Join us for Christmas!

                               Received this many years ago from my crafting nieces in Superior

Christmas tree with a variety of snowflakes and 3 red cardinals.  The 5 spruce tops in window box have blue lights but not dark enough to show now.  2 kinds of Christmas cactus in one container; red one in bloom.

 Nativity set made years ago.  Pa made the fireplace with picture of flames taken at Kaleva Island.  Jen made
  the tree with Ma, Pa and A - J.  Can't be seen but a picture of a cardinal on wall to right of nativity set.

Christmas cards.  We always put them up on this wall.  And on the wall where our aerial photo of the farm is
during the year now has the counted cross stitch Anita made of the angel.  Didn't put up any angels this year.  Do have one of the speakers with the snowmen. 

Hello :)

On Wednesday night we finally got to meet our new little boy, Dustyn Ray!!!!  (I texted everyone besides Liz and Gary because I didn't have your numbers in my phone... but I think I heard Frans on the phone with someone, becky maybe, and asked them to text you guys.)  He was born at 10:15, and was 8 lbs 15.6 oz.  Another big baby for us!  But the delivery was super easy, and recovery so far hasn't been bad either thank goodness.  We are both still in awe that we actually have a little boy...seems so unreal!  Actually, just having a baby right now seems unreal.  With so much going on in our lives this past year, it doesn't seem like we focused much on my pregnancy, and it just flew by.  And all of a sudden, it was time to have him, and it was like, where did the time go???!  But I guess that's not really a complaint! 
We are so thankful that God has given us another healthy baby to love, we are so lucky!  And the girls are beyond thrilled too....it's like Christmas-time around here! 
We can't decide who he really looks like....Does anyone see a resemblance?

 Proud daddy with his Son!

Anna was so awesome and watched the kids for us while we were in the hospital :)  She brought Trina and Taryn to the hospital while the other girls were in school.  It was nice having them come without the big girls...

the girls each brought me two red roses to make a dozen. 

24 hours old here....

Waiting to get discharged from the hospital.  They can' t believe he is going to get to come home with us.  Trina asked me, "Then will we have to bring him back?"  Nope, we get to keep him!

 dressed and ready to go home!

Trina happy to have Dustyn home with us!

Love this little guy...isn't he just the cutest!!?

All the other girls got shipped out to Friends houses for the weekend...but Taryn got to spend Saturday home alone with us.  And I think it was a good thing.  She got lots of special attention right along with Dustyn.  :)  Everytime she walks by him she stops and rubs his head and says "awww....cute baby!"  I love it!  Hopefully she continues to be good with new baby taking over the 'baby' spot!

Life at our house...

Here's a glimpse into life at our house over the past few days:

Wednesday we brought the girls in for their flu shots. Wednsday night Heidi ran a fever, but we figured it was due to the shot, so weren't real worried. Thursday AM, Shawn says he isn't feeling well and he is heading to the ER; thinks he may have kidney stones. Rather than packing the girls up to go with, he figured he would just go himself. I called daycare and confirmed that Heidi could come evern with the fever as we ALL figured it was due to the shot. Shawn heads out the door about 7 and I left later with the girls, brought them to daycare and headed to work.

Half way to work and my phone rings. Shawn calling to say he has a kidney stone 8mm with jagged edges, they want him to go to Virginia for surgery today. (We doctor in Mt. Iron, but use the Hibbing hospital; they, however, don't have a Urologist, so this surgery has to be done in Virginia). He says that if I don't go and get him, they will send him in the ambulance. I turn around and head to Hibbing. Get to the hospital; get all his paperwork and head out the door. As we are leaving the parking lot, the phone rings, Heidi has had a seizure at daycare. We quickly navigate a different way out of the parking lot and head to Cherry to pick up Heidi.

Thankfully, Jen was working up here during the week. I called her. She was still in Virginia. Asked if she could meet me at the clinic, so I could bring Heidi in to see the doctor and if she could get Shawn to the hospital for surgery. What a gem, she was there. I headed in with Heidi and Shawn heads off in the care of Jen.

Heidi sees the doctor and I'm told, "it's a viral thing, just control the fever". Take her with me to the hospital to check on Shawn.

Got there in time to see him before going into surgery. The doctor says it will be about an hour, so Jen and I head to Target to get some Tylenol and Ibuprofen for Heidi (and some shoes, we left daycare in a hurry). Got back well within the hour.

Jen heads out.

Heidi and I are waiting, she heats up and has another seizure.....

Called Jen to come to my rescue. Could she come and follow up with making sure Shawn made it through surgery fine, I was going to have to do something with Heidi. As I'm heading out the door with Heidi, the surgeon comes out to say Shawn made it fine, they got the stone...

Frantically, I call our doctor, she says, if the fever won't go down, walk across the hall to the ER being as I'm still at the hospital waiting to see Shawn and give Heidi another dose of Ibuprofen. Gave her the medication and played the waiting game.... we had already begun trying to cool her off... wet towels under the arms, and that whole bit... with her laying on the changing table in the restroom.

Nurse comes out to say that we can go see Shawn. Headed back, he is not looking that great, but could go home. Told him that Heidi had another seizure to which his response was, "she isn't coming home without being seen". She was still lethargic and not doing too hot. The nurse in after surgery recovery says that Shawn can stay there. They will discharge him and have him wait there while I bring Heidi in to the ER.

Brought Heidi in... of course the fever had come down. The ER doctor questioned me on EVERYTHING! How do you know she had a seizure, what did it look like?

I explained exactly what she does, arms and legs moving, eyes rolling back in her head, spewing out spit up/phlegm.... to which the doctor says, "okay, so she did have a seizure"... "umm, yeah, she has had 10 of them"

"you probably don't treat it right" is the next comment. I had to pull out the medication and prove that I was treating it as I was supposed to be....

Next comes the pat on my shoulder, "your little girl will be fine, just treat the fever"!

Went to get Shawn and headed home. Jen had picked up Hailey and brought her home for me. We hung out at home for a while and sure enough, Heidi starts skyrocketing again with a fever.

Shawn called our daycare provider and Tom came to get Hailey.

We headed to the ER with Heidi.

They admitted her to the ER rather than Urgent Care. She had a high fever; got testing done, white blood cell count was 23,000. The doctor said he doesn't believe it is that elevated due to only a viral infection. Gave her a shot of anitbiotic and we took her home. My daycare provider told me that they would just keep Hailey over night. We didn't get home with Heidi until about midnight!

Friday, all went well, kept everyone home!

Saturday, Jen watched the girls while Shawn and I went hunting.

There was more pressure this ye.ar, then ever! I've been in big buck/big doe contests and don't really care about the outcome... this year, the 2 year old kept saying... "Mine Momma shoot deer, take it home, cook it up, and eat it". We weren't allowed to entertain the thought of not getting one, with one exception...

We were sitting in a doctor's office earlier this fall. Heidi draws a picture and I inquired what it was... "shoot". Her story: "momma shoot deer, miss, shoot me, me die, put me in garbage"...

Anyway, we got out to the woods Saturday morning, I headed to the stand and Shawn was going out somewhere else and then back to a trail. I don't have a ton of patience. I sat there for a while, hoping a deer would cross my path, and then gave up. Started blowing on the buck grunt. Before too long, I can hear them coming through the woods, but they turned away and headed a different direction. I was bummed, turned around to see if I could get a glimpse at them, saw Shawn... he had seen a buck, but didn't get it, shot a doe. I had seen the one run and figured it may come back, turn around and my buck is standing there looking right at me (about 30 yards away). My thought was... "I don't care if he shot at you, you're alive, you're mine" and pulled the trigger. I got him. By 9AM we were working on gutting the deer. By 11:00 we were home with them in the back of the truck and had made a couple stops on the way home :)

Saturday afternoon, Hailey woke up from her nap, running a fever. Our lives consist of Tylenol and Ibuprofen. Shawn went in today and got his stint taken out. Hoping he recovers quickly! Heidi doesn't need medication quite as often :) Hailey has not yet had a seizure :) 

Here's our deer!

 The girls checking out the deer!

Hoping this finds everyone else doing well and hoping you can avoid all bugs (viral and bacterial) this time of year!

Our great granddaughter

Madelyn Halonen, the 3rd great grandchild to visit us in Brainerd.  Steven, John, Laura,
Sarah and Kathryn came to spend Saturday with us and had their niece Madelyn with
them.  Her dark hair amazes me.  Michelle hasn't washed the color out yet.  I always
managed to get our dark headed kids turned light to match Charlies.  But when they got
older it turned dark again and now it looks like many have it turning light again.  I just love to see that!

Birthday muffin from Perkins

 After seeing Dr. Watkins, lunch at Grandma's Restaurant and then to Perkins to pick up some muffins.  Went to Marvin and Nathalie Johnsons for coffee and muffins.  Got a candle from Perkins for the birthday celebration.

Then with Marvin and Nathalie on our ride we went to Chris Jensen Home to visit Marvin's sister Viola Peterson.  So here we are, the 3 surviving grandchildren of Herman and Anna Liisa Koponen.  The last cousin we lost was Gil Jarvela but I guess there would have been no way to get the four of us in a picture.  We relived history and heard some stories for the first time.

What's new!

Well, I am not sure when the last time we posted was, but here is what has been happening the last two months.  We have been spending a lot of time playing with Connor!  At Connor's two month check up he was 14lbs 11oz and 25 in long.  He is in the 95th percentile for his age, which from what I hear, is just like Ivan was as a baby. 

Ivan is working hard at work in the office.  I think that he is really showing the bosses that he is serious about his job and wants to move up in the company.  He is joining a bunch of different teams, and is now presenting during the monthly shop meetings. 

As for me, I am just enjoying having Connor at work with me and playing with the two other kids I have full time. 

Connor in his Baptismal suit.  What a hanson little man!!

Connor loves going "swimming" with Ivan!

Connor and the cat playing together!

Here are the three kids I have at work everyday.  Anna (4yrs) loves helping with the babies!

Connor is "talking" with Auntie Jenn and Uncle Rick.

These two are from the MN Zoo.  I took the three kids out for their first field trip with the two babies.  Fourtunatly everything went smoothly.  But I have a new respect for parents of twins!!

That's about it from here!  Hope everyone has a great fall!
~MISSI~

Woot! Woot!

I have a computer! My favorite computer did not survive the move back to the heat. I'm quite certain it wasn't the bumps they hit on the way. The case of salmon jars, that were not packed in anything other than the case itself, survived. I haven't found one broken thing yet. Must have been the heat that fried the thing. Back to my usual easy photo processing software this morning and hopefully back to the world of blogging or blog hopping.

We're renting a house in north Phoenix. We've gone about as far from our living situation as we possibly could. Scratch that. We should have a community pool and gym ... that might do it! We're in a house that is almost half the size of what we had. I'm anticipating much less cleaning time and much more crafting time in my world. The back yard is the size of a postage stamp. Enough grass for Duke to roll around on and scratch his back, little enough to mow it in about 5 minutes. We do have a guest room. That was a necessity!

The heat. It was suppose to be done before we got here. I was quite looking forward to temps under 100 and it hasn't happened yet. Maybe a day or two. The evenings are wonderful. Several months ago if you told me that I would think 86 degrees in the evening felt good ... I'd have had your noggin examined! Ask me now and I'll tell you I have a pretty good memory recall of waiting for the sun to go down and the cool to complete our day. I laugh to think that we will probably be wearing our wonderful Alaska State Fair Carhart Clearance purchases! Good thing!

The girls still aren't in school. It is beyond ridiculous as far as I'm concerned. First we had to find a place to live before we could find a school within its boundary. Either that or drive them to the other side of town. At some point that might work (or not) but at present I'm hoping to be working in the very near future. Driving kids probably would work ... picking them up would not. Regardless, the high school we're near is right around the corner and a good school. It worked out perfectly. The problem is that the office couldn't get transcripts from the previous schools last week. This week the administrator (who we must meet with for admission) is at a conference Mon thru Wed of this week and there was no school Thurs or Fri. Monday? I'm hopeful. So are they. Enough vacation even for them!

More later.

For now ....

a small slice of beauty from a visit in Fairbanks.

Some photos of the girls...

Attempt at a photo shoot... Hailey 5 months and Heidi 2 years 5 months.

I just love little hats, Miss Hailey isn't quite the fan of them, but they are so cute for the short time I can keep them on her head.

 Had a garage sale in September... Heidi was harboring the books. She is a book worm, will try to read anything she can get. Love it when she reads to her sister, some of the stories actually resemble the book and other times it is about their day.

 Heidi has learned to LOVE fishing. She is has slowed down a little bit on asking to go, but used to ask everyday if we could go fishing. She picks the worms before we leave home. Notice the worm she is holding. Our FISHING consists more of feeding the fish worms. She doesn't ever want to keep the fish we do catch, but rather insists that I throw them back.

 Over Labor Day weekend we went to Brainerd. "Pappa" took Heidi, Shawn, and I fishing. Jen and Grandma stayed home with Hailey. Heidi had been telling everyone for days prior that she was going fishing and in a boat. She was so excited.

 "Pappa's" fish!!!!!

 Shawn told Heidi all about the big blue cow... we had to go see it. Heidi was disappointed that it wasn't real! It had an impact on her, she keeps asking to go back to see the big blue ox and tells everyone she touched the ear and the horn!

 Feeding the horses at Bob and Lorraine Lee's. Heidi is quite the animal lover!

 Miss Hailey checking out Ruth Lake wishing she could go fishing :)

 Heidi has also not yet learned her fear of heights!! How many of you, remember being on this slide? It makes me sick to my stomach! It might be that my 2 year old is standing at the top of it, she would have climbed it all day long if she had anyone to keep going with her.

As for life: Miss Heidi is doing well, she accompanied me to work on Friday and worked hard. She got rewarded by many co-workers and others in the building with all sorts of treats!

Miss Hailey got her first tooth a couple weeks ago and the second one has popped out already. Guessing she is going to be getting many of them in a short amount of time. She is on the move, was just scooting backwards, but now goes forward too. She just now went from laying down to sitting up on her own, we won't be able to keep her still. She goes on all 4 and rocks and tries to move her feet! She was in to the doctor the other day and is at 17 pounds. She has her 6  month well child check on Monday. Will be fun to see how tall she is getting!

Shawn has been busy with work. It had been slow, but picked up as of recently. Hoping he gets all the jobs done before the snow flies. He is currently over at Randy's as someone is combining our barley we planted there. He has mostly finished up with haying. Got a lot of bales this year again, which is good.

My life is pretty consistent, go to work, come home and be with the girls. Doesn't deter much from that! Still loving my job!

Shawn turns the big 40 this April! He has been complaining that he is too old for our little children and doesn't have the energy it requires...So the ultimate birthday gift to him is possibly the birth of our 3rd child on his birthday. I am almost 12 weeks and baby is due on his birthday! Heidi says she is having a sister! We shall see.

Hope everyone is doing well!

Connor William Kuoppala Baptism

An easy date to remember for Connor's baptism, 9-11-11.  Another child was also
baptised, after Connor.  Then to 500 Main St. in Farmington for some good lasagna
and salad and fruit.  Day was beautiful.  These old timers were a little tired by the time
we got home!

Ron Mayry passed away

Ronald Mayry died this morning. Could someone with texting abilities, please text our parents. What do people think about me getting a plant from the Kuoppala family?

Busy busy

Just took these pictures, thought I'd throw them up here!  Its been a hectic, problem filled last 'few' weeks.  Lots to do, and it feels like there is no time to do it.  I believe I have had to ask a few times, what day it is!  Either I'm getting old?  Or...  The nights I've gone without sleep, are starting to mess with my head.

One of those small problems...  err  Maybe its not so small!  From this... (an intermodal box trailer)

Add in a fair amount of steel, a whole lotta time...  And you get something like this, that you start to question shop door sizes!  That childs story, about the steam shovel that dug his way down in the basement, and then couldn't get back out when the hole was done...  That story crossed my mind several times during this thing...  making sure we could get it out.

But hey, all's well that ends well (or so they say).  Shes done, and on the road to get tires, brakes, lights...  But, this is only the first one...  One more to go!

Before I go to take another nap (not sleeping much? Yikes, how many naps per day before you are sleeping too much???    As I started to say, before I go take that nap, figured I'd mention Jades new website.  She doesn't have too many pictures on it yet, concentrating on learning how to use HTML first..

Website, is here --->  http://www.jadessnapshots.com/

Alright, a pillow is calling my name!





Just playin...

Jade is helping me out by filming me, so I can see all of my mistakes on film...  In the "moment", I don't realize I'm doing a lot of the things that I'm doing, but seeing it on film later, I see just how atrocious my riding is.  No wonder my racing is at the level its at!

Anyways...  I'm just playing around with posting video, so unfortunatly for you, your my guinea pigs :-)

There will soon be a little Frans running around our house!  We had an ultrasound last week and found out we are having a little boy!!!  We are so excited and the girls can't wait to have a baby brother :)

Jenny

Welcome to Alaska!

For the past 4 weeks or so we've been busy keeping the sink free of dishes and the floors downstairs free of dog fuzz. We've been mowing the lawn, keeping the laundry caught up and the bathtubs scrubbed.

Now we get a break for a bit.

We had an offer this week on our home, we counter offered and they accepted!

Our planned closing date is August 2nd,

after which we're renting back the house for the month of August.

So ... we're issuing an invitation to you all.

If you've been hankering to see a bit of Alaska ...

we'll be here for another couple of months.

Then we're heading back down south

where I'm going to promptly plant some orange trees. :)

Hailey's Baptism

Hailey was baptised on Saturday

A not so great picture of us...

 Aunty Jen was able to come. She filled in for Godparents Ken and Kari Kako

Little princess got tired

With Grandpa and Grandma

Heidi was quite excited about the cake :)

Hailey getting a little loving whether she wants it or not.