He didn’t wake up to nurse at all during the night. He was up about 5:40 and they came out at 6. When I came out a few minutes later he decided he wanted to go play in the hallway. Carly got him distracted by typing on her laptop instead. He typed ‘hope’ on his own, the vowels, and lots of other stuff. When Carly was getting ready to go we got out his iPad and read the message she had sent in response to his video last night. He was then typing to her, and she called, but August wasn’t ready to talk to anyone. After that, he was sad when we found out the ghost emoji doesn’t work anymore, even if you type it. He sat on the floor for a minute, then decided to move to play dough. We made several letters out of play dough, then made oatmeal for breakfast. He remembered the ‘rhymes with autumn’ question about Pooh and wanted to watch that. However, the episodes we had been watching on YouTube have been taken down. He then wanted to watch Peppa Pig, so we watched some of that. We saw the Windy Fall Day and Bedtime stories, which was exciting since we have those books.
He leaked on the floor before I changed his diaper. He told me there was pee on the floor, then said “I like leaks.” He did iPad art off and on, and typing, of course. On both Paper and in Skype. We decided on Ttukseom Resort as the rain was supposed to hold off and it might be the last day in the 60s. We got ready to go, but then kept getting distracted by things. He wanted to take out the piano keys, so we started by having Puff play the piano (he apparently likes to scare me by playing loudly), then August wanted to put the keys back in in a random order. We happily did that for quite awhile, until he wanted to X key (the one on the very right) to fit in a certain spot, but it wouldn’t because of its shape. He got sad about that, and wanted me to hold him.
After that, he was being a snake in the nest (reading area). He wanted to get even more pillows, and went in and grabbed mine off the bed. He also grabbed August Jr. Back in the nest he said “I’m cozy. I’m cozy too.” He then told a story about the Smurfs. Part of it was “Come on smurfs, let’s go to a mooka moo party…there’s a bridge and there was lightning and it scared them boom boom crack crack.”
He started to sing a funny ABC song, replacing letters with random words, such as potatoes, punctuation, paint brush, and backamapack. He looked in the utility closet and started looking for a fuzzy, pointing and “Is fuzzy there? Noooo.” Then, we changed him to leave, and we ended up spending a lot of time reading the Tigger birthday card. Sadly, the music has stopped working. But he wanted me to read it in an Eeyore voice over and over, and sometimes as Tigger. For some reason he decided he didn’t want me to say ‘P.S.’ He really wants to know what ‘aloha’ means and told him he needs to ask Aunty Glecy for a better explanation. Before we left he wanted a 귤, a mandarin orange.
We headed out. As he was in the backpack he started to come up with “konglish” versions of words, like “sock-uh” for ‘sock’. He started working on a big piece of art on the ipad on the way down that he would continue to work on on the way home.
At Ttukseom we first looked at some sculptures in the J-Bug. There were some wooden Hangeul blocks you could play with. August wanted to play with them, but was hungry so we ate first. We ate on a nearby bench then brought them over and played with them. He said “chwachwanical” and I asked “Where’d you learn that?” He replied “Maybe the imagining, but I. Don’t. Know.” Then, he randomly said “I like people.”
We finished up with those, changed his diaper, and he was ready for a nap. We walked just north of the park and he was asleep in a few minutes. Went to a coffee shop called French Quarter and he slept from 1:11 to 2:36. He woke up and we walked back into the park and to the big play ground. He wanted to play in the sand area. He pretended to be a fox and hedgehog, and used the broom to sweep the bench and chase away the flies. He found some garbage and was burying it and said “I like burying things.” He was using a plastic sandwich container to fill it with sand and pour it on me. Did it a few times and then said “I’m not going to play that game anymore…Dada do it.” So I poured sand on his foot. He took the container and says “Don’t play that game anymore.” as he waved his finger at me. We then dug a big whole, and August stepped in and sat in it, pretending to be Spikey the hedgehog. He was pretty much Spikey the rest of our time here.
We then went and played on the whale-shaped structure, climbing up into it. There is a wavy floor there, and he pretended to be the hedgehog, climbing up and sliding down the waves. I pointed out it was a sine wave, and he chanted “Sine wave! Sine wave! Sine wave!” Some college students asked to take a few seconds of us playing for some video they were doing. We were literally the only people playing in the park, so would have really felt rude to say no. They did that, and gave us a lollipop and an apple-flavored spray candy thing. We opened the spray candy. I tried it, and warned him it was a bit sour, but he loved it, and kept declaring that he liked sour things. We also laid in the trough of the waves and looked up at the sky. I said we should be getting going, and commented that the rain seemed like it might finally be arriving. He then kept saying that he likes it when it rains, and I think he was a little disappointed that we only felt one drop before we left.
Back around home we didn’t know if we hadn’t beaten Carly home. August really wanted to find her, first by the pink building, then going into the park. But I called her, and had him ask where she was, and she was already home. We went up and they nursed, then he was playing around and said his “Now get off!” line. I asked him where that was from, and he said “From Vivian.” I asked who she had said it to, and he said “To Zinnie.” But then he couldn’t explain why she had said it. It made sense though, and sounds familiar. I think he had been playing with Duplos or something and she had been wanting him to do something else. It also might explain why he’s talked about ‘timeouts’ a few times recently, and used the same voice. The voice, scrunched face, and finger wagging totally look like Vivian.
He wanted to go make a nest, but wanted Mama to go with him. He told me to be sad, and to stay sad “because he doesn’t have any paint.” They went in and read Mother Goose and nursed and did some Duplos. He came back out and ate some soup with me, then did another piece of art in Paper and then sent messages, mainly to himself, on Skype. Carly went and took a shower and he and I went into the parlor to read. We read a poem from New Kid on the Block called “The Flotz”, which involved a monster eating punctuation marks, so August picked up on some of the rhymes and found it really funny. We then read Peppa Goes Swimming and Elmo Goes Potty before moving to Skybrary where we found a book about Alexander Anteater. Alexander stands on his head, which August liked and was trying to do. August then said he wanted his shoes (because Alexander was wearing his shoes). I told August he didn’t need his shoes, but he went out to get them. But then he got really sad. It wasn’t clear why and he wouldn’t tell us. I guess because I said he didn’t need the shoes. He just kept whispering “I want to nurse” to Carly until they did. After awhile he recovered and wanted to paint.
I gave him a bath, then we were in on the bed. He counted the stuffed animals, then we talked about which other animals he could get to make bigger numbers. Eventually, I listed Turkey, the turquoise-colored elephant he had picked out at the Salvation Army store our first year. Turkey has been in the toybox for the last year or so, and August had forgotten the name. But when I went and got him he remembered and was excited. Played a bit more in bed, then Ca
rly came in and they were asleep by 9.
