Author: Ryan/Dada

6:53. He was just starting to leak. Half asleep. Said “wait by the elevators” a couple times. Changed him, then cuddled on the reading area. Then he started working on the snaps in the activity book, then got the Duplo animals to play with the octopus page again. Out in the living room, he wanted to choose music videos on the iPad, then wanted the ‘more sad babies’ game. I was trying to get him to say reasons the baby might be said, but he said “Dada has more ideas.” We had oatmeal and mango for breakfast, but not together. He changed his mind about the mango going in, but then ate it separately. When I went to take a shower, he wanted to get naked so he had some naked time. After my shower we brushed our teeth, and he wanted to count the “stuff” on the table, then started adding more things: “14 stuff…17 things”. We skyped with my parents. Didn’t do much talking, as August was loud, so they mainly watched him play: a lot of time spent with the dominoes, which he has pretty much figured out. Took a long time to get out the door, as there was so much he wanted to do. Didn’t leave until 10:30 or so.

At the station, August chose to get kimbap from GS25, and also chose a mango soy milk drink. We went and sat near the stream and ate lunch. Once done, he threw away our garbage and hung out with his favorite garbage cans. Then we went to the stream and he walked right in. It was past noon, so fully turned on, and he kept commenting that it was deeper now (last time was before noon). We walked up and down the stream, and made a game of spraying a dandelion with the squirt bottle.

He was ready to get napping, so we changed him by the stream and started walking. Took awhile though. Along the way we found an interesting tree with some prickly fruit on them. He picked a couple and I found one on the ground when I set him down in the coffee shop, asleep, after 25 minutes of walking. Slept from 1:03 to 2:22. We were in the downstairs coffee shop, which is technically a new name/management, but looks exactly like it used to (same fake flowers, even) but with all the Peace Coffee signs and products removed. New management hasn’t done anything to personalize it yet (and their menus are still just printed paper and inaccurate – they’ve charged me more than it says on the menu for the 3 things we bought this week). Anyway, when he woke up we played a new game on the iPad called Artie’s Magic Pencil. He liked that, and we played together for 15 minutes or so.

He decided he wanted to go back to the pool from yesterday and was a bit sad when I said we didn’t have time. He agreed on the children’s museum though. On the way there we walked by the big metal I Seoul U letters. He hit them all, making noise, and joked that “Now they’re all sad”. Got our ticket for the children’s museum and saw a woman wearing a shirt that said ‘surfing seriously harms you and others around you’. No idea. We first went downstairs, where he wandered around a bit and then ended up at the blue blocks. Played around a few minutes, then when the two other kids left he focused on making a sculpture. He pooped and I needed to change him, and eventually I convinced him we could go and come back. But once we changed him, he wanted to go to the toddler area.

There, the busiest area in the museum, we went upstairs to the cooking area. There, he spent a lot of time making tea and pouring it for us to drink. He came up with some interesting kinds of tea: “chocolate mango tea” “It’s brown sugar tea.” We went back down, and he played with the magnet thing in the puzzle corner. A girl came over, and they played with it together. She had a tray with plastic foods on it, and they ended up playing together for several minutes, pretending to eat the food. They also were hitting it together, and we did the wooden sailboat-shaped puzzle together a few times. Got a photo of them playing where it looks like she is about to punch him, but she was just being silly and kind of dancing. After she wandered off, I suggested we could go someplace less busy. He pointed to the book area and said it might be quieter. So we went over there and ended up playing with a new game they had that involves a plastic container and a lot of colorful marbles. There are rings that allow you to make layers of marbles in the donut-shaped containers. Anyway, August and I were doing that, and realized the pieces were all messed up with the other set of the same game. So we got both sets and were sorting them out. Was doing that when a woman who works there came in and told us we were only to play with one set. I thought there must be someone else wanting to use it, but I looked around and there were only two other kids in the whole room, happily doing other things. Besides, there were plenty of other toys. I said “Fixing, fixing” and pointed out all the other toys. More confused than anything. Went back to it and she left. By this point we were running late from our usual, but it was okay as Carly was staying late at work. August wanted to just keep playing with everything (there was also a game involving ice cream cones that he played with).

Finally, we headed out. Ate a Larabar and crackers on the ride home. He did a lot of singing as we walked home from the train station in the rain. Got a bit wet, but felt good, so didn’t stop to put on hats or anything. Got home at 5:45. August pressed the call button in the hall. Oh, a new game has been him pretending (wherever we are) to push the call button in the elevator. I then ask if there is a problem, and he explains something funny he wants help with (stacking a block, wanting soy milk, etc.). They nursed and we ate dinner. He and I played more of the Artie game, with him wearing his headphones. We then did more dominoes. He went downstairs with Carly to get milk, then I gave him a bath. He was laughing pretty good as I used a funny voice, but started to complain when I washed his hair and was requesting mama. She peeked into the room and he was laughing, as I would turn around and she wouldn’t be there. He thought it was hysterical. He and I went in on the bed while Carly showered. He wanted 16 books on the bed, so started putting books on. Around 12 he had to start going out and getting more from the living room. He ended up putting 17 on the bed. We didn’t really do any reading though. Carly tried to put him to sleep once, but he came out to me at 8:55. We read the Dog and Alphabet books (first time since we’ve been back), then he got some Korean books, including the badger one. When I found the picture of the badger and rabbit on the swings, I reminded him of the summer and how he wanted to go to the sky like that. He started saying “Want more” and pointing outside, but had difficulty saying more of what. Finally I said “Outside?” and that was it. It was clear he was ready for sleep at that point, so they went back in to bed at 9:26 and fell asleep.

He’s been saying ‘meh’ and ‘eh’ recently for when he doesn’t care, or for no. Think he gets that from me.

Morning: 

Counting stuff: 

Skyping and dominoes: 

Children’s Grand Park: 

Stream: 

Coffee shop. New app: 

Children’s museum: 

Little kids area: 

Getting big for this: 

Marble thing: 

Heading home: 

Evening: 

A big day for him, as he got more in the water than he ever has before – after refusing to get out of the stroller for the first half hour we were at the water park.

He was up at 7:45. More upset today. First thing he did was go to the front door and want to go out. He turned the knob thing, which actually locked it. Held him for a few minutes in the bedroom, then he was ready to go. I told him I needed to take off his diaper as he was leaking, and he laid down in the parlor. For several minutes. After I put on a new diaper, he asked “What for daytime?” Now playing with the piano and singing.

He asked where his blue water was and I said the grey backpack. He said “Nope. Maybe she took it to work.” He then sang his favorite colors in play dough and the order in which he wanted to press letters into it. “Want to rock my baby A.” He did some more GarageBand, and some good dancing to the bass guitar, then I took a shower. We then made a smoothie together, and then skyped with Cherie, Kayla, Thatcher, and Derek. Cherie and Thatcher had made a fort, so August wanted to as well, so I made a fort. August was very excited to see them, and at first was knocking the iPad over. He also tickled them a lot through the screen. After we ended the call, we played in the fort, and he had the Duplo zebra and giraffe do the activity book in there: lifting up the octopus arms, pulling the zipper, etc. We did some more play dough, then I was using my ‘sir’ voice when I changed him, and he really liked that, so I kept it up as we brushed our teeth.

Finally, we left in the stroller to go to the water park at Madeul. At the park, from 10:47 to about 11:20 he wouldn’t get out of the stroller. He ate crackers, then watched me wade in the water and the other kids. Finally got him to let me hold him and walked in the water. Had just started dipping his feet in the water when a lifeguard told me he couldn’t have his shoes on. Sigh. Took another 5 to 10 minutes to distract him and get his shoes off. But from then until 11:50, when they close the pools for 10 minutes, I was starting to get him into the water and wading. He was put off by the big kids that kept running by and splashing, and all the things everywhere that spray water, but he was fascinated by the floor colors and wanted to walk on the yellow floor, which was a bit deeper.

From 11:50 to noon we took a break and had some lunch. Soon after they reopened the pools, we went over to the regular pool, and stayed in there until we left at 1. And this was the big breakthrough. There are three steps that go down to the bottom, and eventually he was standing on the bottom, about up to his arm pits. He was fascinated by those blow up toys the other kids had, and wanted to touch them. So I kept telling him that if he got out farther he could reach them easier. Eventually I was floating him around the pool on his stomach, holding him, and we went out to the center rope (about up to my waist) when he was intrigued by it. We spent 15 minutes or so walking back and forth along it, him touching the floats on it (red, blue, red blue) with one hand, counting with his other fingers, and him singing Wheels on the Bus and Five Little Ducks to himself. He saw one of his favorite blowup car toys next to the pool and got out to touch that. The father offered to let us use it, but August only wanted to see it floating in the water. We did more floating around the pool, on his stomach and back (although only slightly getting his head wet), and I was also getting him to sort of climb out at the edge of the pool by himself. The last couple minutes we went to the corner and I got my phone out of the backpack and I tried to get a couple photos, and he stood on the steps singing to himself and stepped in and out of the water on his own a couple times.

At one he was ready for a snack and to get dry. But then he was actually fine staying in his wet clothes, so we just packed up and headed home. At home I mentioned us changing into dry clothes we started taking clothes off. August is used to Carly going to get her privacy when she changes, so he started talking about it: “I’ll get some privacy in the tent…Zinnie’s naked. Dada’s not naked. He’s got shorts on. I’ll get some privacy. I’ll close the door.” Then, he made up a new verb that I liked, when talking about the air conditioner: “It’s not temperaturing…the heat.” He played naked for quite awhile, then I finally got clothes on him and back out for a walk to see if he would go to sleep at 2:50. Late, but it still took time to get him to fall asleep. He fell asleep at 3:15 and we went to the women’s business center. At 3:57 he sort of woke up and I said good, as I was going to try to get him up at 4. We left (a woman pointed out to me that it was raining…it wasn’t much and I never opened my umbrella), but he fell right back to sleep. Tried to wake him a couple times on the walk home.

At home, he let out a “Noo!” when I picked him up out of the stroller, but he fell back to sleep on my shoulder. A little later I figured laying him on the couch would wake him up as I have almost NEVER been able to set him down without waking him. But no. Right to sleep. At one point I woke him up and sat him up and he said “Where’s mama?” But when I said she wasn’t home yet, he went back to sleep sitting up. Then he laid back down. Then he rolled over. Obviously he needed the sleep. At 5:15, finally, I touched him and mentioned going to wait at the elevators for mama, and he popped up. We went out, and she came off the elevator about 10 seconds later.

We went back in and they nursed and I prepared dinner. He was talking more about privacy, then wanted to be naked so I took his clothes off. He then went in the parlor and closed the door for privacy. He let Carly in and they nursed, talked, and cuddled. Came out and he wanted to use the eraser, so I was writing words like ‘Kipper’ and ‘reading area’ for him to erase. He crawled under the dinner table, so we spent a few minutes looking at all the cords, and discussing what he could and couldn’t touch. He washed dishes with Carly, and a few times during the evening he went into the bathroom and peed on his own.

At some point (8 or so) he talked about “Go to sleep with dada.” So we went in to read books. But mainly it turned into a counting books exercise: “I got six books…want Zinnie to get seven books!” Then he would go get another one. He laid in bed with Carly for a long time, then came back out and we played with the blender. In the parlor I started reading Me and My Dad. I said the author’s name and he said “Where Alison Ritchie go? We haven’t met her.” Which is interesting because, while I often say the author’s name, I don’t remember ever talking about the authors as people. Nor does he know someone named ‘Alison’. So a very interesting connection for him to make. We didn’t get far in the book, however, as he wanted me to hold him up and spin him like the bear dad does. So I did, then he wanted to spin in the chair. After some chair spinning, he was doing his water pen book – the numbers one. Doing that, it became clear that he is easily counting things up to 15 or 20. Although for the 20 one he used my finger to help him keep his place as he counted them (but he was the one using my finger).

Carly gave him a bath and they played the milkshakes game – apparently making “yucky” milkshakes this time. He then played with the blended again with me, making a “green soup” smoothie for the Duplo zebra. We went to bed, and he did some good singing and dancing there. Carly tried to put him to sleep, but after awhile he was back up with me. We read the little Sesame Street environmental book, and starting with the insects, he kept point out the window and saying that everything was “outside”. Finally, he suddenly got up and on his own started doing some cleaning: putting Duplo pieces away, closing a drawer, picking up a paper towel off the floor and setting it on the table (“I’ll just set it her
e”). A minute of that and then he walked down to the bedroom and got in with mama. I did hear a little talking from him a few minutes later, but it was then quiet and he was asleep just past 10:30.

Morning:

Water Park. Not getting out of the stroller: 

In the water: 

Home: 

Sleeping in every position: 

Evening: 

Up late with me: 

A big day: rolling play dough with his palm and mixing colors for the first time, a new Smokey Bear app, GarageBand on his own, skyping with Vivian, building with wooden blocks for a long time, singing in a subway station, standing on the subway, and taking apart the piano keys, cleaning it, and learning how it goes back together…

He was up at 6:44. He heard the door when Carly left and said “Where mama go?” But he wasn’t really upset. Looked out the window after a minute, rubbed his elbows on it, and the started knocking the dominoes off the edge and singing.

A little later, we were doing math with our fingers and he asked “3 hundred plus one hundred”. I showed it to him on my fingers, then he walked up to me a minute later holding up five fingers and saying “five hundred”. He then wanted to play with play dough, and as I was opening it he said “Talk to me”. Of course, about trees when I asked. He had a red ball go to Safeway, and got up and took it to the window “The ball is driving…the ball is all done shopping.” Did more math. He also has developed the skill of rolling a ball of play dough with his palm. He then mixed a little blue and purple on his own, so then we mixed more colors. That was fun.

I had downloaded a Smokey Bear app/story, and we read that and he showed it to Smokey. He really liked that. We would read it a couple more times on the subway later on. He was watching Kipper, so I went to take a shower. As I was showering, he came in and asked for GarageBand. I told him to look for ‘Music’, and bring it in to me if he couldn’t find it. He came back with it, and I showed him. I then heard him singing into the sampler on his own. I took off his diaper and he had some naked time. Did some sculpture with the plastic pieces, then made soup. He left a couple skype messages, then Vivian called. Talked for about 20 minutes. He played the piano for them, then mooned them when I went to get him a diaper and had set down the iPad, sang “Six little monkeys jumping on the bed…”, and cooked things in the microwave for her.

We were getting ready to go. Had had some Cheerios for breakfast, but he was still hungry, so got his spoon and was eating peanut butter. He pointed in the jar and said “Zookeeper in there.” I’d forgotten that one and it has been months since he said that.

We left, and the train to Sangbong was full, so we stood. He did some standing on his own, and I was making him hold on to me and the bar. He would do even more standing like this on the way back on line 7. Luckily, on the long train we had a seat. We got off at the National Museum stop. First went to CU and he very excitedly picked out apple juice. We went and sat on a bench near the pond and ate. He enjoyed his kimbap, and was showing it off to me. I dropped a piece of crab, and we noticed ants finding it. By the time we were done eating it was swarming with ants, so I said we’d come back and check on it before we left.

As we walked up to the actual museum, I was trying to see if he remembered it, and then he said “where you stamp, stamp”, making a rubber stamp noise. I’d forgotten about that. So yes, he remembered. It was surprisingly busy inside, and initially we got a ticket for 1:30, but it was only 12:15. Luckily, the guy at the entrance took pity on us and let us in. They had changed it around. Gone were the big puzzles and some other things, but now there was some Silk Road and Silla stuff, and a couple hills (based on the Silla burial mounds) to play on. And different rubber stands. He did the rubber stamps and played on the hills (climbing up, and crawling through a tunnel), but the big thing was these little wooden Tetris-like blocks. He got his hands on them and he went into the zone. He used up all the blocks he had at first and said “That’s a building.” I asked “What kind?” His reply, “I don’t know!” He kept building structure after structure. When he first ran out of pieces, and a kid had abandoned other blocks, he tentatively reached over and said “I can use this.” This went on for just over 30 minutes. I got some reading done when I wasn’t watching what he was doing. Finally, he said “One more piece, then we do something else.” After that, he just had time to color on some fish and worm shapes. The main draw there though was turning the crayons in their plastic tubes. Then the session was over (at 1:20) and we headed out.

Refilled his water in the water machine he really likes (he is fascinated by all of them now, and wants to know if the hot is ever working. So far, no). Got in the backpack and went out the back of the museum and walked. He fell asleep and slept from 1:47 to 2:58, waking up in the coffee shop. Surprised he slept so long as it is the loudest coffee shop we nap in.

He wanted to go, so I put on the backpack and started walking. We went and saw the special exhibit on ancient artifacts from norther Afghanistan. It was pretty amazing, particularly the intricate scenes carved on ivory. We then went to the little gift shop and chose a gift for Carly. He wanted out of the backpack to look. He chose a Hangeul notebook for her, but then also a notepad. I had told him one thing, but he really wanted two things for her. We found a different, more colorful and oddly shaped notepad for her, then bought the two things. We stopped at CU and chose M&Ms for her as well. Both places I let August hand over the stuff and debit card.

We went and checked on the crab. Completely vanished. Probably the ants, but we can’t rule out human or animal interference. He really enjoyed the long moving sidewalks on the way through the station, and was fascinated by the red and green lights showing you which walkway you could and could not walk on. In the subway station, he started singing and walked away from me and stood to perform for a few seconds. Got that on video, then stopped, but then he started to add in hand motions, so I started recording again. Then he spotted some of the machines and kept singing as he said he wanted to do the machines, incorporating lines to that effect in his song.

He had remembered the apple cookie I had bought at CU and that I told him we could eat it on our way back as a treat. I had been thinking about on the platform in case we had to wait. But for once we just caught the train here. He remembered on the train, so we ate the cookie as we went. When we transferred to the 7 there weren’t any seats, and we stood the whole way, with him at my feet, holding on to my hand and/or the post.

We got off and put him in the backpack and headed out. As we were walking, I glanced back. August, always observant, asked what I was looking for. I said I thought mama’s bus might be coming. Then a bus drove by and I observed that it was the 1137. He said “That’s not mama’s bus.” (She rides the Nowon 15.) For each bus that went past that wasn’t the 15, he would then repeat that.

We got home and he really wanted to wait at the elevators. So we went and waited, but after 10 minutes or so we headed back in. She showed up a couple minutes later. One of the first things he said was to ask Carly if they could do the colorful thing. He was referring to one of the gifts. So she opened her August 17th gifts. I had written ‘Happy August 17th!’ On the paper her had stamped at the museum, and their was the notebook that turns into the shape of a vase, the Hangeul notebook, and the of M&Ms.

Carly prepped dinner for us, then he mainly hung out with me. He was curious about the piano keys, so we ended up taking them all out, washing them, vacuuming out the piano, and putting it back together. A good opportunity to teach him about the notes A to G and flats and sharps. He wanted to keep vacuuming, so we did more of the floor. He wanted to do GarageBand, and I showed Carly how he starts dancing when he turns on one of the auto play bass lines. We read Kipper’s Birthday a couple times (he’s been having me read that one story over and over). Then he requested that I give
him his quick bath today. We washed the animals again. When we were done, I was trying to get the towel off the hook on the back of the door without standing up. I’ve tried a few times before and failed. This time, I figured it out (you kind of have to twist when you yank). That was exciting, but then August wanted me to get it BACK ON the hook. And I did, on the first throw. Now that was exciting, and he started high giving me using Sophie, so we called that a Sophie five. Then, once he was out of the bath and I dried him, he said “thank you dada”.

He talked about going to sleep after that, but it ended up taking quite awhile. I was in on the bed with them, and we started listing the things we had played with today. He kept saying “Want ‘more you played with’”. It was a long, long list, but we eventually ran out of things, I think. He was also asking for more finger math, 3 plus 3, etc. Then he said “How you do 12 fingers?…It’s trickier.” He was then holding up six fingers, and hitting the bed with them, saying “Hitting with 6!” Finally, he was off to sleep about 9:30.

Morning: 

Lunch: 

Children’s history museum: 

Finding an August 17th gift: 

Red and green lights: 

Singing: 

On the subway: 

Standing: 

home: 

A full day, with a lot of imaginative play, and a lot of building and doing new stuff at the children’s museum – stuff that was beyond him a few months ago. And he made sculptures out of his Teuni gym pieces.

He was up at 6:20. A bit later they were in the reading area and she was wiggling her toes and he was laughing hysterically. They had a nice goodbye, and after she left we ended up listening to Spanish music on the iPad. We had started by listening to Basho, but August saw all the related albums and kept clicking on them to play them. Ended up finding a couple other albums of children’s music we listened to several times. Later, he was in my bathroom and standing on the scale, trying to use the sink, and dropped his water bottle on his foot. Think he thought it was my fault somehow, as he kept refusing my help, and knocking my hand away. Eventually he calmed down and started playing with his Teuni gym cubes, but wanted them taken apart. We took apart everything except the square at the bottom, and he started building, putting pieces on and taking them off. At first it would start to fall over, and I taught him about ‘balance’ and after that he would figure it out on his own. When he had all the pieces used up, he said “This is a sculpture” I asked “What house is it?” And he responded with “What house?…Gramma and grampa’s house.” We played some more play dough before we left, then got ready to go. But he got sidetracked and ended up playing with his noisy toys: the plane and the tractor. He then decided he was hungry, so we had some Cheerios. He then asked for a cracker, but asked so nicely that I had to say yes. At one point he said “Soup is cooking. Oma’s yummy green soup is cooking.” A few minutes later: “It’s ready now.” He then expanded his pretend stove with buttons: “What the red button for?” We decided blue set a timer, green told you if the food was done, red shot off the stove, and yellow subtracted time. And at some point he asked me to talk: “Talk…about trees.” So we talked about how we were going to walk in the trees in Children’s Grand Park.

We read the Seuss birthday book on the subway, and at Children’s Grand Park bought kimbap at one of the stands in front of the entrance. Hadn’t done that before, so didn’t know what it was. I called it ‘magic kimbap’ and August liked the name so it stuck. We ate near the stream, then he wanted to find cicadas, so we walked around and found a couple and watched them. I got him to go in the shallow stream (it doesn’t fully turn on until 12) and he played the milkshake game, with the same sort of script as last time. One he came up with was “popsicle flavored”. I had set the bucket in the shallow water at the edge, and a minute later he saw it. He said “Don’t like that there.” and went and moved it up to the bench. After awhile I said “Now I’ll make a milkshak for Zinnie.” He tasted it and said “Ooh, yeah. That’s a candy milkshake. Thank you dada!”

When he was done there we went and saw animals. We stopped to look at the zoo map, and he chose the wild birds. Saw some of them, then he heard something from the cats area. We went and saw the tiger, leopards, and lion and went upstairs to push the buttons. Then went and saw the water birds. When we had walked by the big square there, he had pointed and said he remembered mama there. He also talked about wanting to throw a ball in the bicycle wheels sculpture, but her telling him no (because once you throw something in you couldn’t get in to get it out). Both those were true, but I think the ball thing was with me. Oh, also, when we walked by the conservatory he wanted to go in and spray water to the fishes, but we had forgotten the spray bottle today.

He was tired, so we stopped at a bench and changed him. He then spent several minutes studying the ground next to the bench: started by spotting a cicada cocoon thing, then a couple of moths on the ground, then some ants, and a hole that he speculated was for a snake (he kept wanting to see what was in it, but eventually I convinced him we couldn’t look in it). Walked our normal path, and he fell asleep within 10 minutes. Went to the upstairs coffee shop, and he had a short nap: 12:35 to 1:05. After he woke up he had some of my ice, then wanted a juice. We went up and got a fresh strawberry juice and shared that.

After that, we went to the children’s museum. He played around on the first floor, the usual stuff, for awhile: blackboard, shapes on the windows, etc. But he was carrying Smokey around this time. There was an announcement, and it was rather loud and long. August decided it was too loud and wanted to at first leave. I talked about the book room being quieter, and he liked that idea, so I was going to take him upstairs, but then he saw the ramp to downstairs and changed his mind. That worked out well, because once he was downstairs we stayed over another hour. First, he jumped on the jump pad things, holding Smokey. Then, he headed over to the blue blocks and took his own shoes off and started playing. He played there for just over 40 minutes. Four main activities: First, he was building towers for Smokey and knocking them over. Then, he was trying to play with the big kids, setting smaller pieces on top of the forts they were building (often to their chagrin). Third, he started to make sculptures, much like he had with the pieces at home earlier. For a couple minutes, he and another boy worked together on this, randomly putting together all these shapes. Finally, he held my hand and walked all over them like a walking course.

When he was done there, I thought he’d be ready to go soon, but not so fast. “Let’s do something else.” He did the Tesla coil, then found the wheels controlling all the gears around the robot thing, and worked at turning those. Oh, and there were the faces where you turn the different parts to put together expressions of different emotions. We had a pretty good talk about those. Then he found the airport luggage scanner. I taught him how to turn the wheel to send the bags through, and their are four bags you can put through. He did them over and over, and found them pretty funny: one has fish, another a bunny, etc. Finally, there are the colorful gears you can put down on a grid to turn a music box sort of thing. It was still a task to convince him to leave at the end of that, but he went out happy. It is clear that a lot of this stuff suddenly clicks for him in a way it didn’t before, and now that he can turn things with his hands, he is much more able to do them.

We headed home, which was pretty non-eventful until we got to Hagye and were walking through. For some reason he started chanting “This is a woman. This is a guy.” and sort of pointing to other people he saw. It went back and forth like that for awhile until it didn’t, and he caught his mistake, chanting the whole thing: “This is a woman. Nope. It’s a guy.” And as we walked past the pink building I pointed out the sculpture of people dancing/flying and told him he used to really like it. He said “Zinnie can fly! Zinnie fly in the backamapack!” He then put his arms out as if flying and chanted “Fly in the backamapack” several times.

When Carly got home, he and I were sitting at the table eating our pretend soup. He turned to her as she entered and asked “How are you doing?” They nursed and read some Kipper together. He then made a game of rolling the bouncy ball under the couch and seeing if it would roll back out. We played that several times. I gave him a bath, which went well. We washed Sophie and Ducky again. Left him naked for some time after that, and he stood in front of the fan again and said it tickled. He was okay when Carly started her shower, and was in there with her, but then he started trying to play with everything on the counter, and Carly took it away from him. He wouldn’t recover from that, and I had to go in and get him. I took him out and he cried until she got out. She took him in and he went straight to slee
p, about 8:30.

 

Teuni sculpture:

Children’s Grand Park: 

Children’s museum: 

Lotus pond: 

Headed home: 

He was nursing at 5:50 but fell back to sleep until he woke up at 6:10. When I got up a little later he was lounging on the reading area. A couple minutes later he unscrewed the water pen and spilled it, but then wouldn’t wipe it up when Carly asked him to. A couple time outs and then some separation from Carly while she got ready. But he was calm by the time she left and just asked for a kiss and said bye. We spent a good long time playing with GarageBand. We then played with play dough. He said that one of the balls was going to Safeway. Then called a squished red one a “kimbap spicy worm” and joked about eating it. I changed his diaper, but didn’t get a new one on right away, so he had some naked time. We did the puzzles on the floor and found all the pieces. Then got the box of animal dominoes out of the toy box and took them to the living room and was teaching him to play dominoes. He was quite into that. We played on the piano, then played the “More sad” game, inspired by singing The Wheels on the Bus.

I’d been in touch with Derek, who was bring the kids over to our park at some point. August was ready to go out though, so I figured we would walk to Toys R Us. But on the way there he surprisingly fell asleep a block away. The earliest he’s fallen asleep after waking up since we’ve been back. So I turned around and sat outside the coffee shop at the corner of 2001 Outlet and he slept from 11:40 to 12:40. At that point, Derek had been in the park for awhile now, so I started to push August over there and he woke up. We met up, and first went to the playground, where August was still waking up and wouldn’t get out of the stroller. So he sat in it and watched Logan play with his bubble gun while a couple of bigger kids came over and batted at the bubbles. At 1 the fountains turned back on and we went and played in that. Logan was all about the fountain, whereas August was most fascinated with Logan’s bubble gun and played with that. He also liked talking to and playing with Kayla in her stroller. August did get close to the fountain with me holding him, and we both got pretty wet.

THe fountain turned off at 1:30, and we went with them over to Burger Ton, where Derek got lunch for him and Logan. We stayed outside the door with Rosie and Logan while Derek ordered food. August wanted to go in, and twice went in with Derek while I stayed outside with one or both of the other kids. That was pretty big for August. In fact, Derek was pretty excited by how August wasn’t scared by him this time.

They then came up to the apartment with us and we’re here about an hour. Derek shared his French fries with August and the kids played. At one point August got in his cubes thing and was acting like it was a bus and was then singing. Eventually they took off, and August actually seemed a little sad for a moment. But then he went and played with his Duplos on his own for a few minutes. We then got the set of wooden shapes blocks out and played with them for awhile.

We then headed out again, to Toys R Us again. On the way he started saying things like “What is six twenty-six?” If it was a time, I would say what I thought we were doing then…sleeping, playing GarageBand, etc. That went on and on and I was running out of things, so I asked if he wanted to do math instead and he said yes. So we started chanting addition tables, and he was counting along from 1 plus 1 to 1 plus 4 on his fingers, and also roughly hitting his back against the stroller in rhythm to the chanting.

At Toys R Us he got out and spent quite awhile trying out the big toys: like a bus that is a play house, little slides, and a tricycle. We wandered around a little bit, then looked at the books, but didn’t find anything worth getting. We headed back, and went to Home Plus to do some grocery shopping. We were running late, so he stayed in the stroller until we got up to checkout, then let him out to help put things up and take them off. Got him a new pair of sunglasses, red, as his blue ones disappeared after Saturday.

Got home at 5:30, after Carly. He sat up at the table with Carly to eat dinner, and told her “more talk to me”. After dinner, he played more GarageBand, then Carly gave him a bath. We read Kipper together, then Carly attempted to put him asleep. That didn’t work, so he was back up. Started a ‘cleaning the squares’ game, where he asked what was on each playmat square and would then pretend to clean it: I said things like drool from Kayla, ketchup from Logan, etc. We then did more of the pretend soup making using a pot, then they nursed. He was asking what each flavor was as he nursed, and said of one “This is gum. I’ll save it for later.” He played Duplos on his own a bit more and was singing, then eventually headed off to bed, about 8:30.

 

Morning: 

With Derek and kids: 

In the restaurant with Derek: 

French fries: 

Blocks:

Walk to Toys R Us: 

Back home: 

He was up at 6:50, then nursed. He then wanted to clean, saying “It’s messy around there.” He and I then did GarageBand with me for quite awhile, then went and nursed. He then wanted to play caterpillar with Carly, he wanted to do the pretend sad thing, saying “Hold it and say no.” He then played with a pot, pretending to cook soup. He would have it boil over, then turn it down and clean the floor. The pretending continued as he had Sophie doing more peeing, and then gave her a timeout for not peeing on the toilet. We read Me and My Dad, then he had Sophie being sad. I asked why and he said “mama at work” We cheered her up by getting the Duplo giraffe, who he decided was a teacher as he said “Teach her something.” So I had ‘Giraffe Sangsaengnim’ teach Sophie how to read Wild about Books. He then went back to soup, and we were eating it at the table together. He had a whole monologue going: “Should we get some more dada? Scoop some dada’s, scoop some Zinnie’s. Let me check the temperature. It’s ready now!” I needed to switch the speakers we had in the two rooms, and August helped with that. He was fascinated by the cords.

Carly went down to a coffee shop to get some work done. We mixed some drink together, then he dumped out the fruits and veggies on the couch. We got ready to go, then went for a walk. We walked up and around to the north end of Madeul Stadium. He ate crackers on the way. He wanted to look at the map, and we took a couple minutes interpreting that. We walked over to the dog park (where he once got licked) and there were only three dogs. He wanted to go in, so got out of the stroller, but then wouldn’t actually go all the way in. The dogs had gone to the other end of the area, so we kept going. He walked from there the length of the soccer field to the piano sculpture. There were a couple pigeons that he wanted to scare, but his idea of scaring them was to simply walk towards them and say ‘A!’ loudly, so not too bad. At the piano sculpture we ate a Larabar and played a little on the exercise equipment. We also looked at the map again. We then went over to the sand, and started to write some words in the sand. We were having a lot of fun with that, but it was incredibly humid, and while not sunny and incredibly hot, we were drenched in sweat. So we headed home. He did some nice chanting as we did so. He asked about a lot of signs on the way home. We were getting more and more raindrops as we walked, and started to actually get wet as we crossed to Brownstone. We got home at 2:10.

Carly tried to put him to sleep, but he wasn’t tired enough for a nap. He had found an eraser and wanted to know how it works, so I went in search of a pencil. Ended up getting out all our pens, so he got to play with those, and also learned how to use a pencil eraser. Carly had made hummus in the morning, and we had some to eat. He liked the garbanzo beans, but still isn’t sold on hummus. He would request a piece of pita, but “want a dry piece”. At one point Carly asked if he wanted orange, and he gave her an odd look and shake of his head and said “Umm, not the orange…I just want the banana.” He and Carly played with the cubes, with her putting them on him. He then got out his car and magnet puzzle and just played with that by himself for a few minutes, singing to himself as he did so.

Carly wanted to go outside at 4, but August started doing GarageBand again. He really kept wanting to do the guitar amp one, but you actually need to plug in a guitar for that one. So I think we need to get him a guitar. We also played with the sampler, making some really creepy music from his voice.

We went outside a little before 5. First went to the playground where he sent on the swings with Carly, then we played with exercise equipment. At 5 the fountain came on and we went over there. He played a lot with the spray bottle. He also saw a couple boys drawing a hopscotch course using a rock. He was very excited by that, so we found a rock that he could write with, and he did that a bit. Near the end, he actually said he wanted to get close to the fountain. So Carly picked him up and got close and he touched it. Sadly, it then turned off.

At home, I gave him a bath and washed his hair. To get him into it, we washed both Sophie and Ducky, and he wanted to get them both ready for bed. At the end of his bath, I said “I like giving you baths.” He replied “Mama loves to give a bath.” I then said “Well, something like that.” He said “Want to ask her!” So he ran out, but in his excitement to ask her, all he could get out was something like “You like it!” Which isn’t exactly a question.

I took him in to get his pajamas and we put a diaper on Sophie. We then started working on the puzzles. I was trying to not interfere too much, but must not have been doing too well, because when he only had the last two pieces and had it under control he told me (politely) “Go away.”

A few minutes later, we said goodnight and Carly took him in. He was asleep about 8.

Morning:

Madeul: 

Home: 

Park: 

August was up just before 7. We had breakfast, did recycling, etc. and left the house at 9, taking the bus over to Wolgye Station, where we met up with Sarah and a couple of the new teachers at APIS, including the new art teacher and the stay-at-home dad I communicated with back in the spring. August was a little nervous about people, and didn’t want to stop at the playground before going in. And once on the platform he wanted to stay in the backpack. But he did pretty well with the people. Everyone was there about 9:45 and we headed down.

A kind of difficult ride down on the subway, as August kept wanting to nurse. Finally pulled out one of the ZonePerfect bars and that placated him until we got to Junggok Station. We walked up to the ARA Art Museum, which I’d never heard of before this show. It is on a side street, behind the Gana Art Center in Insadong and the big Buddhist temple. So we’ve been around it many, many times, but never seen it.

The show was pretty amazing. Four floors with a couple hundred works by Mr. Brainwash: http://www.mrbrainwash.com I’m quite familiar with Banksy, but had never watched the film Exit Through the Gift Shop, which is about Mr. Brainwash. Carly told me about it in the morning, and I’d watched about 50 minutes of it, so had a decent idea who he was. Anyway, think Warhol meets Banksy. It also reminded me a lot of the Chapman Brothers show that Meg and I went to a couple years ago down in Gangnam and that I then took Carly to. Seeing the show was kind of difficult though as August got upset, wanting to touch the art. Carly took him out to the lobby area, where they played on the iPad and investigates a tray of metal paint and sculpture tools (he particularly liked the knife, which of course Carly wouldn’t let him touch). We sort of took turns to see the exhibit, and took August in a couple times. One time, when Carly brought him in, Sarah played with him a bit. We looked up the stairs and there was a piece with Mickey. He said “See Mickey Mouse?” I was surprised and asked how he knew Mickey Mouse. “From the diaper.” Indeed, he had some Mickey Mouse diapers in Centralia. But a pretty impressive connection to make. Then he walked around a bit with me and we saw a piece with Picasso in it. He lasted a few minutes. When I had gone through it all, I went and switched with Carly. August got really upset that I wouldn’t let him go in with her, so I had to take him outside. He’s got a new distinctive ‘waa waa waa’ cry the last couple days when he can’t use his words. Anyway, we were outside for several minutes until he started to calm down and wanted to go back in. We were heading back down the stairs when Carly came up.

We went back down to the gift shop where Carly got a poster for her classroom, and I got a couple postcards. There was a puzzle, and they had a demonstration one on the counter. August really liked this, and we played with it for several minutes. Carly wished they had found it when they were sitting in the lobby. Everyone else was ready to head out, so we said goodbye. We played with the puzzle some more, then walked up towards Subway for sandwiches. Along the way we saw that they had lotus flowers at the big Buddhist temple, so went and saw those. August wanted to touch them, and I let him touch them a bit. But generally he wanted to get going. He remembered throwing coins in the pond, but I told him we couldn’t do that now. But then I started throwing pretend rocks in and getting pretend splashed, and he really got into that. So then he was upset when we were ready to leave.

Went up to subway and he helped decide what veggies to put on our sandwich. Sat and ate. August didn’t have his shoes on, and he liked being in his bare feet. From there we walked back down to the station and headed home. As we went, he made up, all on his own, a ‘chomp’ song sort of to the tune of “Cada Semilla”. He was using his hand to chomp me and Carly, and also towards passerby. He was also singing Wheels on the Bus and sang “The flushes on the bus say flush, flush, flush” That also reminded me that a few times now he has sung “The penis on the bus…” instead of “The people on the bus…” and thought it was quite funny.

We expected him to take a nap, but he didn’t. Instead, he wanted Carly to talk about something: “Talk. Want to talk. Trees. Talk about something.” He wanted me to turn on some music, and I asked what he wanted, and he said “I do not know.” He’s been saying that a lot when asking him for opinions. At 4 we headed outside. We stopped at Mama Juice and they got a watermelon juice to share and I got an iced latte. We went across to the fountain, and Carly and I got a bit wet. He got close to the fountain once, and ran around it a couple times, but mainly played over by the recycling bins, then started wandering off. The fountain turned off and we made our way over to the playground and played there, mainly with the exercise equipment, but also with the teeter totters, spray bottle (he enjoyed squirting us, and another boy, who played with him a bit), and climbing wall for a bit. The fountain came back on at 5 and we went over for a bit longer, but August wasn’t being drawn in. He also played with the vending machines, and at the playground wanted to go in a pretend fountain, which he and Carly ran around in.

From there we all went to the pink building, which August now knows is Lucky Mart, and did some grocery shopping. August helped bag veggies and take them to Carly and the basket. We headed home and Carly made fruit salad and French fries for dinner. We had fun with that.

Gave him a bath, then he was ready for bed around 7. He ran out and said goodnight to me. I went in and told him to think about what he wanted to do with me tomorrow when Carly went to do some work. He said “Playing! And do things.” Helpful. He was asleep at 7:15.

Oh, and yesterday I forgot to mention that at a couple points he started to chant or sing to the pace of my walking, all on his own. At one point he was doing a two bar thing: “bum bum bum bum 1 2 3 (rest)” over and over again.

Subway: 

Art museum: 

Subway: 

Home: 

Juice and park: 

Running in the pretend fountain: 

He was up at 6:10 but Carly got him back to sleep. Up at 7:37 and upset for a second, but let me hold him. He then helped type the email to Carly and when I asked what he wanted to tell her, he said “More ant juice, mama”. He watched a Kipper video, then switched to his Korean videos. We ate Cheerios and a plum, then I took a shower. He came in with a chip clip out of his toy drawer, having broken it and wondering what it was. We then brushed our teeth, then he blew on his little trumpet to make me pretend cry. He watched Wheels on the Bus, and as usual, wanted to know why each baby was crying. Recently though, he has expanded to then asking “What mama said?” That is, what did the mama then say to the crying baby. Sometimes he will volunteer them, or expand on what I say, such as “Mama said wait home to nurse.”

Then he discovered he could close the microwave door, turn it on, then open it. And he has to run back from one side of the counter to the other to do it. This became a huge game, as we pulled “More hot things” from the microwave: “All done…in our tummies…dada eat the rest.”

We got ready to go, and he got upset about wanting me to help him jump. He had a couple times today where words seemed to be hard for him and he would get upset instead. Calmed him down and went to change him and he ended up running around naked, and rolling around the bed. After awhile he wanted to go in the bathroom: “Want to go in her bathroom.” This led to another big imagination game, as he would have Sophie pee in the little toilet, say “Good job, Sophie”, pretend to pour it in the toilet, and pretend to flush it. We then took Sophie in to give her a diaper, put her in pajamas, and have her go to sleep.

In the changing room, he decided he wanted a photo of himself sitting on the box of doctor toys, then “doing this” as he played with the magnets. Got out the dry erase board, which he and I haven’t used for a long time, and identified the three things in the corner: “this is pizza, this is a coffee grinder(?), this is a mug.” Not entirely sure he said ‘grinder’, but it was definitely ‘coffee’. He got the loud tractor toy out and kept pushing the button to make it go, but supposedly it still scares him, as he kept saying “don’t like it!”

Finally, he was playing with the Teuni ball and asked where it came from, and I said he got it from Gaeguli Sangsaengnym (Frog Teacher) in Teuni Teuni class. He then asked “What gaeguli sangsaengnym teach you?” Which shocked me as a.) it shows that he knows that ‘Sangsaengnym’ means ‘teacher’ and b.) that a teacher ‘teaches’. Which, I’m sure has come up in discussions at some point (particularly in 5-Touch class, where I probably mentioned that we learned about shapes today) – but then I’ve probably focused more on using ‘learned’ than ‘taught’. Anyway.

We went out in the stroller, and asked where he wanted to go. He wanted the “Dragon playground”. Turns out that is his name for the one across the street, next to the dinosaurs. Played there a bit, then he agreed to head on to Sarang Children’s Park and the fountain at noon. On the way up, he had the new bag of fish crackers. I looked down and found the bag empty. I said “You ate them all!” Him: “There’s a bunch of them.” Me: “Where?” Him: “There” (pointing on his tray) Me: “That’s two!” Him: (Chuckle)

We stopped at the park, then went across the street to play with the phone booths. It was about a million degrees and I had to hold him up for that, but he didn’t want to stop and got upset again and couldn’t use his words. We got over that, and we found some of those ubiquitous and mysterious plastic beads in the sand. The fountain turned on, and we went and played in it. We played in it both at 12 and 1, and we were the only people playing in the park the entire time. I wore my swimsuit, put my phone in the backpack, and took my shirt off so I could get nice and wet. Felt very good. Despite almost no one else in the park, when we went back over to the platform by the sand, we found a bunch of garbage on it. Crazy. In between the water being on (it turned off at 12:30), we ate and played in the sand, finding more beads. There are little holes in the table in the sand, and we discovered the beads would just fit in the holes, and either fall through or get stuck. In that case, if you pushed them from below they would pop up into the air. While at the fountain, August didn’t play in it a ton, but would play over in the little tree area next to it. A couple of times he also ran around the fountain, following the border, chanting “Run in circles, run in circles.” He would also bring little rocks, or the beads, over to throw in the fountain. A couple times we took buckets of water over and he spilled them on the ground. While he didn’t get in the water a ton, by the end he was still pretty wet as he did get closer to the big fountains a few times since I was standing by them.

We changed him, packed up, and walked out the back of the park, then made our way down the stream. He fell asleep by Cafe Tolerance but I checked and their is no elevator. So down to the stream, across it, and up the other side and we went to the women’s business center, where he slept from 2:04 to 2:54.

When he woke up he just laid there for 10 minutes or so, then wanted to head home. At home we mixed of drink stuff and he used one of his new straws (requested pink) to drink it from a cup. He saw peanuts and wanted to eat them, but pretty sure he just carried one around. He wanted more cereal, so had a little. Then we played with GarageBand on my iPad for quite awhile. We just did keyboards, and he got quite into it, and changing all the settings. Then he was back to the microwave game, really expanding it. When I asked what it was he said “Chocolate. Cake. Mango. And gum.” He would set it on the counter and bring me a piece: “Put some water in it and cool it down…one for dada.”

The microwave game went on and on and on… Eventually I convinced him to go meet mama at the elevators. His shoes were still wet as he put them on: “Feel it…the cold..the sprinkly things from the fountain.” We timed it well. We were at the elevators for maybe 20 seconds before Carly arrived. With her he nursed, then they played with play dough, making little balls and doing math with them. He then showed her the microwave game, and we ate dinner. Carly started cleaning the floor, and August really got into helping: “What is the messy there?…mango dust…I like blueberry dust more than mango dust.” They read Kipper A to Z, then I gave him a bath. He was quite upset, until I got Sophie involved. After the bath, while naked, he had Sophie peeing, then did the whole dumping it out and flushing thing several times. We then got her ready for bed, and took her in on the bed. He rolled around and played on the bed naked for several minutes. Being a clown. We read Picasso’s Trousers once, then Carly tried to get him to sleep once. Got up for awhile. When he was ready to go to sleep I went in and gave him a kiss, then he wanted a “Bonk bonk kiss”. Then he wanted “14 bonks”. So we did 14 forehead bonks. He was asleep at 9:30.

Photos he wanted to take: 

Park: 

Asleep: 

Interesting insect: 

Home: 

Today felt both long and busy, but also rather small, in that all we did was play in the wading pool at Dream Forest and take a nap in the coffee shop there.

Started at 6:30 when he again woke up and asked where Carly was. He was in pretty good spirits, but clingy, and not happy when Carly was leaving. I suggested we walk her to the elevators, which worked well. He got a little upset when the doors closed, but as we walked back to the apartment I was carrying him so he put his head down on my shoulder. At home, we read A Pocket for Corduroy. I was then looking for something, and he found the old toy that went on top of his food tray – the plastic thing with lizards and a monkey, etc. and played with that. A few times. We then played with the zoo and the wooden bolts. I got the iPad out had he was on YouTube when I started a shower. When I turned off the water, August came and said “Dada is done.” I could tell he was watching something else, so asked. In his new big kid it’s-no-big-deal voice he said “Timmy”. It’s like everything he used to say used to have an exclamation point at the end of it, and now it doesn’t.

He wanted cereal for breakfast, but not Cheerios – the other kind. So he had the last of those. He had been singing “Yellow Submarine“ and so then I was playing it on the iPad Pro. He started choosing other songs of the Yellow Submarine album and liked a couple. Then clicked on “Come Together” and liked that. I then pulled up music videos. He really found Macklemore’s “Thrift Shop” (particularly the part where he’s in footie pajamas) and Fat Boy Slim’s “Weapon of Choice” (with Christopher Walken dancing on an escalator and flying) funny and tried out several others. While watching the latter, he decided he wanted me to spin him in the chair, so we brought that out and did that. There was one Brad video he also said he liked.

He said he wanted mango, and was very particular about getting it the right temperature in the microwave, but then he didn’t actually eat any. He then did dishes for quite awhile. I kept giving him dishes and he would rinse them then put them in the drying area, saying “Dada! It’s clean now! More washing things!”

We were playing in the parlor and listening to Amanda and Jack Palmer’s album of cover songs and he started slowly singing to it. At one point he got in the cube thing and kept dancing, then fell over trying to get out of it. I then spotted a dancing video that Paul had posted on Facebook so we watched that. It has a dancer dancing as a swan while Yo-Yo Ma plays. August copied some of the footwork, then flew around the room like a swan.

The video: http://youtu.be/qfEYjKWJ56E

We made a quick trip to the pink building and got fish crackers, as they were out of letter crackers, and frozen strawberries. I apparently kept talking to myself, as August, in the stroller, kept asking “What you say?” When we came home and turned into our hallway, August pointed at one door after another and said “Neighbors, neighbors, neighbors…” Did every door except ours. We opened the crackers, and got ready to go in the backpack. He took a cracker and said “One more then we’re going.” “Three of them then we’re going.” He got up to five or six before we left. As we walked out, August said “Two walks…dada has two walks.” Sang Wheels on the Bus as we walked, and saw a guy with a t-shirt that said “I don’t thing so.” Note the typo.

At Dream Forest he wanted to get out at the playground and play with the kids on the round thing. But then he got upset when I put on sunscreen, and the kids left. So we kept going. He saw the play structure made out of hexagons and we talked about it. I said it was like the one at Yangwon that he’s played in a couple times. He out-remembered me by saying something about “Where had the treat.” It was a reference to the ice cream cups or whatever it was that the woman gave us at the coffee shop in the hospital near there and that we ate in that play structure.

We went to GS25 and got a couple triangle kimbaps, a cup of peaches, and a fruit and veggie drink. At lunch sitting on a step, then played in the wading pool. I was throwing buckets of water, with the ball in it, and he would give each throw a funny name, saying things like “cha-gay-moo is a tricky one.” A bit later I got him to sort of sit, and I splashed him a little. He then said “want big splashing” and I obliged. Walking on the spots where the water comes out, he said “that’s a cold one…that’s warm.” Finally, he said “Pretend…when mama paints.” He wanted to pretend to paint letters in the water.

At 1:30 we changed him into dry clothes and walked for a few minutes and he fell asleep. He slept from 1:37 to 2:59, fell back to sleep, and woke up at 3:47 as I woke him up as we walked back to the bus.

As we walked the few blocks home, we sang Wheels on the bus, and made up new verses, such as “Ants on the bus go tickle, tickle, tickle.” At home we switched to the stroller and went to Home Plus and did some grocery shopping, buying broccoli, zucchini, hotdog buns, etc. He was walking, and helped choose all the veggies and fruits and put them in the cart. Walked home, and actually met Carly in the park. I saw her coming, so we stopped. August didn’t see her until she was close. When he saw her, he immediately said “Ant juice!” When she didn’t understand him, he switched to “Beetle juice!”

At home, Carly said she was going to change into lighter clothes, out of no where, August decided he wanted “Mama match the same color…Want to match the same color as Zinnie’s clothes.” So they went and he got on dark blue shorts and a blue shirt like her. They went down to get rice to have with the baked beans we got. We ate dinner, and he was being kind of whiney. A package had arrived from Gmarket, so Carly wanted to go down for it. She asked August “Nurse then look for packages?” He replied with “Yes. Deal.”

They went down and got that package (tahini). Back up, Carly was on the couch. August said “Move that then we cuddle,” referring to the cushion. So they cuddled, then he pretended to eat the caterpillar. That turned into a game where he wanted Carly to say no when he asks “Can you hold it?” and then he would pretend to be said. I then played on the couch with them and the caterpillar. Carly took a shower, and he was not at all happy about that. He was talking about some animals and said “They want to go outside…the animals want to go to Safeway.”

I was going to go meet Derek over at 7-11 to sit and talk for awhile. We had just gotten August in the bath when I needed to leave at 8:30. Carly said he fell asleep a little after 9.

Music videos: 

Dream Forest: 

Asleep: 

Sleepy: 

Strange flowers: 

Cuddling with mama: 

A very happy wake up at 6:25. I was still in bed and he asked where mama was, then ran out of the room and found her. And when Carly left for work he was with me and happily said “Bye bye” and even said it a couple of times, quietly, after she had gone out the door. After my shower, he helped put lotion on my leg, and wanted to make it squiggly. He thought the lotion looked like “A worm…a broken worm…that Colin stepped on.” For the record, I don’t know of Colin ever stepping on a worm – or August, for that matter. We also played with his Teuni jungle gym pieces and turned the cube into a double cube/rectangle thing. He stood in its couple times, then escaped.

He wanted to go outside, so we went out in the stroller about 8:30. Over by the art museum, we ran into the guy in the straw hat that Cherie had taken a photo of last year. He was cleaning with a broom. Talked to him for a minute, and he remembered meeting her. Museum didn’t open until 10, so we walked around and ended up back at the playground. There, we played on the exercise equipment and ate letter crackers. I also helped him climb on the climbing wall. He’s getting a bit better, and a couple times was hanging on the wall by himself. When we first got over to the art museum I noticed that August had a red mark below his right eye. At the playground, before he got out, I asked him where it came from and he put his head down on the stroller, as if it was from there. It was still around in the evening, and when Carly asked he said something about bonking his head on the stroller. Interesting, because it was quite a mark, but he didn’t get upset about it. Also interesting because he is now starting to be able to tell me things I don’t know: A couple times now he has also been able to tell me where something is if I ask him.

Close to ten we headed home, stopping to get our iHerb package. Went up and opened it. August was most excited by the peanut butter and more vitamins: “Want to use peanut butter…want those omega-3 vitamins.” Hasn’t said ‘omega-3’ before, but has asked what his vitamins are in the past. We skyped with my parents for a long time. He spent much of the time using the toolbox, screwing and hammering, then working on his Duplo zoo. Really starting to look like a big kid when he plays with it.

We made a salmon sandoo for lunch. He has told me he prefers ‘water’ instead of ‘wawa’, but ‘sandoo’ is apparently still okay. Ate lunch, then watched YouTube videos, finding nursery rhymes and songs in Spanish. Then went for a walk in the stroller – up to Madeul Stadium and then back along the other side of the stream. No nap, so we continued on to the art museum.

There, he played with the locks on the umbrella rack for several minutes, figuring out how to use those. We went and looked at art, listening to the headphones one and catching the blowing things once, then went to the play area. He took off his shoes and on the tile, then on the padded surface said “it’s cold there, it’s warm there.” He climbed just barely further than he has before, but still has a whole section he hasn’t been in.

A little more art, then we headed home, then caught the bus to APIS. We got off and went to the water park across the street. But any hopes of playing there vanished when we had to take our shoes off to go in. August got upset when I took his off, and wouldn’t calm down (he’s kept his shoes on every time we’ve gone in the water). So out we went. Went to the other end of the park, where the playground is, and he wouldn’t let me set him down. He fell asleep at 3:20. I laid him down on the bench. At 4, Carly sent an email saying she was down with her meeting and asking if he was still asleep. I started to respond with ‘yes’ and he woke up. I took him to APIS, and he got upset when we entered the school, calming down when he saw Carly. For some reason he has decided he doesn’t like that place.

They nursed, then he played at her desk while she got ready to go. He particularly liked her Washington rain globe. He looked at it then said “I’ll just set it right there.” I had said it was of Washington and told him what all was in Washington, and a bit later he picked it up again and said “This is where gramma and grampa’s home are.” He liked her pushpins and asked how they worked. Carly showed him, and that turned into a game of him getting pushpins and taking them to her, then telling her where to place them on the board. While doing it he said “I’ll get another one. It’s helpful.”

On the bus home (and on the way there) he wanted to know the name of every stop. He also started talking about his favorite color, first saying “My favorite color is yellow” but then saying “blue…red…black…orange”.

Carly wanted to go to the art museum to see if it would work for a school project. So we went there and August showed her the blowy things, the gun piece, and the headphones one. We then went to the play area. Carly asked if she could slip away, and I thought she meant to go home. So when August decided he wanted to leave a minute later, that’s where we headed. Carly called as we got close to home; she had meant to go look at art. So we met her in the park. He and I had been coming up with funny juices, and had ended up on insects. He ran up to her and said “Beetle juice!” That is one he came up with all on his own. He then had fun asking her for ant juice and beetle juice as we headed home.

At home, we had a can of beer open, and at one point he picked it up and carried it to Carly and said “You need this.” This apparently goes back to Centralia and when he once grabbed Carly’s allergy medicine and she actually needed it and told him so. He has since brought stuff to her, expecting the same reaction. Carly wanted to go down and get bread, and August wanted to go, but then he started working on his Duplos. She asked if he still wanted to go and he said “Work on buildings first then (go).” They went down, then we gave him a bath and got ready for bed. He and I picked out a ton of books for reading in bed. Out of nowhere he started to decide that some books were daytime books: “That’s for day time. I’ll just go put it away.” He would then walk out, put it on a shelf, and come back. Spent so much time choosing books, that I only read half of Imogene’s Antlers and then he was ready to turn of the lights. They were asleep at 9:10.

Cube: 

Playground. Crackers: 

Climbing: 

Art museum. Umbrella stand:

Sitting alone on the bus: 

Asleep on the bench: 

Visiting mama: 

Headed home: 

Evening: