He was up at 7:10. He didn’t nurse during the night, making it three nights in a row. He nursed and read Walking the Bridge of Your Nose with Carly. A bit later he and I were doing stickers, finishing up the stickers from his class that just ended, and putting shapes stickers on the drawer unit: “Mama is sitting by the stars.” (He had put the sticker of the mother on the camping trip up by the sky.) “Square is like a cube.” For the shape stickers he was at first stacking them on the side of the drawer unit, then making lines of them. He also tried climbing on top of it, but couldn’t really get started on that. He also thought it was funny putting one on my forehead: “Put it on dada’s cheek!”
Carly made French Toast for breakfast, and I got ready to leave. Meg is moving to Moscow, so is only in Seoul for 3 more weeks, and we were going to the Heyri Art Village northwest of Seoul, near the DMZ and the Kaesong Industrial Complex.
While I was gone they went to the store (we actually walked out at the same time). They bought some watermelon and he ended up eating a lot of it. He took a two and a half hour nap, waking up in the middle from a bad dream and saying “Want to hold it.” After the nap, Carly bribed him into the stroller with the letter crackers, telling him they were stroller crackers. But once in it he loved the stroller. They went up to Madeul and he played in the water with a cup and pail and shovel. They played by the piano sculpture for a few minutes, then went to the ‘new’ playground in the apartment complex, played on the spider web, then played in the sand with his toys. There was a girl there about his age, and Carly asked him to share the cup, and he handed it to her. Later, the girl’s mom left for a few minutes and came back with some juices and gave August one. He said “Thank you!” without being prompted.
Meg and I had a good outing. We first had lunch, having a caprese sandwich and macchiato at a place called Farmer’s Table, supposedly slightly famous because some K-Drama was filmed there. We then went to the modern history museum, which is a building full of stuff from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. Just packed with stuff, and comically undersized mannequins. Really cool though. Meg had borrowed my camera for AP Art portfolios and returned it, so I had fun shooting in the museum – mannequins are amazingly easier to shoot than a two-year-old. We then stopped at the ice cream bus and had ice cream, then walked around a bit more. We found a couple galleries and a handmade toys shop – interesting stuff, but not overwhelming. Before we left we walked around a last couple of buildings and found an African goods shop. I bought a kalimba and little wooden giraffe for August.
When I came home, August said “Happy birthday dada!” Carly had made a berry thing in the rice cooker and they had made a card together. Very nice of them, and a good surprise. He wanted me to say letters, and I started hiding and then popping out and saying them, and he was laughing hysterically. He had been hyper since they got back from their walk. We shared our dinner (spaghetti), then I was holding him while he did ‘Rocky like a chimpanzee’. We did more stickers from class, then I pulled him around in the laundry basket (now he wanted to hear the “ssss” sound). He wanted me to keep taking him to touch the Teuni ball, mama, etc. I hung up laundry, and he went reading with Carly, but then showed up to me with a Korean book to read. We sat in the changing room and read it a couple times. We had blown up a butterfly thing from his class, and he got the idea to trace it. We did that on paper, then he and I were drawing shapes. August said something to Carly and she said “uhh” in response. August started laughing, and wanted her to say it again. To him it sounded like the ㅡ character in Hangeul, so he started drawing it on the paper. Our phones kept getting notifications in Kakao for a conversation that was happening, and August kept copying the notification sound.
Finally, about 9 he went on his own and lined up books to read at the end of the bed, then he went and found a shirt that he wanted to wear for pajamas. He was ready for bed. He was asleep about 9:20. Sometime after 11 he sat up and said a few words. I saw Carly get up and lay him back down, and he fell back asleep without nursing.
In the morning they had been drawing on the paper and he was drawing shapes. Carly had drawn a line that he didn’t like, and he was explaining he was sad “because” of what she had done. Wasn’t all grammatically correct, but he was using ‘because’ in a nice complex sentence.
New words/phrases: because
Morning:
Wih mama:
Evening:
Books and shirt, ready for bed:
