More pictures...

Our Christmas tree...the bright boxes are actually lit packages on the tree.

The blood sweat and tears were so worth it! I think our house looks great!

Me and my sisters: Lindsay, Melinda, Macy, Jennifer and I.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

We had such a great Thanksgiving! As you can see, all of us Gutzeit and Larson kids got together at Dad and Lisa's on Thursday. We had such a great time!!

On Friday, we had a nice relaxing day. Slept in, put up the tree...it was so nice! Friday night we went to a CR Roughriders hockey game with Mason. They, of course, lost, as they tend to do whenever Mason goes to a game with us! It drives him crazy!

Saturday, I took Mason to CR to get some new clothes for his senior pictures. He's such a great shopper. He in and out of stores in under 5 minutes! It was great! Saturday afternoon, Scott and I hung lights on the outside of the house. It took about 2 1/2 hours, but it looks great! I'll send pics.

Today we had Thanksgiving with the whole Gutzeit family at Aunt Julie and Uncle Rick's. It was so much fun! We played round robin type games. It was pretty cool! We then went out to Scott's mom's house and walked the turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy off in the timber next to their house. It was so nice out today! If it would stay like this and then just have a light snow dusting on Christmas...I would be way ok with that! More pics to follow!

Work outing...

The is the great group of people I now work with. From left to right: Wannette (Aaron's fiance), Aaron (I work with), Bridgit (Jim's wife), Jim Humphreys (my boss), Leah (Shawn's wife), Shawn (I work with), me and Scott.

We won a Life insurance contest for the months of September and October, so we won a hotel/supper/gambling/museum trip this past Friday and Saturday.

We started out by checking into the Grand Harbor Resort in Dubuque. We then went to Timmerman's in East Dubuque for supper. Then it was onto the Diamond Joe Casino for some light gambling for some and some serious gambling for others! hehe (I played for about an hour and a half on $20...my kind of gambling!) After gambling, we went back to the hotel bar and closed it down. Saturday morning we went to the Mississippi Museum and Aquarium; it was a lot of fun!

I'm trying to make up for the fact that I'm so bad at this, so I've posted quite a few pics today! Enjoy! Can't wait to see the girls from the Class of '94 over the Christmas holiday!!

Grandma's Birthday Party

We had a birthday party for Grandma Gutzeit today. The first picture is of her and Grandpa. The next couple are of Maddie and I acting a little crazy. This is Maddie's "scary" face. Mine is just "tryingto make Maddie belly-laugh" face. The last one is, of course, Maddie and I cheezin'. Enjoy!

Mark Twain and Scott

We went to the Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium in Dubuque on Saturday. Here is Scott sitting on the Mark Twain bench. It just cracks me up! More pics to follow!

I'm so bad!!!!!

Ok, so I thought I would add a picture of my "kids" to hopefully make up for the fact that I have been sooooo bad updating this!! There's been so much that's happened, so I'll just hit on some of the high lights.

Maddie, Melinda's daughter, turned 5 on the 30th!! I'll post a couple of pics from her party.

Also Kaitlyn, Brenda's daughter, turned 9 on the 26th! She had a birthday party this past Friday. I met Brenda and the girls at the new super WalMart in Marion and we went onto Pizza Hut for supper and then went to see "Santa Clause 3". We had a really great time! The kids were wayyy more well-behaved than I thought they would be. I also thought Brenda and I did a great job keeping tabs on 10 kids!!

Saturday, the 4th, I got to spend the morning with Maddie Mo. Melinda was at work, so I picked Mads up around 7:30 and we went grocery shopping first. By the time we got to the checkout, Maddie says, "Aunt Lissa, do you have ANY groceries at your house?" I laughed for a solid 5 minutes on that one!! Since it's just the 2 of us, Scott and I usually do a big grocery shopping run about every 1 1/2 months. Of course we have to get the regulars like milk and bread...you get my drift. We got back to the house and played a few games of cards. She kicked my butt at War, Go Fish and Memory. I thought I would try and win a game, so I taught her how to play Kings in the Corner. She kicked my butt on that one too!! Little turkey!! ;-)

Saturday night Scoot and I went to CR. He turned 31 today, so we went to a hockey game and did some window shopping at Kay's Merchandise. They're going out of business, so they had LOTS of deals! The hockey game was a lot of fun! A couple of really great fights happened after the 1st period, so that made it even better! hehe

Today was a nice relaxing day. Scott slept in until about 10; I, of course, was wide awake at 6 am!! grrrrrrr Oh well. I made Scott his loaded meat pizza for supper. It was just about a perfect day!

Well, Extreme Home Makeover is almost on, and like April, it's my scheduled cry for the week! Hope everyone is doing well! Love, Melissa