He came out at 7:23. Stood near the entrance to the parlor. I asked if he wanted alone time, or to cuddle with me. He waved me into the parlor and we cuddled in the nest for several minutes with him in my right arm. Then we read the Mother Goose books. He liked the back of the book and asked what it was. I told him it was a list of the artists and which poem they illustrated. He picked up the book and said “I want to do the artists on paper.” What that meant was we went in and he copied words onto paper using a marker. He started with ‘Mix’. He had been intrigued that the ‘M’ was a lot bigger in the book. He then copied ‘feet’ and ‘I’m’. And wrote ‘book’ on his own. He kept writing ‘I’m’ so I said he could write his first sentence. I asked what he was, and he wrote ‘I’m sad’. A sad first sentence!” He then wrote ‘no’ a few times. Then he and I both wrote ‘owl’. He then drew a line connecting them. “You attached them…so they can hang on ropes together.”
While we were playing on the floor he suddenly got up and said “I’m going to do sugar in it…the tea!” He then actually walked over and wanted to carry the sugar over to me. “I’m going to do too much sugar in it. What happens if you do too much sugar in it?” It was actually my coffee he was referring to, but I said I could make tea and he could put the sugar in that. He was then watching as I heated the water and he asked, referring to the flame, “What happens if you touch the periwinkle?…you go to the hospital.”
We did banana bread and strawberries for breakfast, watched Puffin Rock, played Musyc, and I took a shower in there as well.
We got ready – a more streamlined process than yesterday, and he said he wanted to to go to Children’s Grand Park – but then I couldn’t find the cap for the brown marker. We ended up doing a lot of straightening and putting away, and cleaning under the couch. I got his flashlight out to look under it, and when he saw it he got a worried sort of look on his face. I think he considers it HIS flashlight and didn’t like seeing me use it. He said “Don’t use the flashlight. I’m gonna take it. I’m using it.” I made him ask politely before I actually gave it to him, and that was a bit of a struggle for him. So he helped look behind and under the couch: “I found two socks though…I found the puffy letter stickers we lost.”
We found it, then needed to change him. He was playing on the changing pad, using it as a gap: “I try to not step in the gap…I’m stuck in the gap…it wasn’t a big deal.” I then tied to put the green striped shirt on him, and he rejected that. So we went back in and I started to choose another shirt: “I want a soft one.” So I gave him some options, and he chose the same shirt we had started with, the green stripes, because he said it was soft.
And he’s still asking his ‘What happens if you break…’ questions. Today one was “What happens if you break your palm?” Yesterday was penis.
We headed to Children’s Grand Park at 10:30 or so. Got some kimbap, which was good. I’d brought plenty of food, I thought. But he kept eating and we were pretty out by the time we got home. He first wanted sidewalk chalk. So we wend and did that for awhile. His style was different today, as he spent the first few minutes writing one long line on the ground, which he hasn’t done before. After that he sort of just played around for awhile. Wanted to wash his hands, but the water is now off. And he made a couple jokes. He said “I want to eat dada.” Which I thought meant he wanted lunch, but then he pretended to bite my leg. And while looking at the hopscotch outline, he asked “What it not called walkscotch about?”
He then wanted to go up on the play structure, and wanted to go out on the rope floor area. We had done it once, then after that he was frightened of it. Haven’t really been by it in many months. We ended up taking the backpack up their to eat lunch. He climbed out on it, and was climbing on my legs. Randomly, he said “I want to sound like dada.” and repeated it a few times. He then was pretending to be a spider – and said he sounded like a spider. While being a spider he then oinked. I said he was a spider pig. He replied “A spider pig? I haven’t seen that.” Eventually we were done and wanted to head to the children’s museum. But by recycling we played on a hopscotch outline. He was telling me what number to jump on and I would jump on it. I did the same with him, but he often made up his own mind.
At the children’s museum he handed over the tickets and walked into the chaos of the first floor. He looked around a bit. I asked him where he wanted to go and he decided on book room. But on the way up he saw the signs for the space area and wanted to go there. We played there for 15 minutes or so. He mainly did the running game, where you see how fast you can run.
We then went to the book room. He got one of the bead puzzles and we took it up to the loft area to play. We played with it a bit, then realized it had a wrong piece in it. I went down and got another one and we straightened them out. Needed to change him, and getting towards nap time, so we did that. He was silly on the changing pad. He was asking what a sign said, but when I tried translating it for him his head was in the way and I told him. He responded by putting his cheek on the sign so I really couldn’t see it. Then, he took a sock of while I changed him and was playing with it – rubbing it across his eyes, etc. and hiding from me. When done, he crawled under the changing table and pretended to sleep.
We went back in the book room and read Oh No! a few times, then I Taste. He was playing around, so I went around and recovered all their English books from around the room. They’ve been in disarray since the summer.
We got going and walked for a half hour. He was quiet for a long time, but no nap. He said he was hungry, so I walked down by the rectangle pond. Ate the rest of our food. We ate a mandarin and he asked again what the white part was called. I told him ‘pith’ and he said I was pronouncing it wrong. “No. P H. P I P H.” Second time he’s argued a TH word is PH. Although I don’t remember what the first one was. It would be convenient for him, since ‘th’ is his most difficult sound.
He walked over and was looking in the now empty pond and started dancing to the music on the PA. He then stepped up on the edge of the pond and I told him that would make mama (and me) nervous. We played a few minutes more, then changed him in the bathroom. He didn’t want to go, but remembered the flushing in this bathroom was quiet. He still held his hands up in front of his eyes a bit, but was fine. There’s also classical music playing in this bathroom, and there was flute music we listened to. Back outside, I remembered the Ants Go Marching book. We found that, and read/sang it together. I also found The Hungry Little Catepillar in Korean and looked at that. Was surprised to find that it starts and ends with the sun talking, which the English version does not. Huh.
No nap, but we had filled our day and he was ready to head home. It was after 3:30. A little earlier than usual, but we needed to go register him for his new Teuni Teuni class. We headed out to head home. As I was carrying him, he almost knocked my glasses off. I said ‘careful’ or something like that. He said “Don’t say ‘careful’…say ‘okie dokie’.” I asserted that I had the parental right to tell him to be careful. He was doing a lot of the walking, so it was a slow trip to the subway as he kept stopping to look at signs and things on the ground.
A few times he had started to chew on his coat sleeve. Which I told him not to do, as I didn’t want holes in his brand new coat. On the train we got a seat and I got him out of the backpack and he chewed on the strap to the backpack instead. He said “It’s nectar…bee nectar.” He has been pretending to be a bee a lot (mainly to wake us
up when he has us pretend sleep). Not sure if that came from Puffin Rock, the bee video he’s watched with Vivian, Winn-the-Pooh, or me just talking about flowers. Or a combination.
Anyway, he did Sketchbook and Art Maker on the subway down and back up today.
We walked to Home Plus and I got two registration forms so he had one to write on. At first it worked to share a pen. I’d translate something, write the answer, then hand it back to him. But then he didn’t want to give up the pen. I went to get a second pen and came back to find that he scribbled on my form. He did really well though, considering he hadn’t had a nap. He scribbled in the class brochure, putting boxes around the classes. Went up to pay, it was right about 5, and I was holding him. He started to majorly yawn and rub his eyes. But when I was done he said he wanted to go to his class. I said class wasn’t until tomorrow, but he wanted to go look in his classroom. We went down and looked through the window and it was a ballet class for kids up to 5. We watched for a couple minutes. I asked a couple times if he wanted to go home to mama, but he wanted to keep watching. Eventually I made the decision to head home. I don’t know how much longer he would have watched. I told him we could watch videos of ballet at home, and he watched some with Carly later.
We were home before Carly. I started on cooking everything for burritos. She came home and they nursed. He had been playing Musyc and did more after they nursed. He excitedly got me from the kitchen to show me that he can now attach the objects to the walls. He has always had me do that in the tutorial, as it is slightly tricky, but he’s literally been practicing the maneuver with his fingers. He has it figured out, and he would attach one and get really excited, then do another.
I finished the burritos. He ate some of the seasoned tofu. He randomly said “Hey dada. Do a slant rhyme.” And a bit later said “I had a fun day.” Earlier he wasn’t answering my questions, as usual, about what we did today, or if he had fun. Carly gave him a bath. There was a lot of laughing again, and August was eager to get in at the beginning. He kept calling her ‘dada’, both before that and during the bath. He does that from time-to-time, but it was a lot today.
Carly took a shower and we were hiding August Jr.He grind his teeth a couple times, something he started, I think, just yesterday, and which I told him is very, very bad for his teeth. Mainly because I can’t stand the sound. I suddenly understand how people that don’t like chalkboard sounds (remember those?) feel like. That’s never bothered me, really, but this does.
He was being a bee to wake me up and then we played in the nest, hiding the zoo keeper. Before bed I got us a couple slices of banana bread and made it an extra special treat by putting honey on one slice. We all went down to bed, and he had a massive hyper 5 or so minutes in bed. But Carly got his pajamas on just fine and he went straight to sleep at 8:10.
Photos. Cuddling:
I’m sad:
Play structure:
Children’s museum:
Acting cold:
Tasting the railing:
Hiding from mama:
