He was up at 7:07. No crying at all. Silently walked to Duplos and stood by them, then lay his head on the rocking chair and simply said “Yellow” once. We then took care of the animals, and the E we had built from Duplos. It was hurt as well: “It was hiking and slipped and hurt its knee.” The hiking and slipping part he had taken from me telling him about breaking my arm. I had told Carly about the yellow comment in an email (it was the only word he had said for the first several minutes) and she had replied, commenting on it. I read the email to August and he said “Want to lie down.” He got out of the rocking chair, grabbed a yellow brick, and laid on the floor with the yellow brick.
A bit later, after banana bread and more playing, we skyped with my parents. They had had to have Celeste put to sleep after she was hit by a car a couple days ago. And it was my dad’s birthday. Not a very happy birthday. Talked to them for a half hour or so, then got ready to head to Children’s Grand Park. August was playing on the iPad and did the digital letter magnets app. He was thrilled when he discovered he could he could change the colors of the magnets by tapping them. He came to me asking why the Korean characters changed color. He was using the actual Korean names of a couple of the characters. Definitely at a tipping point where he’s about to start learning Korean that I don’t know.
Before we left, we spent some time playing xylophone together. I believe he had mentioned something about ‘tune’. Yesterday, he had made up a new tune while singing and I had commented on it. He had then wanted me to sing the tune, but was confused when I couldn’t remember it. He had brought back up the ‘tune’ incident again today. I was trying to explain that every song has a tune, and he wanted me to play the Are You Sleeping tune. I started playing, and then he played the “Brother John” notes. We played for awhile and he was trying to imitate me, getting the rhythm pretty good, if not the notes.
Got ready to go and was getting him in the backpack and told him I love him a ton of Qs. He said “Dada loves you a ton of Vs and Qs…and soy milk and Vegemil A and snakes.” Then “Why they put an A on that soymilk?…what is Vegemil C?” He then talked about how some soymilk was white and some brown and said the Vegemil was “kind of brown.”
Played Animal Doctor on the way down. More people watching him, but not as bad. We stopped and got kimbap and eggs. Grey and about 68. Could have eaten outside, but gave him a choice and he chose the children’s museum. We went up and ate in the family lounge. He was getting silly in there, pretending to have me eat things and throw up (earlier he’d done the same with the little birds as we crossed the pond area) and saying “Sorry”. I finally convinced him it was time to actually go play in the children’s museum. He looked across the (always) closed sky bridge thing and wanted to go to the construction site, so we walked around.
Got distracted by the third floor. Did some of the matching puzzle stuff in the cultural area, and sang a song on the fashion runway. Then did a lot of stomping and singing the ball thing activation pad. Got on the bike pedal one and really wanted to pedal, but he needs another inch or two on his legs. Then continued down the ramp to the construction area. No one else there, so after playing with some of the bricks (he was making a house for us), we got to play with the rolling cart and crane for the first time. Sent one basket of bricks up to the second floor, then went up and got them out. But most of the time was spent on the conveyor belt, putting bricks on it and sending them up to the second floor. Also did the magnetic tiles up there, and counted them in various ways (at his request).
Changed him and headed out, now a little after 1 and time for a nap. We played on the round bench for awhile, both walking around it. He did some crawling as well. He saw a baby and asked why it was crying and I said it was just making noise because it couldn’t talk yet. I had to explain that babies couldn’t talk, and he said “The babies don’t say I love you.”
We got walking, but it took him quite awhile to fall asleep. He fought it a bit: We now walking in a sort of circle start at the children’s museum and around the north side of the central path, then walk back and forth on the south side – our regular napping path this whole time. Anyway, I turned back part way and then walked a slightly different route back through the outdoor theater because there was a large group of school kids coming on the path. August picked up on the change of route and said something like “Done with that pattern” and tried to convince me to go to the coffee shop. I kept walking and he fell asleep about 5 minutes later.
He slept from 2:02 to 3:28. He woke up and wanted out. I asked if he wanted to do sidewalk chalk and he said yes. We headed over. Playground wasn’t as busy. We had a couple people join in, but just a little. He wanted me to write ‘Konkuk university’ in Korean. He was then pretending to write my name. He drew a sort of face, and also pizza, which he then drew a cranberry on. He had some energy and ran around in circles and was singing. He wanted me to spell ‘sand’ and we were sounding out the ‘a’. He sounded out the whole word on his own, and said “Ends in a D!” He was fully sounding out words on his own today, and Carly saw more of that at home. We were also counting syllables, and he would randomly ask how many syllables a word had. He was doing pretty well with counting 2 and 3 syllable words if I just pronounced them.
And at one point he asked me what color the chalk he was holding was: “What color that is?” I said “Pink”. He matter-of-factly replied “red”.
We left at 4. He was fine with going. We went to Costco, stopping to change him in the bathroom at Sangbong Station. He stayed in the backpack as we shopped. Found a little set of early reader Biscuit books and got those, then went downstairs for our cheese supplies. He got 3 samples: grapes, a smoked gouda cheese, and cheddar on toast. We paid, then got food for dinner in the restaurant part, and headed out. He was patient through the whole thing. We stopped by the statue for a snack. He tried to convince me to eat the calzone there, but settled for the last of the banana bread. He played around a bit, tracing and trying to pronounce the name of the statue in English and Korean.
We headed home, doing a lot of counting and singing numbers. He was having me sing our number song long past 30 – up to 120 at one point. His favorite sentence today was “What comes after that?”
Stood up on the subway, and when we left through the turnstiles he joked about “We sneak!” again. He had seen the little Larva cartoon again.
Got him at 6. He wanted to nurse and read with Carly and they opened the Biscuit books and read a little, but he didn’t nurse. He then did the Hangeul app for awhile, then he and I drew in Art Maker. He wanted to draw homes again, and I made a rectangle. He then divided it into quarters, and said “That a present. That’s not a home.”
He needed to be changed and when I tried to do so, he remembered he had yet to nurse. So Carly changed him, and he finally nursed at 7:15. A bit later Carly gave him a bath, and he was doing a lot of sounding out words. He came into the parlor and dropped his towel on the ground. He looked at the shape it made and said “What’s that shape? Maybe it’s a donkey.” He and I did some cleaning up of the Duplos and bricks, and made one tower that he knocked over.
He wanted pajamas on, then wanted to go in on the bed and make a nest, so we did that, and read Peppa Pig and the Fall Day again, and Harold and the Purple Crayon for the first time. He played in the nest, and Carly came in and he wanted to nurse. Looked really tired as I left at 9. But at 10 he suddenly came into the parlor, wanting a tissue. He sat with me for awhile. We typed out
some math problems (working on typing + and =), then read the Peppa Pig book again, and ended by reading Rain! He can read/recite most of the book now. Took him back in at a quarter past 10 and he was soon asleep.
Yellow boy and yellow brick:
Subway:
Children’s museum:
Almost:
Building area:
Outside and chalk:
Chalk:
Costco:
