mrs. Hartwell

Friday I received my very first letter addressed to Mrs. Hartwell. My little Annie that I tutor and love so dearly is super excited that Christopher and I are getting married. She wrote me this note to thank me for helping her with math. :-) This little chickie could barely write her name when she entered first grade and now she is just absolutely incredible. It was so weird to think that this is the first piece of "student mail" I received under a teacher name I'm going to have for the rest of my life. Only one more year of Miss Minsterman and then Mrs. Hartwell it is!

Update from the house - things are crazy. Had a MINOR breakdown today about everything that is going on in my life. I have my final paper due for school on Thursday and am way behind schedule (hence the fact I am writing this at 3:15 in the morning). But come Friday I will hopefully be a much happier, much less anxious girl.

Thanks for all the prayers for Lindsey. Please keep them coming!

Stressed Much? Try Organizing!

One day in college my roommate Louis came home to find me spring cleaning my bedroom. I had the furniture pulled out, a bucket of water to clean the walls, and was blasting Tom Petty as I scrubbed the baseboards.

"Holy crap, Mins. Did your fish die?!?!?"

To most, this would seem like an absurd question directed at a person who was just trying to tidy up a house she shared with SIX FRAT BOYS. But the more I thought about it, it made perfect sense. Although I am obsessive with cleaning (at least I was before I met Christopher), my strong spurts come when I get really stressed out. Some people drink under pressure, others smoke, I organize. And Louis had seen me through grad school applications and a host of other stressful events and assumed that something TERRIBLE must have happened for me to be cleaning so vigorously. (No, Tritan did not die, I really was just spring cleaning).

Fast forward to last night. I'm up, studying for my very last grad school final exam. I am, of course, running through my usual course of creating a hierarchical study guide by combining the lecture notes, extra research, and class readings into outline form. I am on page ten when BAM. It's gone. It just disappeared. All my work. All my beautifully organized work was gone. I looked at the clock. 3:50 am. I still had one essay to write for the take-home portion and a few more lectures to work through before the exam. Hyped up on my octuple-shot of espresso, too frustrated to work, and too wired to sleep, I had no other choice. I had to. It called to me.

I organized Christopher's closet.

Sick. I am a sick, sick person. Who does this when their computer crashes? Who decides to organize? (I took a picture because there is a slim chance it will ever look like this again). Having restored my sense of order and control with the world, and feeling only slightly ridiculous, I headed to bed. If only he were as excited about his right-to-left order by shirt type system as I am, boy we would be the PERFECT team. Oh well - they say opposites attract. ;-)

Isn't Espresso Supposed to Come in a Teeny-Tiny Cup??

Not for grad school finals!! This has GOT to be at least an octuple-shot of espresso. Isn't my fiance the most wonderful man in the world for making me this? HERE WE GO 717!!

My Girl, Revised

Linds likes this picture better. :-)
Isn't she GORGEOUS?!?

I know I always say that Christopher is the love of my life, and he is, but this girl is a very close second. Lindsey is my family - she's the daughter of one of my best friends Lori, whose family I lived with while I was in the hospital. I used to baby-sit Linds years ago when her and Jakey were little. She has my old bedroom furniture. We used to play catch together. She is a gorgeous, smart, talented, caring, amazing, funny, and loving girl.

Lindsey got hit with a line drive during softball last week. I'm hesitant to say more just to respect the privacy of the family, but she will need surgery soon. I plan to head to Maryland for her operation as we have seen each other through quite a few illnesses. Tom and Lori have been so good to me and I cannot imagine my life without them.

Long story short, I know a lot of people read the blog to keep up on the happenings of the Minsterman-Hartwell household. Because of that, I ask that you all say a little prayer for Lindsey and her family. She is such a resilient young woman (14 years old) and I know in my heart will be just fine. :-) But I would appreciate all the prayers we can get.

Dress Dilemma

Look what arrived yesterday! The first of the four bridesmaid dresses. I was told they were backordered until the end of June, but since Robin ordered a petite (she's like 4 feet tall) they had hers in stock.

I was SO excited to open the box. I made Christopher come downstairs and watch. He wouldn't stand too close to me because, as he said, "I don't want to be near if you if you don't like it." Of course I made a huge deal out of it since it was the first thing for the actual wedding that arrived in the mail.

Have you ever gone to take a sip of what you thought was pop to find out it's water? It doesn't necessarily taste BAD, it's just not what you expected so you're a little bit shocked. Yeah - that was me. Although named "clover" the dress is not actually the color of any clover I have ever seen. It has more of a yellow undertone. The actually style is GORGEOUS - lightweight and breezy - I just wasn't impressed with the color. Bummer.

It's a good thing we ordered early because it has a snag in the silk too so we'll have to return it no matter what. Luckily J.Crew lets you return to the store free of charge and just order another no big deal. I just have to decide if I want to stick with the color. Robin really likes it and it's not that I DON'T like the color, I do - it's pretty, it is just NOT what I was expecting/hoping for. I looked online at some other places and didn't find much - especially much you could wear again so we may just stick with these. It just kind of takes my "vision" of the colors and turns it all around.

Anyone have thoughts? It looks darker in the photos (which is what happened online). Sigh. Silly J.Crew. Or silly Kristi's computer monitor.

Girls Night Out

School is a complete Debbie Downer these days. My anxiety has been horrible and I know I only have to get through the next few weeks until graduation, but the thought that I'm leaving UVA without a job lined up is quite unnerving.

Therefore, back to the wedding fun! Tonight Suzie, Stephanye, and I are going to see Bride Wars on grounds at the UVA theater. Since the movie is out on DVD already, the tickets are only $3 - hooray! I have been waiting to see this since it was released, but I have issues spending $10 for a regular movie theater ticket.

Oh, and in case anyone was wondering. I tried on the dress that Anne Hathaway wears at Vera Wang. It looked hideous on me - good thing I couldn't afford it. :-)

Heaven Must Be Front Row DMB

Dave Matthews Band - Friday, April 17th
Taken with my cruddy camera phone

For those of you who frequent Facebook, this is old news. For all others - boy did I get lucky this past Friday. My good friend Suzie and I attended the Dave Matthews show in Charlottesville. The band originated in Charlottesville - actually the mother of one of my tutees said she used to listen to him in people's backyards - so his shows at home are always extra special.

Suzie's husband works at John Paul Jones arena and secured us tickets for the show. We thought it would be a great way to spend a Friday night - a few $6 beers and a jam session. Little did we know how the night would end up for us. Let me just say this, God bless Joe.

We got to the arena and waited in the lobby for Joe to come see us. He told Suzie that he had a "present" for her so we were playing a guessing game of what it could be. Suz figured it was a set list - it's always fun when Joe can get these little things for us - we turn into giddy high school girls again. He came out and we chatted for awhile and Suzie said, "hey - where's our present?" And Joe hands her two tickets.

She handed one to me and we kept staring and then looking at each other, then back to the tickets. "Um... honey, these say Floor, Section 1, Row A." And Joe just smiled. WE HAD FRONT ROW SEATS TO DAVE. After asking several times if it would be inappropriate for me to kiss her husband, Suzie and I made our way down to the floor. As the usher walked us closer and closer the stage, the harder we giggled. We knew those were our seats but had a hard time believing it. He finally said - here we are, seats 23 and 24. CENTER STAGE. There were 20,000 people at this concert and Joe had gotten us the best seats in the house. NOW THAT IS WHAT MARRIAGE IS ALL ABOUT!!!

We immediately sat down and started text messaging every person we knew. My mama had the best response with, "Congratulations! Stay off the stage and out of jail. Have fun." We decided we better use the bathroom and get some more beer/fries/pop because after DMB came on, we were NOT going to be able to leave for 2.5 hours. We came back, sat down, and started chatting with the security guards, asking when Dave was going to start. There was a black curtain surrounding the stage. We knew we were close, but I don't think we had any idea HOW close until that curtain opened.

Seriously - we were less than 15 feet from him. We could see the sweat falling down his face. We witnessed all of his facial expressions. We screamed and jumped and screamed and jumped. It was an incredible show and I cannot thank Joe and Suzie enough. It was, no doubt about it, a once in a lifetime experience.

Oh, and... I caught Dave's guitar pick at the end of the night. SWOOOOOOOON.

Team Seth

TEAM SETH

Because we had two soon-to-be-eight-year-olds that are very special to us (my cousin Seth and Christopher's nephew Gabriel), we decided to forgo the idea of a ring bearer and have mini ushers. We will have four ushers total (note: not groomsmen, these are real ushers - in charge of seating guests) - 2 on my side and 2 on Christopher's side. I could not ask for a better team of people to seat my large family than TEAM SETH.

"Big Seth" has been one of my very best friends since we starred in the kindergarten circus together. We attended elementary school, junior high, and high school together. We went to our senior prom together. We have attempted to see the Yankees/Red Sox from box seats only to get a 40 degree rain out. He is, by far, the person I miss the most from high school. And although we rarely get a chance to catch up with one another, not a day goes by that I don't think about him. (If you couldn't tell the "white hair" similarity, Seth's sister Morgan is one of my bridesmaids). I wanted to make Seth a bridesmaid (along with Burk) but both got angry and said they wouldn't wear green dresses. Men these days...

Be sure to click the images for a close up shot!

Kindergarten Circus - 1988
Seth is the cute tiger in the bottom left.
I'm the huge head with a little bow and red outfit in front of the ringmaster.

No green dress but apparently blue hair is just fine.

Senior Prom - May 2000

"Little Seth" has been keeping me laughing since he learned how to talk. My little buddy who knew more about dinosaurs at 3 than I do now, he would always relay reliable information such as the ones that have "a bony neck frill to scare off predators." (Seth, which one was that again??) Seth and Burk became fast buddies and doubting the validity of a UVA master's degree, asked if "Bert could read." Upon realizing that Burk COULD read, Seth schooled him when he mispronouned a dinosaur name saying, "let's find one you can pronounce." SMACK. Well little Seth is quickly becoming big Seth and is finishing first grade this year so by the time we are married he will be a SECOND-GRADER. Whew, time flies.

Now that is some cousinly love!

Hanging with Uncle Barry - GO HOOS!

Jedi Master

It will be difficult to tell these two apart. Little Seth wanted to know Big Seth's middle and last name to make sure things don't get REALLY confusing. Rest easy, little guy, they are different. Although you both have the initials SR!!

These are two of the most important guys in my life - definitely the most important Seths, and I could not be happier that both of them agreed to work in tandem to seat the enormous and neverending bridal family. I love you Big Seth! I love you Little Seth!

Blogs on Christopher's usher team coming soon!!

TOO Cute

Julie sent me this picture and, although I have posted a TON from Running of the Brides, this one was too cute not to put on the blog. I think I may have the most adorable flower girl in the history of the world - but then again, I am a little bias. ;-)

Reception Hall on Hold

This afternoon, Christopher and I went to look at UVA's Alumni Hall for our reception. The regular reservation coordinator won't be in until next week, but we got a good idea of the space and what the gardens and terrace will look like at this time next year. We have a hold on the date (WOOHOO) so nothing is finalized yet, but I feel better just knowing we HAVE THE DAY if we want it. Christopher liked it and said that if it's what I really want, that's all that matters to him. :-) Isn't he the best?? Having the reception at UVA would be really special to me because I spent five years of my life at this school and during my graduate years my life did a complete 180. The church is basically on the historic downtown mall and then Alumni Hall is on UVA's grounds so the combination would really bring together the essence of Charlottesville. So we'll see, still deciding, but I feel 8,000 times better knowing no one else can take it. :-) YAY US!

Off to do some reading and then meeting my Matty Wade for Good Friday mass. No matter how beautiful the day, the sun always disappears at 3:00... and now it's raining. God sure does have some interesting ways of reminding us of the importance of today.

365 Days and Counting...

HAPPY -1 YEAR ANNIVERSARY TO US!!

Cripes all Friday, can you believe it? We still have an entire YEAR until we get married!! Today is the one year mark until our big day and we would be so blessed to get the weather next year that we had today. It was beautiful out - upper 60s and sunny. Unfortunately Christopher is sick, and working tonight, so no celebration but I'm still excited. Tomorrow we (if CGH is feeling up to it) are going to take a tour of a possible reception hall - woohoo. Once we get that booked we will have the church, the hall, and THE DRESS. Yes, I bought a dress. No, you will not see pictures on here! But if you do want to see photos, send me an e-mail and I'll invite you to the super-secret-invite-only website where I'm holding them hostage. :-)

This week is spring break for the public elementary schools so I had my little Annie yesterday and today. I've been tutoring Annie for the past few months and with her mother out of town this week, she came to hang with Christopher and me. It was a lot of fun having her here - she's more picky of an eater than I am if you can believe it! Yesterday we painted with tempera paint and today with watercolors before heading to the park. A quick view of my masterpieces (Annie loves when I make things for Christopher!)

Tempera Paint Love Note

Watercolor Get Well Card

Blowing Bubbles in the Park

How can you not love that face?!?

Annie is so excited that Christopher and I are getting married. Sometimes during tutoring I have to snap her back to reality because I find her staring at my ring and not paying attention to what we're working on. Each day she says, "you still have your wedding ring on - that means Christopher still loves you." :-) When we first told her we were engaged she replied "Soon you'll be married then I can be your daughter!" Her mother was ALL about that. And yesterday, the sweetest thing... We were putting jackets on to go outside and play with sidewalk chalk on the driveway. I put on Chris's sweatshirt and she said "Christopher lets you borrow his jacket. That's because he's your boyfriend... And he's a good guy - you got one of the good ones."

Yes I did, baby. I got one of the great ones. :-D