We had planned to go to Children’s Grand Park today, and that was still the plan for much of the morning. But then August got on a quite a roll playing at home, and we stayed here through lunch.
Nursed a couple times early this morning, then slept until 7:39 when he threw open the door and came running out. Lay on the couch, then saw the Kipper Collection book so we went in the reading area and read that. Read almost all of that, then August went and did a headstand on the chair: “There’s someone on the chair…Is it Santa Claus?” We finished the Kipper book, then he said he was hungry. I offered a couple things, and he said “No. I’m being picky…I want dada to give you something. There’s leftover something.” Thought he was referring to the pizza, but then he settled on oatmeal.
When Carly emailed him, he asked “Are You with Megan?”
I went in the kitchen and commented there was a warm spot. He came running and lay down on it. We shared the blueberry donut from yesterday, then made oatmeal. Plain, which he chose to add banana and honey to.
He did some Endless Numbers after he played something on the piano that reminded me of the Endless Alphabet song and I mentioned that. Later, we would learn part of the Endless Alphabet song on the piano.
Did some exercise, then did exams of his entire head and did heart surgery. He had an entire Duplo giraffe in his chest slowing down his heart. When examining his teeth we talked about what an actual dentist would do. On paper he wrote lower case letters, then upper and lowercase letter pairs. He then announced he was going to draw a sun, and did so. Interesting that that is a shape that all kids draw. For one he said “That looks more like a heart.” And he used the phrase “Let’s keep that in mind.” at one point.
He did a headstand on the ghost and I had it say “Hey, I’m scrunched.” He then recited the title “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day…That’s from Alexander.” Figured out he meant my use of the word ‘scrunched’.
He was writing Chinese characters when I went for my shower. In my shower though he opened the door and told me he was doing math now. But then an amazing thing happened: he closed the bathroom door behind him. That’s never happened.
Back out in the parlor, he was playing with the medical supplies on his own, taking the carpets, temperature, etc.: “I’m taking care of the carpet” “You’re going to explode, so let me give you…”
He did lots of TodoMath with my help as I got us ready to go. He’s really into the multiplication and the high level number line activities. He wanted to play with the Duplo animals – particularly the pig, so we found all of those. He walked around going “oooh” with the crayon as if it was a flashlight “there’s a cave…a dark spot…” He was then doing the same thing with the pig. He crawled under the chair once while doing it, then announced “I’m a badger.”
He called the gorilla a monkey, and I reminded him of the difference, and mentioned that Ruby had told us about chimps versus monkeys this summer, talking about Curious George. He requested the story about Ruby a couple more times.
He was playing with the Duplo alligator and started to have it chomp, but then told himself “It not really chomp because it not really an alligator. Don’t be scary.” He gave it a dental exam: “its teeth are broken.”
He showed off his newfound kicking ability, kicking the stuffed animals a couple times, then talked about “J O K” being the author “of a sentence”. In on the toilet he said “Let’s do the random game.” Talking about bones in his feet: “Can I see the metatarsals?”
At this point I thought we were going to head outside soon, but then he really kicked it into an intense mode. He went to the piano, and was working on scales and chords. He wants to play chords, but it is hard for his little hands to stretch his fingers far enough, so was practicing that. He said he was sleepy at one point, but kept working on chords. He then, out of nowhere, decided to take apart the playmat pieces and stack them. That involved moving all of the toys and instruments off, which he did by himself. He then decided to methodically move literally all of it in to the parlor so he could play with it in there.
At this point I suggested a change in plans and that we eat lunch here then go someplace closer. He agreed and when I asked where he said “Cheysanthemum Park. No, something different. Madeul.”
With everything now in the parlor he said “Now I can play with everything…I want to play with all these things…Let’s count all the stuff…There’s 41 things…”
He did a headstand on the chair and was in a crazy mood: “I’m blood stinky salami breath…no, something else…Let’s be crazy.” “I can’t go down cuz DADA’S IN THE WAY.” Back down, lying on the floor: “…on top of me of a flower…Someone. I said I was a flower.”
We ate lunch and played with GarageBand. Then back to the piano for Yankee Doodle singing and playing. I put his coat on. “Hey. Something’s wrong. There’s a bump in my coat and you didn’t zip it.” More piano. He was working on the chorus and changing the verses so fit the words in the other verses. He took all the black keys out.
We finally left a bit after 2. Walked up and around the stadium and got to the playground at 2:15. He did some writing in the sand and found a couple shells. Climbed up to the play structure and went down the wavy slide, after I tested it to assure him it wasn’t too bumpy (he doesn’t like bumpy slides, and I don’t blame him). On the swing for awhile, where he requested the random game again, but like earlier he started copying me, turning into a copycat.
He wanted to go up to the exercise equipment. We went up and he played on the piano sculpture, pretending to play Yankee Doodle. He seemed to have a memory of the cicadas there, as he said “Cricket, cicada…you used to see cicadas here?” Using the bone white elliptical machine with my help, he said “This is the bones of Nearly Headless Nick.” Then was identifying what bones some of the pieces were.
I pointed out the swinging machine where he knocked himself over a couple years ago. He pretended to be a baby and played with it. And almost knocked himself over once. But he also climbed on it and perched there. He then found an elliptical machine that was still too big, but that he could do entirely on his own.
I noticed that the long curved bench had had the broken pieces fixed. I pointed it out and mentioned how he used to walk on it, so he got up. He stopped where he could touch the moss on the tree and talked about remembering the moss. I also said this was where he started reciting the Korean numbers, so we practiced those, and he wanted to know big Korean numbers, like ‘billion’ and ‘trillion’ (we already know million).
I did the ‘duh-duh’ Jaws thing once, and he gave me the rules: “One – don’t chomp me. Two – don’t say duh duh. Three – don’t hide. Four – don’t do that.” I asked where that came from and he recited what Carly says before they nurse in the parlor: “One – no turning on the light. Two – no falling asleep.”
He then found some really gooey mud and had fun getting it on his shoes and rubbing it off on one of the exercise machines. I was getting chilly as the clouds had come in, so after a few minutes of that we headed out and left at 3:35.
On the walk home he was making “bzzz” noises and listing bones – it was an x-ray machine. When he named all the bones he could, he was asking me for the names of “things I can’t feel” (organs) and would then do those. We paused by the gas company building, and he got off to study the mat in front. It is like the one at the children’s museum: “Is that noodles?” We were home just before 4.
Played some piano, and shared some crackers. He played some Metamorphabet. For t
he ‘village’ he asked which one was my house, then pointed to another and said “That one is mine…we live close to each other.”
Carly was home at 5:30. He helped me put the iHerb order away. He played Yankee Doodle on xylophone and was silly in the chair. We did superbaby and rocky, rocky, rocky like a chimpanzee. He kept repeating “Alexander and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.”
Carly gave him a bath while I washed his gloves. He was playing with words: “Noke rhymes with poke. Joke rhymes with joke.” He sneezed and told himself gezunheit. Carly was laughing, and he asked “Why are you laughing? Because you’re silly?” He pretended to be a baby, then was writing things in the air “I wrote it too fast. Mama can’t read your words.” Fairly straight to bed after his bath, and asleep by 7:20.
Photos. The warm spot:
Letter practice:
Chord:
All the things:
Park. Running:
Exercise:
Pointing:
Perching:
Standing on it together:
Elliptical:
Reflection:
Bench:
Scraping off mud:
