Carly was up early – too early to mention. I was up about 6:40, and August was up just a minute after me. He had a nice long Skype call with Vivi in the morning. Then, looking through his notebooks, he was able to read ‘se cayo’. Carly Skyped with Cherie for a bit after that.
Around 11 we all went out and headed over to Home Plus. Carly did most of the shopping while I watched August. First, he just wanted to look at all the “yummy” fake food at the food court. Then he found a shape in tape on the floor that looked like the hopscotch area he was playing on yesterday (I have know idea why this design was on the floor in the middle of the supermarket) and wanted to write ABCs. So we did that for quite awhile. Then he wanted to carry the basket around. Yes, so Carly did most of the shopping.
We finished that then headed home, walking through the park. Snow had been falling when we left, but really started falling now. August wanted to stop in the park and draw in the dirt. Carly had a pen (pluma) that he used for drawing. It was very pretty and a good opportunity to stand in the park and watch the snow. When he wanted one of us to draw, it was mainly Carly, but he had me drawing at the end. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned our new game, where we switch back and forth between English and Spanish as we write the alphabet. I’ll be writing “A B C D…” in English, then he’ll call “Espanyol!” and I’ll say the next few letters in Spanish, etc. It is definitely helping both of us master the Spanish alphabet. Anyway, so we were doing that, then we decided to move along, as it was time for his nap. He wanted to walk by the signs first to push the buttons, so we did that. But then he went into stalling mode, wanting to go up on the bridge, or watch the people on the ice (the ice rink thing opened up yesterday), so I basically had to drag him inside.
Inside, he was really tired, but hadn’t eaten lunch yet. He was really confusing Carly as we got food ready for him, because he would go back and forth between wanting to eat and wanting to nurse. Eventually though he was in his seat and settled down enough to eat lunch first.
He fell asleep a bit past 12:30. I left a little before 1 to meet our friend Meg and we went down to the Seoul Art Center for a show Called Picasso to Francis Bacon. It was a pretty cool art history show, with works from about 15 modern painters, all from the Venezuelan Museum of Art. The lighting and signage were bad (Meg and I rarely like how the SAC presents their shows), but the art was really good and that made it worth it. Afterwards, we went across the street to Starbucks and got coffee (well, I got and Earl Grey latte and a scone) and sat and talked for about an hour. She accepted a teaching position in Moscow for next year, so that was a major point of discussion, as was the Patti Smith book I’m reading, as she’s read some of Smith’s other books.
While I was gone, August slept an hour and a half, the last 30 minutes on Carly. They then called me because August wanted to “call Dada” and then they went over to the art museum. August spent most of his time in the play area doing forward rolls and being social – only going in the play structure a little but and wanting “Mama fit.” He was going up to multiple bigger kids and saying “Hi, baby”, which people found amusing. And when another kid got upset August was again very sympathetic and patting the kid.
From there they went up to the cafe on the 2nd floor. Unfortunately, the woman had just shut down the cafe for the day, so Carly couldn’t get coffee, but they were able to sit up there and play on the iPad together.
Anyway, we headed back to Nowon on a very packed train. I got home a little before 6. Carly made stir fry for dinner. A lot of drawing with August, and playing the brand new Dr. Seuss A to Z book/app on the iPad (they had also played it at the cafe). At one point he spent a lot of time by himself flipping through the notebooks and writing ‘H i’ over and over, and then Qs and other things.
I gave him a bath, then Carly took him to bed. He was asleep around 8:30.
New words/phrases: pluma, upping (invented word for wanting help up on the bench)
Home Plus:
Walking to the park:
Park:
Ice rink in operation:
Art show I went to. It says ‘Picasso to Francis Bacon’:
Evening: