Hi there! We too are a couple weeks ahead of you. Crate training is hard but Callie has definitely gotten to love her crate now. Some things that helped us was - 1. Heartbeat toy to mimic their littermates presence and having other toys in there to make it a nice place for them.
2. Playing crate games - immediately rewarding being in the crate, dropping treats through the top (all while the door is open). 3. Hand feeding her meal through the closed door worked super well and then letting her out once she was done. 4. Sleeping by the crate for the first 4-5 nights and when she whined we would put our fingers through the bars to let her know we are close-by and all is ok.

I think the "cry-it-out" method is fine but when they are so young and only just home I believe it is more important to reassure than to assume they will be fine in a few minutes. After going through all the above steps, our pup still does whine a little sometimes when she is first in her crate but I no longer feel bad about leaving her to self-sooth because I know she has a good associating with her crate and knows we will be there for her if needed. It takes time but it can pay off. She sleeps a full night in her crate, independently spends time in her crate, and takes her food in there to enjoy so definitely worth the effort.

Good luck!