Keller-Heikkila Blog

Here are a few more pictures of Amara (and others):

The Lunar New Year on Jan. 26 was a very eventful day.

It started for us at 2:00 am, when Willa’s water broke and contractions picked up. We had a birth tub, a small inflatable swimming pool, which I inflated at about 3:00 am to make ready. At 6:00, I rolled it upstairs to our bedroom and filled it with water. Unfortunately, we didn’t have a hose so I had to fill it with about 100 gallons of water using a 10 qt. bucket.

Labor progressed slowly with irregular timing over the course of the day and I talked with the kids about what was happening. As I started making dinner, Willa started feeling urges to push and I called our midwife, Sue Wolcott. As she got stuck in traffic, the contractions picked up considerably and we wondered if I would have to deliver the baby unassisted.

It turned out that the progression subsided, though the contractions didn’t. Sue arrived and helped, but the baby would not come out. Willa would push and push, but the baby would make progress and then seem to retract back in. We tried lots of different positions and even a popular Mexican rebozo technique that is popular for turning a baby into the proper anterior position for birth, but the progress was still slow.

Finally, at 9:06 pm (Pacific Time), Amara Rose became our second water birth in the tub. She was 9 lbs. 10 oz. and measured 21 3/4 inches long, which is typical for all our babies.

The name Amara appears in many cultures, including Greek, Latin, German, Igbo (one of the languages in Nigeria), Ethiopian, and others. A common meaning for the name is “unfading” or “eternal,” derived from the Greek word “αμαραντος” (”amarantos”) which means “unfading.”

After Amara was born, we learned why the birth was so difficult. She was born asynclitic and occiput posterior. Sue told us that if we were doing a hospital birth, the standard procedure for this position normally involves a cesarean section. We only wanted to reserve that option as a last resort in a medical emergency, so we were very thankful we were able to deliver at home without the surgery.

Willa is recovering very well, much faster than with Jasper. Her blood-loss was minimal (as opposed to the 2 pints she lost delivering Jasper) and her strength is starting to return.

Here are some pictures:

We had our first Christmas in California. Brian’s parents and sister flew from Minnesota for a week to celebrate. We all had a lot of fun together collecting shells at Huntington Beach, finding rocks on the high desert on the edge of the Mojave, and (most of all, as the kids would say) opening presents.

Here are a few pictures:

It snowed about 24 inches today in West Covina. At least in the Civic Center courtyard (funny how the snow-shower was so isolated). We went to check it out and here is what we found:

We wanted to do something fun and trick-or-treaty for the kids for Halloween. The problem is that we didn’t know where to go. Different cities do different things for Halloween. In Aberdeen, SD, door-to-door is still common, as is going from business-to-business downtown during the afternoon. In Minneapolis, very few kids go door-to-door anymore. It is mostly a dead custom, as everyone goes to the malls or churches.

We didn’t know what it was in LA, and didn’t know enough people to ask. The best information I heard was about some neighborhoods that get all dolled-up for Halloween and focus on a trick-or-treating experience. Parents drive from all around to go there. Unfortunately, the people I asked didn’t have young children themselves, so they didn’t know precisely where such a neighborhood was. Sadly, our gated community wasn’t one, as we didn’t see any kids walking around. We looked on the internet.

We found that there’s an anything-goes costume parade in West Hollywood. Sounded exciting, but definitely not kid-friendly. Another article said that there is a family-friendly event going on in Hollywood right on Hollywood Blvd. We envisioned that it might be something similar to downtown Aberdeen, where the businesses hand out a little candy but with 100,000 people attending instead of 100.

When we arrived, there were a lot of people. I don’t know if it was 10,000 or 100,000, but it was a lot. There was no official event, so the street was open and the sidewalks were overflowing.

We spent about 2 hours there, but only scored one piece of candy for each kid. Sadly, the stores were generally not handing out candy. It was so full of people that in two hours, we only walked down and back one block. It was overall a disappointment, since we weren’t so interested in just walking around and looking at people’s costumes. But the kids did get one or two good memories.

We got to see a lot of super heroes, like Elmo, Super-Man and others. Julian saw a Mickey Mouse statue sitting on a little bench and wanted to have his picture taken.

On the way home, we stopped at Winchell’s donuts for the kids, so they could have something to eat for Halloween.

Here are the pictures from that interesting night:

Jasper celebrated his second birthday today. Willa spent the day making two three-layer birthday cakes, one for Jasper to have all to himself and a larger one for the rest of us to share. Kaisa spent the day in school and talking about the order of our birthdays. Julian spent the day having his usual fun. And we all spent the evening opening presents and eating the cake.

After eating our cake, we brought a couple pieces to share with the neighbor’s 2 kids. They shared 3 pieces of birthday cake with our kids a month or so ago when their youngest had her first birthday. It’s a great way to get through the cake before it gets stale (or before I eat too many cake calories).

Here are some of Jasper’s highlights.

Kaisa had her first day of Kindergarten today. She was very excited to go, though more than a bit shell-shocked by the time she sat in her assigned chair. Things have changed a bit for Kindergarten since I attended. At a parents meeting, the principal said that by the end of Kindergarten, the children will be expected to be able to write a three-sentence paragraph to be considered “up to standards.” I don’t remember learning to read and write until the first grade. They also started on counting to 100 today, I heard.

After school, Kaisa worked hard at being the Big Girl, especially toward her jealous brothers. Julian had a harder time with jealousy than Jasper. He accepted that he wasn’t ready to go to school, but it was hard to not feel left behind, especially with all the fuss over Kaisa’s school uniform and backpack (which it turned out she doesn’t need until First Grade).

Since the school is only 1/2 mile away, Kaisa walks to school as I escort. Julian wanted to come with me to escort her back home and I suspect that might be a daily ritual for us. I just hope that Julian can keep going with the 1 mile round trip each day, as his 41 pounds is not a light load to carry a half mile.

Here are a few pictures of Kaisa’s first day of her school career.

Kaisa on Her First School Day

Kaisa and Me at School

Kaisa in Class

Here are some pictures of Kaisa’s new school. Schools in LA are quite different than the ones we’re used to in Minnesota. They are generally “outdoor” schools, which means there are no interior hallways. They are a collection of buildings (essentially trailer houses) with canopies covering some of the pathways between them. There also are large permanent school buildings, but the classroom doors are on the outside of the building, similar to a motel.

One sad thing we noticed was the lack of windows. Maybe since the students are outside between classes, for recess and for gym class (since there is no fully-enclosed gymnasium), the builders decided they didn’t need windows. At least Kaisa’s school has an interior, fully enclosed cafeteria. I saw another school nearby that had their cafeteria outside with large canopies.

Here are some pictures of Kaisa’s school.

Many have asked us to see pictures of our new condo/townhome. At long last, we finally have some for you.