Weekly Recap #3- Feb 5- Feb 11

Let's get the party started on another weekly email.  Hope this week went well for everyone.  We had a busy week, but I feel like I say that all the time.  So... we had a normal week.  :)

This week McKay finished the framing on the basement and started planning out the H-Vac.  He bought all of the materials for it but is still pretty intimidated by how it all goes together.  Hopefully he gets up the courage to start it this week sometime.  I have no doubt that he will figure it out and it will be great. 

We had our Valentines dinner that we were in charge of on Friday.  For the dessert I decided to make Lush (thanks mom for helping me figure it out) I feel like we lived at the church this week between being in charge of the dinner, a play group on Wednesday, a meeting for our blue and gold banquet coming up, and helping clean the building late Friday evening we were there a lot.  Luckily the kids really enjoy playing and watching movies in the nursery so it was not too bad.  The dinner went well and my dessert was delicious.  (see our photo from the evening below).

This past week McKay has been attending an "in town" training at a hotel near the river.  This meant he didn't have to leave until 7:45 in the mornings, came home at lunch, and got home at 4:00.  Super nice to see him a little bit more and have his help with Kindergarten drop off.  Definitely would not mind if he worked closer to home.  Back to reality tomorrow. 

I took the kids to Ijump on Thursday since it felt cheaper then therapy. Haha!  Seriously we were starting to go stir crazy being stuck inside ALL day.  They LOVED it and had a great time jumping.  Adalyn thought she was so cool when she finally got brave enough to jump from the trampoline into the foam pit. #daredevil #jk lol Yeah I never doubt that she is my child.  Thank heavens that snow is starting to melt and we finally saw our grass for the first time this year on Friday.  The kids played outside all day on Saturday in the 40 degree weather and it was glorious! 

We gave the boys hair cuts on Saturday and Declin screamed through the whole thing.  I think I need to learn some better little boy hair styles because I don't particularly love how they turned out.  I think I am going to try taking Jensen to great clips next time he needs one to try out something new. 

This week the hot spot in the house was the bathroom sink.  I could not keep Declin away from it.  He wanted to spend all day filling up cups, "making soup" and "washing his hands".  It was a wet disaster all the time, but he loved it. 

I started a goal to read my scriptures at least 30 mins a day.  Not too hard, but better then my normal 5-10 min quick reading that I had been doing.  I have done it each day this week and am loving it!  So much to be learned.  I feel like I have a lot of things on my mind and it has been really nice to set some more time aside each day to ponder on specific topics. 

I am excited for this coming week.  Especially Valentines day and my birthday.  We love you guys!   Here are a few snap shots from our week.

Love, Kajsa and Fam

Weekly Recap #2: Jan 29-Feb 4

Here are some highlights from this past week. 

Hello Hello!

Glad we are keeping up with the weekly email for the second week in a row.  We are on a roll! 

Our week has been pretty busy for us, yet I have hardly left the house.  haha!  These 4 munchkins keep me pretty busy, just cleaning up after them and keeping them fed.  I am going to break this down by person since that feel a little bit easier...

McKay: Worked on the basement till midnight several nights this week.  He will finish the framing up tomorrow night.  He has done a great job!  We have an electrician that is going to do our electrical work down there in a few weeks so McKay needs to get the H-Vac done before that.  McKay also helped a couple in the ward with their family history on Wednesday.  In exchange for him helping them, the wife offered to babysit our kids on Friday evening.  She used to babysit for us a lot when we just had Adalyn and Jensen so the kids know her well.  Our date night was fun.  We tried a new Mexican restaurant (new to us) and then went window shopping at Home Depot for cabinets, mirrors, etc.  This has been date night #3 in 3 weeks!  So awesome!  I think we went on a total of 5 dates last year so we have definitely improved in that area.  The best part is we have 2 more planned in the next two weeks!  It's the best month of the year after all right (my birthday month).

Kajsa: Biggest news of my week is that I do not have to report for Jury duty!  I called on Friday and they said all the cases have been resolved for this coming week.  Yay!  Magnolia still wont take a bottle so this is a big blessing for me to not have to figure out how to leave her.  I finished the Harry Potter book this week and started Pride and Prejudice.  Hopefully I can finish it!    I also tried a new workout that I think I am really going to enjoy.  It was Barre Workout (online) which basically combines ballet moves with weight training.  The workout was fairly quick and I definitely felt it by the end of the workout.  I am excited to try a few more of them to see if it is something I want to do on my days off from Zumba.  I am in charge of the dessert with the Adult Valentines party for our ward this coming Friday night.  When given this assignment I thought "what would my mom do?".  If it were me I would just wing it and things would probably be very stressful the night before as I try and pull it all together.  BUT if I were mom I would plan ahead and make sure I knew exactly what I was making ahead of time and make sure that it isn't a new recipe, etc.  I am learning that winging it with 4 little kids just doesn't work anymore since "running to the store at the last minute" actually takes 3 hours to do and ages me 5 years in the process.  So somewhat out of necessity I am trying to be more of a planner.  Thank you mom for showing me how planners think!  With that in mind I went to the store this weekend and tried out a few new recipes.  Neither of them are totally working for me and I am still looking for the perfect thing.  

Adalyn: The big moment of her week was losing her first tooth!  She lost it Monday morning.  We aren't really sure how she lost it, it was just gone after breakfast.  It must have been very loose since all we had  for breakfast was oatmeal.  Which doesn't usually require a lot of chewing.  Luckily I also swallowed a tooth as a child so we knew just what to do in this situation.  haha!  She wrote the cutest little sounded out note to the tooth fairy explaining what happened.  Luckily the tooth fairy understood and still brought a dollar for her.  Love her little toothless smile.  She also has fun building little beds in random containers or closets for herself and hiding little handmade Valentines under each of our pillows. 

Jensen: Jensen spent his days running from one end of the house to the other and then taking breaks from that to jump on the couch.  He is so ready to be outside riding his bike.  We also decided this week that Magnolia looks the most like Jensen.  It took us a while to figure it out, but after looking at his baby pictures we decided she looks like him the most.  He was the cutest little toddler so I can't wait to see what she looks like as she gets older!

Declin:  He is SO cute these days.  His vocabulary is crazy and he is constantly saying full sentences.  His logic is adorable and he is following Jensen's example and now tells me several times a day how beautiful I am and how much he loves me.  He also tells me about the baby Nolia that lives in his tummy.  Whenever he is hungry, he tells me how hungry his baby Nolia is and that she needs to eat.  He tells me how cute his baby Nolia is (the one in his tummy) and lets me know when she is tired or crying.  I think him becoming a big brother has affected him more then we realize and it is interesting to see how he is processing it all.  Thankfully he is slowly out growing his super clingy needy stage and sleeps through the night a lot more often.

Magnolia: She had a fairly normal week.  We finally took her 3 month pictures.  I also took some pictures of her in the same dress that my mom wore when she was 3 months old.  The winter lighting hasn't been great, but I still think we got some good ones.  She is just a little doll.  It was fun playing dress up with her.

Overall we are doing well!  SO happy to be started on the basement project, hopefully it goes smoothly. 

-Kajsa and Fam

A few snap shots from our week-

Weekly Recap #1- Jan 22-28

Last week on Sunday I got an email from my sister, Mykelti.  She explained that she wanted to start a family email.  Basically where everyone in the family takes a moment once a week to write about what is going on in their lives and how their week went.  Great idea Mykelti!  Everyone email back within a day or two and it was awesome to hear about specific details and experiences from each others week.  My family is close, but we don't all live close to each other.  So grateful for technology so that we can stay in touch and continue to love and strengthen each other. 

A few days after I sent the email out I realized that I should post our portion on the blog as a way to save and print them.  The last month or so I have been struggling to keep up with blogging.  Currently there is just not a lot of extra time in my day to blog.  When I do get to it, it takes a long time to finish one post (we have been having computer issues).  With only a little bit of time and slow computers I am barely able to write about the big events in our life, and I hardly ever have time to document the little things that go on daily.  re-posting the weekly email felt like the best way to remember the little things in our lives.

I obviously will only be posting the parts of my email that are appropriate to post publically.  Not my responses to everyone else's emails or private personal details.  But I am excited to have a place to record the individual things that go on in our lives.   

Here is our first week's email...

Dear Family:

A recap on our week... Monday morning I woke up at 7:43 I ate eggs and toast for breakfast and then changed Magnolias diaper.... haha!  just kidding. 

Really our week was interesting.  We had snow and more snow.  Tuesday ended up being a snow day for everyone including McKay.  So since we didn't have any other plans we decided to get started on finishing our basement.  We moved everything out of the basement and are now a family of 6 living in 1400 square feet of space.  It is cozy.  Hopefully the basement wont take TOO long.  I am hopeful that we will have carpet by next Christmas or this time next year (although secretly I hope we actually have it by the end of the summer).  We shall see.  Tuesday we also ventured out in the snow to visit some friends who live 2 miles away.  Our van only got stuck in the snow 10-15 times in that 2 miles and it was a miracle that we made it home.  Seriously!  So while Wednesday was not an official snow day, but I declared it one.  Adalyn did not go to school since I was afraid of getting stuck again.  They finally plowed our streets in the middle of the night on Wednesday so we are no longer home bound.  If this weather keeps up we are buying a suburban.  Currently we have 2-3 ft of snow.  Craziest winter that we have had since moving here. 

Friday Mom and Dad Cannonwere nice to come and visit.  They helped motivate us to really get started on the basement.  Dad used his truck to help get the wood to our house for framing.  At this point they have about 2/3s of the framing done.  We will finish the rest of the framing this week.   It is getting real people!  Also while mom and dad were here we went and saw La La land for a date night Saturday.  It was a fun movie to see in theaters and I just love Emma Stone so of course I liked it.  Declin was as sassy as ever this weekend, but a cute sassy so we decided to keep him.  Magnolia learned to reach of her toys.  Jensen loves to play like he is Declin's puppy and is constantly asking Declin if they can be best buddies (Declin usually says no).  And last, but not least we discovered today that Adalyn has her first loose tooth.  She is growing up fast!  As for McKay and I... He is getting back into family history after lots of talks at stake conference about it and I am enjoying reading Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.  But each time I read it I get teary eyed.  I just love the Harry Potter books so much!  I feel like I have literally grown up with these characters.  Hope life is treating you all well.  You are awesome and we think about all of you everyday!  Love ya! 

-Kajsa and Fam  

Also in this email Draesen (Mykelti's Husband) created a few memes with pictures of our kids. Here are a couple of them.  Kids are too fun!

 

My family thinks it is hilarious how my kids get out of bed after we have tucked them in to tattle on their siblings who are also out of bed.  Nightly occurrence when we are visiting family!  Aren't kids always the cutest when they know that it is bedtime.   

A few more photos from our week-

         

 
   

The Last of 2016

The day after Christmas we headed out to play on the farm.  McKay took the kids out in the morning to follow grandpa around on the farm, do a few odd jobs, and see the goats.  In the afternoon, McKay slept with the little ones while I took Addie and Jensen out to go sledding behind the 4-wheeler in the field.  It was a pretty short sledding trip since it was bitter cold, but it was fun and beautiful.  Maka and Cade came out and played with us.

December 27th was Jensen's 4th Birthday I did a separate birthday post for him.  After his birthday party we ended up going back to my parents house to spend a few more days with them.   

Originally our plans were to just go home after Jensen's birthday party on the 27th, but a few weeks before Christmas we got a call from Larissa and Rusty (they live in Connecticut) that they were planning a surprise Christmas trip out to Utah.  They would spend the first 1/2 of their trip with Rusty's family and then they were going to surprise my parents on December 30th and then spend New years with our family.  Of course we were excited that they were coming and we definitely wanted to see them.  So we decided to change our plans and stay in Utah until Jan 1st.  Because of this change we had a few days between Christmas and New Years with basically no plans.  Originally we were going to spend those days hiding out at Corinne and Stu's house until the surprise party for my parents on the 30th.  But by the time the 27th rolled around I was pretty tired of packing and repacking our stuff and moving from house to house.  So we decided to just tell my parents that we changed our plans and wanted to stay in Utah for a baby blessing that we were going to go to on Jan 1st.  We asked if we could stay at their house until Sunday.  Of course they said yes because they are awesome.  The baby blessing part was true (we really did have one to go to!) but it was only half the story.  Honestly I really hate lying to my parents so keeping the secret was a pretty big challenge for me.  But in the end we were successful and it was a great surprise for my parents! 

December 28th, 29th, and 30th we tried to just keep life simple.  Let the kids calm down after all of the Christmas fun.  They slept in and went to bed on time.  We did laundry, went to the library, mommy did some work outs and the kids played with their new Christmas toys.  It was a great break from the busy fun and helped the kids not be too burned out with travelling.  So grateful to my parents for always letting us stay at their house.  We are a big group to host for that long!  They even let McKay and I sneak away for a shopping date on the 30th.  We decided to go try out the Traverse Mountain Outlet stores and then lunch at Café Rio.  McKay's mom met us at the outlet stores and we had a good time shopping and visiting with her. 

The afternoon of the 30th was the big surprise.  We all met at Corinne and Stu's house.  We had to race my parents to their house since we wanted to be there before them for the big surprise.  Larissa and Rusty hid in the bedroom when my parents walked in the house.  August was just running around the living room with my kids.  My mom looked at August and said "who's that?" with a confused look on her face because he looked "just like August".  Then Larissa and Rusty stepped out of the bedroom and said SURPRISE!".  It was classic and a complete surprise.  The rest of the party was so fun chatting, playing games, and of course we had to take some pictures since we finally had all the grandkids together.  My dad made not one but two yummy dutch oven desserts and we had soup and bread sticks for dinner.  August has gotten so big since the last time we saw him.  He is now running around, playing with my kids, and fighting over toys with Declin.  :)

The group photos did not go that well since only the girls were cooperative for the picture.  The boys wanted nothing to do with posing and sitting still.  It was hilarious to watch!
 

A small note on games. It feels like my family gets more intense on games every passing year and this year was no different.  We play games ALL THE TIME when we are together.  We seem to go through phases with different games and play the same one over and over again until something new catches our eye.  This year we played Settlers of Catan, Sushi Go, and 7 Wonders over and over again.  We also played lots of rounds of golf.  I used to not be a huge game player and avoided them most of the time we are together.  But I even find myself loving them these days.  It was fun to learn some new ones over the Christmas vacation and it will be fun to play them with our kids when they get older. 

New Years eve we had a big Fry Family party at Heather and Brent's house.  It is get togethers like these that make all the crazy Christmas traveling worth it.  There is just no other way that gives you such a wonderful opportunity to spend time with cousins.  We also had another little party with my dad's sister and her family earlier in the week.  Where we got to see and visit with cousins and their families that we don't normally see.  These kinds of things are so special to both McKay and I. 

Anyways back to new years eve... We had our traditional pizza buffet and played some more games (pretty typical).  Heather also has the tradition of doing "time" bags.  The bags have different activites in them to help pass the time until midnight.  You open a new bag each hour.  We weren't there for all of the bags since we left before midnight, but the ones we were there for were fun for the kids.  First they decorated the house with streamers and balloons (Adalyn loved the decorating part), next they had glow sticks and glow stick games, then they had a piñata.  It was too fun to watch the toddlers hit it!  After the piñata we headed back to my parents house before our kids melted too much.  The kids fell asleep in the car and McKay and I were in bed before midnight lol! 

4 Generations.  We are all the 2nd daughters in our family

Glow stick party

And that wraps up 2016 for our family.  This is my 6th full year of blogging.  SO SO SO happy that I have all of these posts and life experiences to look back on.  I printed out the books for 2014 and 2015 this year for Christmas.  McKay and I have had fun going through them in the evenings after the kids go to bed and remembering all of the fun times we have had as a family.  We are very grateful for our health, faith and our amazing children.  They are all so unique and each bring their own special talents and abilities to our little family.  We are trying our best to honor each of them and help them feel loved and accepted.  We often fail and make mistakes in parenting, but I hope in the end they can see that we are trying our best.  Hope each of you had a good 2016 or at least survived it (sometimes that is all we can do)!  lol  Hoping for good things to come in 2017!