It was a day of overcoming fears: of riding his bike and going to the Christmas dinner. Also, a day for playing in a fort.
He walked out at 8:08. Looked at me but walked into the parlor and lay down for a few minutes.
Then wanted to do art on my iPad, so I let him do that. I made him a couple of the healthy pancakes for breakfast. Then he wanted to paint with the watercolors. We did that, but after a few minutes had a disagreement about the ratio of water to paint as he applied it to the paper. His opinion was that paint was optional in this ratio. I disagreed. When I took the dish of water away he got really sad. He then went in the parlor and closed the door. He was alone for a few minutes before he came back out. We gave painting another try and painted for a long time – mainly with me painting shapes and whatnot at his direction and him smearing them with a paper towel. But he did some painting as well. Oh, and we did fingerpainting, making dots. While we were doing that he wanted his bracelets. So I got those and he wore both for awhile.
He then watched Puffin Rock and I took a shower. Later, we did a lot more painting, then he wanted bubbles in the sink. He was staring at the bubbles and asked “What the colorful colors about?” I was trying to hang laundry in the changing room while he did that, but he kept coming and saying “Hey dada! Come and see the bubbles!” He climbed on the toilet and we played together. He started investigating Carly’s stuff, and found the tweezers and wanted to know what they were for. He then went around pretending to tweez things out of things, mainly slivers out of my foot and hand.
I had hung one sheet up on two chairs in the parlor to dry. He found it and hid in it, then was sticking his feet out of it, then putting a train track piece on it, and ‘hiding’ things in it. He was naked, having used the toilet a couple times before, and now had a little poop accident on the sheet. Very minor. As I told Carly later “So much poop today.” We cleaned him up, and switched the sheet for a clean one. It was a smaller sheet. We both then got in the fort and were sitting in it. He kept trying to pull the side down. Eventually I asked if he wanted a bigger sheet. He said “No. I just like this one. It’s very fine.”
He saw the wooden flower puzzle and brought that in the fort and worked on it. Then he decided he did indeed want a bigger sheet. So got a queen size and a third chair to make the for nice and big. He then got really imaginative. Or saw a ghost. A little creepy actually: “What’s that over there? It’s eyes!” I think he was referring to the kitchen lights through the sheet. But he kept joking about it “It’s mama!…You think someone is in the apartment.”
I had planned on going to Children’s Grand Park today, then heading to APIS from there. But when he started playing in the fort I asked if he wanted to go to the children’s museum and he said no. I had already packed the backpack, so I went and got the peanut butter sandwich out as I was hungry. We ate that, then were out of the fort for a minute. We were listening to Mother Love Bone song and I said ‘Kick it’ when the singer yelled it. August looked at me and then sort of kicked the chair or something on the ground next to him.
Back in the fort, he randomly said “What the what?” I asked him who says that and he said “Mama!” He wanted puffin stories, so I told him the one about Baba trying to swim. We then got the kimbap and the rest of the lunch and ate the rest of it in the fort as well.
He had to go on the toilet for a third time. He said it was uncomfortable – itchy. So he let me put some cream on afterwards, something he usually resists. He was of course reciting more Puffin Rock lines, and one now was “It’s the seagulls. It’s not safe to be here.”
He saw the loose bell on the bike and I remembered we were going to try to fix that. I went and got the screwdrivers. He wanted ‘his’ at first but I couldn’t find the short one. So I let him play with the long one for awhile. He had fun with that, then switched to the short one when I found it.
He then was pretending to be a fox, and went in the parlor and was hiding, saying “I’m going away now.” He told me to stay by the door and I lay down on my back. At first he told me I couldn’t lie down, but I insisted. He agreed and said “You can lie down and stretch your back.” I got the rolled up yoga mat that I used. He then wanted to try it, which was fun to see.
He was all dressed now, with his Mickey Mouse Christmas pajamas so he was ready for the party. He pooped yet again, so had to go change his diaper. During which he also took off his socks. It felt like we were never going to leave the house. Finally, before we left he was standing on one foot like a seagull.
It was 3 or so before we headed out. Our first venture was with the bike across to the park. We got over to the park, and he started by walking the bike by the handlebars. Good progress. Then we were surrounded: by two women, a man that really wanted to talk to me, and Preacher. It was actually good to see Preacher, as we haven’t seen him in a couple months. But it was rather overwhelming in that I was trying to get August on the bike at the moment. August handled it pretty well. He walked off a bit and played around for a couple minutes while I talked to the guy and Preacher and the women wandered off.
When he came back to me, we tried again. His first thought was to stand on the seat, then I got him sitting. And he loved it. I pushed and he pedaled. When we stopped he would stand up, put his fists in front of him in his ‘I did it’ pose and give a big smile. Did that several times. Helped him figure out the pedaling. He couldn’t really move the bike much without me pushing a bit. So we went for a walk. Wandered around our side of the park, looping around and back a few times. He then pointed to the bridge and ramp and we went up and over, then around the pagoda on the other side. August figured out that he had some control over steering, and could say “This way!” and turn the handles and get my attention. We needed to head to APIS thought, so we went back over the bridge, looped by the senior center looking for Preacher, then headed home, riding the bike the whole way.
At first he wanted the stroller to APIS. I wanted on an email from Carly to confirm that she’d prefer to take the bus home. August and I played around for awhile, and by the time she said yes he was open to the backpack. So we walked to APIS. He was singing at first with his head back, looking up at things, but then got quite when we were close to the stream. Told him he couldn’t fall asleep and he gave a big smile. No problem though as we made it to APIS. As we got close, we were talking about smells. Caught a bad one near the construction site and August said “What is that smell? Disgusting!”
We got to Carly’s floor. But first he wanted to stop for a “little drink”. He had some, and said “Ahh. Good water.” Played in Carly’s classroom for awhile – typing and nursing. And Carly took him with her to the bathroom and he peed there. She went back to the bathroom to change. He realized she was gone, and went out in the hall looking for her. He went in Courtney’s classroom and joked that she was mama. Kept wandering down the hall and looking in classrooms (one had a lot of Christmas lights) and then found Sarah’s classroom open, with music on. He wandered in and looked around and wondered why there was no one there. Carly walked by and saw him.
We then headed down to the basement to get to the cafeteria early to get him used to the idea. On the way down, we saw people by the office. They were all waving and saying hi to August. He hid behind his hands, but treated it more as a game this time, laughing every time he saw them (he would then do this with Don a few minutes later in the doorway of the music room). Downstairs, he knew something was up (from the first mention of it this mornin
g he was fine with mama’s classroom, but didn’t want the rest of it). We wandered to the music classrooms, thinking that might distract him. He saw an eighth note on the window to Melinda’s (she is the choral and elementary teacher) classroom. When she came out of the classroom and we were talking to her, I pointed to the note on the window and asked August what it was. He said “Eighth note”. She was impressed and told him she had a poster with all sorts of notes on it inside. We went in, and they were looking at it, and he identified all the notes and some of the rests.
She then asked if he wanted to play a xylophone. At first he said no, but I held him and she showed him. He got hooked pretty quickly. He asked me to play a specific note. But when I set him down he ran all the way across the room and out in the hall. But when Melinda started playing he stuck his head back in. He watched from the doorway for a minute, but soon was over, playing with us.
They played xylophone together for a few minutes. Very cool. She had to go to the cafeteria, as she was playing piano for the songs. She said we could hang out in her room though and use the instruments. So we played for another 10 or 15 minutes. Caroline and someone came in with Logan (Rosie has pneumonia and is in the hospital, so Jill wasn’t there and people were watching him), and he played for a couple minutes as well. He’s a bit less gentle, so August was showing him how to gently hit in the middle of the keys.
It was now past 6. Carly asked him if we could try going to the cafeteria. He said “I’m scared.” He agreed to let her hold him and get close though. They stood outside the doors for a bit, then he wanted back to the music room. A few more minutes (we would also play with the piano, he’d identify the treble clef on the piano, Carly would play some drums, etc.) then they started up the music. I picked August up this time, and walked him into the cafeteria. We stayed up close and watched them play the first song. He could see Melinda on piano, the Holbrookes on trumpet, Emmalee on violin, etc. After the song, we went back in the music room for a few minutes, and Carly stayed.
August agreed to go back in the cafeteria for the next song, and we stayed in after that. Or maybe Carly took a short break with him at one point. For each song we could go up and stand close. Carly had taken paper and markers down, and we sat on the floor and did that at one point. When they handed out gifts, August got a cool Eric Carle Animal Tales book. Dr. Kim (who mentioned that I’d lost weight when he saw us earlier) gave an extra gift for the kid wearing the most red. August might have been able to win that one, but I wasn’t going to drag him up again. August also liked the candy lemon-flavored punch. That kept him busy for a few minutes.
A couple more songs, then food was open. We jumped up, knowing that he might not last long, but he did fine. After eating some he did want to go home, but I reminded him of dessert. When we got to that he had a fair amount of chocolate cake, then berry cheesecake with me.
We headed out. On the steps outside he saw a couple and said “Hi!” to them. He was intrigued by the weather (earlier, he had commented on the wind as we crossed the bridge). Now, he said “What it dark windy about?” and was squinting at the lights. On the bus he initially sat with Carly, but wanted to go up to me. I didn’t have room (I had the backpack), but told him our two standard Puffin Rock stories (Oona fishing, Baba swimming) and we made it.
We were home at 8. He was doing well, so Carly gave him a bath. Came out and did iPad art and music. Had some banana, then went on the toilet one more time. He was asking what poop was, then said “I will try to not eat anymore.” Carly assured him poop was a good thing. He lasted until about a quarter to 10.
Photos. Happy wake up:
Bracelets and paint:
Bubbles:
Fort:
That’s Preacher on the right:
Success!
Big eyes:
Falling asleep:
Xylophone with Logan:
New book:
Eating:
