8:57. Several minutes of alone time as he quietly lay and then sat on the floor. Then came to me and wanted a document on my iPad, but first told me to type funny words. I started by typing real words, then made up ‘blingomorph’. He then deleted my ‘ph’ and typed an ‘f’ instead and said “It ends with ‘f’.” I cut up strawberries and made cereal and strawberries for breakfast. He then wanted books, and we read Peppa Goes to the Pool and Would You Feed It to the Monkey? He wanted to play Musyc, so I said I would take a shower. But right before I turned on the shower he came in and cheerfully said “Hey dada! Come!…To do tutorial.” Couldn’t resist, so went and did that with him for a few minutes. He really likes getting the shapes “stuck” in small spaces, which means they vibrate quickly and make a lot of noise.
I finally got a shower, and after that, we watched some Puffin Rock, then hid the animals, then went back to Puffin Rock. I got all of our stuff ready to go to Children’s Grand Park, but then he didn’t want to leave. At first it was just that he had more and more things he wanted to do at home. First it was doing vet checkups of several of the animals, so we did that. Then he wanted a nest, and more hiding of August Jr and Turkey. We brushed our teeth, but he didn’t want to brush his, just suck. Eventually, he started brushing my teeth, and did a very careful job of it. But kept going and going and going. Spent several minutes on it. He spent some time loudly spelling random madeup words, and peed on the toilet a couple times.
But then he was fighting putting on clothes. He kept wanting to play duplos or hide the animals. We were getting frustrated with each other, so I said I was going to go read my book on the couch, and I was telling him he could play on his own until he was ready to go, but I wasn’t going to play anymore. He ended up coming out to the couch where I was, lying on it, and saying “I’ll just stay at home.” So I was talking about other things we could do, and I said Ppippi House, where the trains were. He said liked that idea, then asked “Is it far?” I explained and said we could walk or take a bus. “Let’s take a bus. How we do that?” A little later I said “Maybe we’ll do Children’s Grand Park tomorrow.” He said “When it’s WARM.” Sometime later, I asked if he was cold in Uijeongbu and he said he was. So it kind of sounded like that was why he didn’t want to go outside today. On the other hand, he was the one choosing to be outside in the colder cold on Sunday. But at any rate we put two pairs of pants on him today. And I kept reminding him of what we could do to keep him warm. Finally, he got his flashlight out, and as I changed him one last time, he was playing in the dark in the changing room. More of the possessive ‘my’ coming out, as he was saying “This is MY toy. This is MY flashlight.”
We walked over to the art museum and caught the Nowon 15 bus. I could have taken a more direct bus, but wanted to walk a couple blocks at the other end. We walked to the department store, and went up to the sixth floor. I tried going outside on the roof, but they just closed it for the winter. So I found a nice lounge area, but he didn’t want to get out. He said he wanted to eat outside. We were looking out the big windows overlooking the main intersection, and could look down and spot benches below. There were some in the sun right below us, so he agreed to that. Took the elevator down.
Ate lunch warm in the sun. At one point he rubbed his hands on the ground and I made him wipe his hands with a wipe before he could eat more. We went back up to the Ppippi House. They charged me 11000 won – for the play time and the drink. At the end I would question this, but she insisted that was right. Not how I read the sign (one hour free if you get a drink), or how I thought I was charged in the past. So won’t be quick to come back. Unfortunately, didn’t get a great video for Colin. A boy was hogging the trains the whole time. August tried to play with them twice: The first time, the boy had left. August played with a couple trains, but then the boy came back and grabbed one right out of August’s hand. I made him give it back to August, but August was put off by that, and just wanted to throw it up in the air. A half hour later, the boy left again, and August played with them, sort of, for a couple minutes. Then August was done, the boy came back, and that was it.
August was more into the magnet letters for one. When we came in, they were all on the floor. A tabla rasa. So he had fun putting them up. Came back to them a few times. We also played with a couple of wooden puzzles. The animal one didn’t make noise, but I supplied the sound effects, which he thought was funny. The other one had musical instruments and did work – when you put a piece in it played a little music. We then put a dinosaur floor puzzle together. He climbed on the turtle a bit, briefly played with the doll house a couple times (put the doll in to take a bath at one point, and then up to sleep, I think). And at the end he was pushing one of the baby walker things out onto the regular floor to “Get more dirt”. Sigh.
We changed him, then headed out. We first went down to the grocery store to look for good butter and sour cream. No for both. August got several fruit samples, so it was worth it. Back outside, we had some crackers and got in the backpack, then took a look at the small presidential protest (in fact, she had jus agreed to step down). I gave August the option of the back roads or the main street, and he chose the latter. As we stood at the intersection, Derek came up and stood beside us. He had been at Starbucks across the street and spotted us.
Derek walked with us all the way back to our place. August was singing the entire way – first ABC songs, then made up alphabets, then mostly-fake Korean (with some from signs). Derek came up for a few minutes, then had to take off. August found his new letter stickers (from Daiso yesterday) and he did some marker art and letter decorating, then a few minutes of Musyc. We talked about Logan’s birthday party this Saturday, and I asked what we should get him for his birthday, knowing the are about to move away. August said “Balloons…a bunch of balloons.”
Then we headed to Home Plus. Kept him in the stroller while grocery shopping. Facilitate by a lot of fruit samples: strawberries, kiwi, apples. A good day for fruit samples. He rejected mandarin samples today though. I think he’s already tired of them. Paid then let him out. We went up to the first basement floor and left the stroller at the entrance. Went in to look for Christmas light hooks. August, walking around, first found knifes (in a package) and was requesting I get them: “More knives please, dada.” We got hooks in one spot, but then I was looking at some other things. First he was looking at a vacuum cleaner, then in another spot he started grabbing random stuff for me: tire cleaner, more tire cleaner, another bottle of something from automotive, an air freshener, etc.
On the way out, at the top of the walkways, is a new little booth, with tons of humidifiers going. He played with those for a few minutes, putting his hand in front of them. Finally got him headed home and we got there at 5:45. He likes to call in on the door bell first before we actually open the door. They nursed, etc. He was saying “See. Works every time.” today – he says that Mossy says it on Puffin Rock. I got ingredients together and he helped make banana bread. He liked the spatula when we were finished, as usual. He helped the whole time, though he finds it difficult to not keep touching the dough. But he will pour everything in, and stir in between each ingredient.
Carly gave him a bath. A lot of laughing. He requested songs in Chinese, so she got her computer and they put on videos. Back out on the couch he watched some more, then did some Musyc. Took him in to bed and we had fun hiding Green Monster. He was
asleep about 8, but woke up a couple times before we went to bed, as he was rather stuffy this evening.
Photos:
Flashlight:
Lunch spot:
Ppippi House. Magnets:
President protest:
“More knives please dada”:
Humidifiers:
