I get to write-off my haircut, right?

Completely kidding. But I did just get my thank you from Locks of Love, which I thoroughly enjoyed receiving.

I think LOL is a great organization. But now that I've put that out there - they could use some help in the postcard-design area. Kind of creepy and plain weird.

There is no place like Nebraska

Trevor and I headed to Lincoln for the NU/Iowa State game. We haven't been back to a game together since 2005, which was only two years ago but it felt like an eternity. Anyway, after the game (third quarter, rather), Trev and I walked around campus. It was so fun to reminisce. I told Trevor I felt like I needed to be wearing a backpack! So much has changed on campus since we were students there and then other aspects feel like we never left. We sure have a lot of great memories from Lincoln; it was wonderful to be back.

Below: Wendy's home for three years - Kappa Kappa Gamma

















Below: Trevor spent a lot of time at Nebraska Hall
















Below: Trevor's home for two years (or was it one year? I can't remember) - Lambda Chi Alpha

All I want for Christmas is

a food processor. And a subscription to Us Weekly (especially since it raised its newsstand prices .$50 an issue). And an address embosser. And a...let's be honest. The list goes on and on.

Back to the subject at hand. I have to post this because a friend talks about how he got a crockpot for his birthday. And while I am sure he was appreciative, I'm sure he won't be as ecstactic as I will when I open up that silver Bed, Bath and Beyond box December 25.

Happy Birthday Famous Trevor!

Looking forward to our dinner at Famous Dave's!

Dinner at the Four Deuces

Last night we hosted a murder mystery dinner party. The best part was how into it our friends got! I mean - look at these costumes! I was voted "best performance" (Madam MeMe didn't have one real-world conversation all night) and Trevor got best costume (he was a fat mobster). Too much vino to remember who got the other two prizes. Anyway, if you get the chance to participate in or host one of these, do!

US Weekly Tells No Lies

I'm a Virgo, but I'm sure you already knew that.

Maverick Mojo. Why Fight it?

Well, I did it. I applied for grad school.

Actually I only applied for my non-degree status because I have two prereqs to take, but still...I'm going back to school. I'm going to study and go to class and skip class and wear a backpack and buy books and take tests and do projects. Dear Lord. What have I done?

I'm actually very excited about it. If all goes as planned I should start my MBA program in the fall of 2008. I am very excited about that (not so much the prereqs). I met with an advisor in the spring and mapped out my MBA plan and she spent a lot of time talking about how MBA students choose a publicly traded company (no duplicates, though) and apply each course to that company. I find that very exciting. I also think I will truly value this experience being in the "real world" and having business knowledge to relate my courses to.

So, my application is with UNO. I received an email saying they were processing my application, in which I realized my birthdate on the application somehow is listed as 10/17/1975. Nothing about that is anywhere accurate. Need to get that fixed.

I'll keep you "posted." HA! Sounds like a blog pun if I've ever heard one. Oh yeah, my horoscope in US Weekly this week said something like "now's the time to do something you've been contemplating, like apply for grad school." Holy cow! I KNEW that publication was like the Bible. I'll scan it and post it soon.

Happy Birthday to Me

Slowly but surely I'm catching up to the rest of my friends...I'm finally 27. The big day was last Friday, September 7th. I think the most enjoyable part was that I had the day off and I was in OMAHA. So often I feel like days off are spent traveling back from vacation or doing laundry because you just got back, or you took the day off for a specific reason (i.e. to recuperate from the JT concert). It was fun to have the day off work and just enjoy it. And that's exactly what I did. After first waking up at 6:45 am, Macy must have remembered it was my birthday and willingly napped with me. Until 10. It was awesome. However, that did mean we didn't get to the dog park like I had planned (but we went Sunday - no worries). I had a delish sushi lunch with my mom and then she and I headed to Golf Galaxy to pick out the putter she and my dad got me. Then, I hit the links with my mom and dad. However, might be the last time that happens. My dad got a little irritated when 1. my mom stopped by their house (we played at the course they live on) to go to the bathroom after the third hole, 2. when he had to go back two holes because my mom left her pitching wedge on the green and 3. when she didn't think she could play the last hole because she had to pee so bad. For the record, we didn't even drink beer! Anyway, it was fun. We ended up the big 2-7 with dinner at Bonefish Grill and beers at Clancy's. Mike, Denise, Josh and Shannon - thanks for meeting up with us at Clancy's. Like I said, have to take advantage of those Friday night birthdays! And to the Hites - you stayed out way too late to drive us home. Thank you. Yellow cab is pissed we never called to cancel.



Thanks to ALL of my friends who called, sent cards or text messages. The best part about burfdays is the reconnecting with all of your friends. Because when everyone has so much going on, it's great to know they'll always remember you on your day - and vice versa.

No Subject

From: Fitch, Trevor
Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 9:11 AM
To: Wendy Fitch
Subject:

when you're out of town, all hell breaks loose (dog-wise). she spends all of her time looking for you, then ignores me, then barks her ears off, then runs off and almost gets hit by a car, then gets yelled at and shoved back into her kennel, then makes me feel bad, then gets to sleep in our bed, then gets rolled over on in the middle of the night, then gets elbowed at 3:00 in the morning because she will NOT stop licking my elbow armpit.

Cue Pomp and Circumstance

And another good Macy story

Man I love this dog. She's hilarious. And gross too, as suggested by the below email. There's also the time she stumbled upon a Wheat Thin covered in ants and put her face right into it. Brushing off large, black ants from a white, furry face is something I never thought I'd do. Oh but I did. Or how about the time I thought she had an ear infection (per the groomer) so when she was rubbing her ears in the rocks at my parents' house I thought nothing of it. But when she didn't stop I pulled her away only to realize she had been rubbing her face in a dead, decaying frog carcass.
Sidenote: after a 40 minute and $40 vet appointment, no ear infection.


From: Fitch, Trevor
Sent: Friday, July 13, 2007 8:15 AM
To: Rachel McKenney; Wendy Fitch
Subject: RE:

Gross email time! This morning the dog barked me awake, I just assumed it was time to get ready for work. So after standing in the yard for 5 minutes, I realized it was 3:30, not 4:30. So I put the dog in bed, where she took up her favorite game, licking herself in her special area. Do you know what's more gross than watching her do that? Listening to her do it right next to you while you're trying to sleep. I even elbowed her to get her to stop and she just flopped on her back and continued. ..........Then she licked me in the face, therefore, shower time.

Enjoy your coffee. Happy Friday.

Since you've met Miss Macy (via photos), you'll get a kick out of this email I received from TFitch a few weeks ago:

From: Fitch, Trevor
Sent: Tuesday, July 10, 2007 9:35 AM
To: Wendy Fitch
Subject:

synopsis of this morning's encounter with the dog:

4:48:00 - wake up, walk into laundry room, hear quiet jingling, let hound out.
4:48:10 - let dog out onto porch, carry down stairs
4:48:30 - hound pees, yawns, looks around
4:48:55 - hound lazily walks over to steps, sits down, yawns
4:49:00 - hound lazily follows me up stairs, into house, sits down, yawns
4:50:00 - hound lazily eats treat, nearly falls asleep, yawns
4:50:10 - i say "lets go see wendy" and walk towards bedroom door
4:50:12 - hound stares at me from dining room table as i stand in bedroom doorway
4:50:13 - hound's eyes almost bug completely out of her head, hound runs into master bathroom faster than i've ever seen her move
4:50:13.5 - hound makes the turn at the shower and heads back out into the living room. trevor in pursuit
4:50:13.7 - hound races into guest bedroom, begins to defecate. turtle head is popping out
4:50:14 - i apprehend hound, pick up around lower waist, hold upside down like a doggie poop bouquet
4:50:16 - hound is transplanted in front yard, takes MASSIVE poop. is nice enough to leave bits and pieces around yard
4:51:00 - dog is asleep on wendy's face

The Blog is Resurrected

Hi everyone! I've decided it's time to bring back the blog. I miss not sharing life updates with you. Whether or not you miss receiving them...we'll that's up to you. Actually I just realized everyone is so busy the blog is an easy way to keep everyone looped in to what's going on with the Fitches. So if you have a blog or a Web site, please send me the link. Of course, there are times when phone calls will be made. Like when I win the lottery. But I have a feeling you all will be calling me first when that happens!

The biggest update sine my last post in December of 2006 would be the new addition to our family - Macy!
Macy was born April 1 and joined our family June 5. She's a female Maltese, currently weighing in at 4 pounds, 2 ounces. She's actually grown a lot in the two months we've had her. In the above photo, she only weighed 2 pounds!



In May, right before we got Miss Macy, we went to New York with eight very close friends. We had a great time; nothing like five couples in two NYC hotel rooms! We crammed a lot into three days, including a double decker bus tour of the city, tasty meals at The Eatery, Mesa Grill and Dos Caminos, Wicked, a Yankees game, the top of the Empire State Building (buzzkill) and shopping. It definitely was a once-in-a-lifetime vacation. We're so fortunate we have such great friends to do things like that with.

Just last week I cut 12 inches off my hair to donate to Locks of Love. I'm still getting used to the new 'do (moreso getting used to having to do it every day!) but I like it. And I probably shed less which has to make TFitch happy. Macy doesn't care about length; it all tastes the same to her.

Our jobs are still going well. I'm still with Barkley working on Blue Bunny and the Breast Cancer 3-Day and Trevor's still with Kiewit working at the Mid-America Power Plant in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

That's it for now. Talk to you later!

Merry Christmas from the Fitches!

Where was this article last year?

Brides may need help with post-wedding blues

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Everything about Brian and Christina Behrend's late summer wedding was picture perfect - from the bright Texas sun to the emotional vows that symbolized a storybook romance.
The Dallas couple - she's an account manager for an e-mail provider, he's a professional Web developer - met six years ago and, as their online diaries say, it was truly love at first sight.
So when the Sept. 2 wedding was over and the honeymoon bags unpacked, Christina headed back to work and was a bit unnerved when her life as a new bride was marked by a case of the blues.
"Our apartment was a mess - there was no motivation to clean. Our bank accounts were empty. The high from the adrenaline of planning a wedding for over a year was completely down. So moving into this new low was quite depressing, particularly when you return home with nothing to do except continue on with work and everyday activities," she said.
The Behrends are not alone. Wedding planners, psychologists and other experts say a post-wedding letdown is perfectly normal, even common.
Carley Roney, co-founder and editor-in-chief of the online wedding site theknot.com, said weddings are often the high point in someone's life, particularly young brides.
"There's a certain high to having such an increased sense of purpose," Roney said. The wedding "is filled with all the things that are sort of so celebrity: my guest list, what dress should I wear, how can I spend this $10,000 budget? It's very glamorous.
"You build and, all of a sudden, it is over. Period. Full stop," she said. "The glamour is over. You become another person - sort of on the normal list."
Marg Stark, a San Diego author whose book "What No One Tells the Bride" offers women a realistic guide to the sometimes rough waters of walking down the aisle, said newlyweds often find themselves isolated.
Single girlfriends may not understand, and no new bride wants to sound like something is wrong with her marriage, she said.
"So you're cut off from the friends who used to keep you sane. And your anxiety is doubled, thinking that you're the only bride out there who isn't basking in bliss," Stark said.
Susan Padrino, a psychiatry instructor at University Hospitals of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, said there aren't many scholarly studies on the topic but psychiatrists and psychologists are seeing more patients with emotional wedding hangovers.
In many cases, the stress of marriage and wedding planning sparks underlying depression, which should be treated right away, she said.
"You could speculate that today's emphasis on the wedding as the 'best and most expensive day of your life' would put even more stress onto the bride and groom," she said. "Unreasonable expectations about what the wedding day will mean could also contribute to a significant letdown feeling."
The Internet, where wedding postpartum discussions abound, and more realistic portrayals of marriage in the media have helped. But Roney and Stark say the idea of being depressed just after getting married is still somewhat taboo, mostly because people are afraid to talk honestly about the sometimes bad feelings associated with getting married.
"As long as there are women fogged over by tulle in their wedding fantasies, there will be newlyweds who have turbulent adjustments after the perfect wedding is over," Stark said. "I do think society sets women up with a lot of impossible, overblown expectations."
Many wedding planners say they have begun counseling clients about the possible post-wedding blues from the minute they start putting together the ceremony. They recommend a budget the couple can truly afford without dipping into credit cards; enough time to plan without rushing, which could add stress; and postponing the honeymoon to allow time to recover financially and emotionally from the wedding.
Loree Tillman, a wedding designer from Escondido, Calif., said newlyweds often end up missing the fellowship of family and friends that a wedding brings.
"I have had brides say, 'OK, now what? What do I do now?'" Tillman said. "What I tell every bride after their wedding day is, plan another party! Large and/or small - family reunion, barbecue, holiday party. This helps carry those wonderful feelings that brides and grooms had on their wedding day."
As for the Behrends, they have started a weekly date night and work out together at the gym as a way to focus on their marriage now that the wedding is over.
Christina said she hopes their Web log, which details their experience, will help other newlyweds.
"Hopefully, once we've settled into this new phase we can finally start building our relationship and lives together," she said.

366 Days Down

And I can't believe it!

Trevor and I celebrated our one-year anniversary on Saturday. We decided to go to dinner at V. Mertz stay at Embassy Suites on the Old Market. When we checked into the hotel and found our room, we realized we were upgraded to the Presidential Suite. Presidential Suite as in my dad really wanted that room for the wedding last year and they wouldn't give it to him. We opened the door and were in awe, and did what we had to do: call our friends to have them come down to the hotel and party with us. Like Trevor said, "we could not have had that room and not called anyone." It was a super fun night! The only problem is we were planning on staying at an Embassy Suites every year on our anniversary...but Saturday night might have set our expectations a little too high :-).

Hola

Hey everyone! Since I haven't blogged in nearly five months, I'm sure you all thought I fell off the face of the earth or was eaten by the mouse in our house. You'll be happy to know I'm alive and well and our house is mouse-free (so I've been told). Most importantly, I'm getting back into the blog groove. Nothing much to know at this time, other than a little life lesson I've learned while being a wife:

When you are baking and wearing an apron, remove it before you to the bathroom. Aprons tie in the back and it's easy to forget about those ties. Sadly, I realized this the hard way.

There's a Mouse in our House

' nuff said.

Garage Sale

This fall I am walking in the 2006 Chicago Breast Cancer 3-Day. The Breast Cancer 3-Day is a three day, 60-miles walk benefiting the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation and the National Philanthropic Trust Breast Cancer Fund. Each walker is required to raise $2,200 to participate.

I’m walking with three friends: Shannon, Lizzie and Michelle. As part of our fundraising efforts we are holding a garage sale. The sale started yesterday and ends tomorrow. Profits at this point are minimal, but hopefully tomorrow’s “Everything Must Go” sale will help.

I have to just take this opportunity to thank Trevor and the other girls’ husbands, Josh and Brian, for everything they have done for this garage sale. I’ll be candid. Garage sales are pains in the asses. We stored crap in our garage and storage room for five months, waiting for this weekend. Shannon and Lizzie dedicated all day yesterday, I took today off from work and Michelle’s dedicating her entire Saturday to man the Sale. But the best part is how supportive the boys have been. We spent five hours Tuesday hauling, pricing and merchandising the items, and the fellas were with us the entire time. They’ve came over before to help us prepare for the day, and after work to move the unsold items from the driveway back to the garage.

This is one of those crazy ideas we had and our hubbys have been so encouraging and helpful. We’re very fortunate to have such great support during our Breast Cancer 3-Day journey. Thank you.

Quirks

I had to create a bio for work today. Part of it included listing “Fun Facts” about ourselves. I was in a hurry and quickly sent an email to Trevor to help me out.

From: Wendy Fitch
Sent: Tuesday, May 02, 2006 3:09 PM
To: Trevor.Fitch
Subject: Help

So I have to put together a bio like the attached. I need you to help me be funny.

- What are fun things about me?
- What should I call the fun section? What about Wendy? WTF? (Better not).


Trevor’s reply was the best.

From: Trevor.Fitch
Sent: Tuesday, May 02, 2006 3:26 PM
To: Wendy Fitch
Subject: RE: Help

Lets see…..
Your love of puns is bewildering. That’s right, bewildering.
You got your picture taken in front of a donkey wearing a shirt and hat.
You’ve been in a French Canadian wedding and done the 2 kiss cheek thing. With a man and a woman.
Your mom has a cremated dog in an urn which is currently sporting a two piece swimsuit.
You make fantastic chicken parmesan
You make horrible pasta salad
You’ve been on the today show
You somehow got over a slightly uncomfortable (for the rest of us) obsession with Jessica Simpson. We’re still waiting on Nick Lashay (sp?)
You are a horrible singer but you never give up.
If a bird walked up to you carrying the bottom of someone’s shoes, your ass would be grass.
In the last 30 days you have lied on the floor in the garage and cried.
Your mom has worn your wedding dress more recently than you have.
You routinely wake up your husband by talking in your sleep. Sometimes you wake him up by laughing hysterically. In your sleep.

And then he sent a second email.

You really don’t (even though you swear you do) understand the concept of sea level.
Math makes you nauseous. (and I quote)
One time you threw a temper tantrum in the Target toy aisle. You were 24 years old, I believe.
You have good taste in paint colors.
You have more clothes than anyone I have ever seen.
Your love of the color pink, no matter how much I ridicule you for it, actually impresses me.
You never whine. Happy Opposite Day.
You keep our house clean. No matter how much I try to stop you.

That’s all I got. I’m going to try to leave soon. Bill has a table we can borrow, but I think it’s covered in beer. I told him it would be a last resort

Trevor loves my quirks and I love his. I do whine. I do pick my nose. I do shout at the top of my lungs when my favorite song is on. When you find someone that you can do these things with, and that they for the most part, enjoy, consider yourself very lucky.