He was up a bit after 8. Read and nursed, then they Skyped with Cassie, ate oatmeal and mango for breakfast, and played on the iPad. At one point he was drawing in the air and started joking “Line down, sideways V turns to Z…O…zero.” A bit later Carly skyped with her parents. We left the house a house just after 10:30. As we left, he was spelling ‘picnic mat’ again as I had mentioned going to a picnic.
We walked down to the bus stop and he sat next to and on (he was pretty squirmy) Carly while we waited, spotting bus numbers. We got two seats on the bus, but by the time we got to the park it was packed, and I had to force my way off – I believe I lost my hat at this point as it was attached to the back of the backpack.
In the park, August first spotted the flowers by the building and said “Remember flowers.” (the ones in and by the broken flower pot). We had to look at the garbage cans, then walked up to where the party was. He was a little shy at first (I keep thinking we should get to these things early, so we don’t walk into a crowd of 10 people), but soon said “Have food” and was excited about that. But we put sunscreen on him, which he wasn’t happy about, and Carly took him off to nurse for awhile. When he came back he had some pasta and pesto, then spotted the lemon bars and kept repeating “This one, this one, this one…please” etc. So I shared one with him. He found it interesting and had some interesting looks and took several nibbles, but didn’t want more. He also liked the bubbles that people were blowing and the balloons that were around. Two of them popped, startling people, but I think he liked that more than anyone else.
When we started singing “Happy Birthday” to Cora, August suddenly jumped up and took off. Carly had to go and chase him down. I caught up and asked if he had escaped, and he liked that. He was saying “Zinnie escaped!” several times. Cupcake time, and he shared a blue one with Carly, then a purple one with me. He really wanted more, and when he was off playing with Carly a bit later he kept talking about the “yellow one”. At one point he was walking around and tripped but kept his footing and said “Stumbled!” He went with Carly to throw away some garbage and they played around a bit while I talked to Rob from APIS.
We left about 1. On our walk back to the park entrance August started saying “See 8 Os”. He was referring to the sign on the fence around the apartment complex across the street that is still under construction. It says “outdoors” and the two Os are an infinity sign. He really liked it when we were here with Carly several weeks ago. Anyway, he couldn’t see it yet, and I don’t think he saw it when we got off the bus, but he remembered it.
He was ready to fall asleep on the busses (took two on the way home, as the direct busses were a long wait). Mainly just stared off into space, but I also sang to him. He complained a little, but did a really good job of waiting until we got home. At home he napped from around 2:20 to 3:20.
After his nap, we opened the box of puzzles we got yesterday at Costco. They were pretty perfect: animals (which he loves), in Hangeul (so he can learn animals in Korean), and 5 to 7 pieces. We put 3 or 4 together, and he was very talkative: “Puzzles for you” “Where it go? Right here.” “Where do you think this goes?” Carly brought him some soup, and he wanted to spell “Oma’s lentil soup” I got him using the apostrophe to spell ‘Oma’s’.
We went on a walk about 5. We went to the women’s business center, but the coffee shop was closed. So I mentioned going across to Tolerance Cafe. August picked up on that and definitely wanted to go, and was pointing across the stream saying “This one open…think so.” As we walked up to the building, he pointed to the first floor restaurant and said “This is a shop. What is it?” We went up and ordered coffee drinks for me and Carly and a dalghi smoothie for him. Carly paid, and August pointed to the signature pad and was, I think, telling himself not to cry when he couldn’t use it, saying something like “No cry…writing.” I took him outside to wait, but then he wanted to go back up and we read words on the door while waiting.
We got our drinks and headed up to a park. I let him have a couple drinks while in the backpack, but then told him to wait until the park. He kept asking for more, and was very polite about it. It was tough for him to wait, but he made it to the park. We were going to go across the stream to Chrysanthemum Park, but he said no, wanting to go the other way to Madeul. So we ended up there and sat on the platform of the piano sculpture and drank our drinks. He climbed on Carly a bit, then wanted to walk back and forth on bench round bench like he did last time we were there with Carly (he remembered that, pointing to the bench and saying “Mama here”). He got Carly to walk him back and forth, and he was walking more without holding our hands. It was a little chilly, so we convinced him to wear his moose sweatshirt for the first time this spring. He wasn’t happy about it, but once it was on he started lifting up his sweatshirt and shirt and poking his tummy. Played a little more, then headed home.
At home Carly made peanut sauce. He ate a bunch of that with mushrooms. Then I gave him a bath around 8 and after that Carly made spring rolls. He’s not big on raw vegetables, but worked on that a little since he likes the peanut sauce. Carly took him in to bed after that, but be came back out at 9:05. He didn’t want to play with me though, and he dragged me by the thumb into the dark parlor. He then asked for his water, which I was holding, then ran off, back out to the couch, saying he “escaped”.
We also looked at the I See 100 book I got at the Rubens art show a couple weeks back. He really got into that, looking at the pieces of art to see what we could see. We spent a lot of time on the Brueghel “Numbering of Bethlehem” pieces. It is set in the winter, and their are people walking across the ice, which I explained, and sliding around on boards, like they do on the ice here in the park. He started to say that was “sad”, and the best explanation I could get out of him is that it was sad that the boats couldn’t go on the river.
Carly took him back in around 10 and they fell asleep a bit later.
Riding the bus with mama:
Party:
Back home:
Spelling on the door:
Madeul:
Spring rolls and peanut sauce:
