Author: Ryan/Dada

He was up at 7:19. Pretty much straight to Sesame Street art Maker and we spent a good half hour drawing shapes and words. He wanted me to draw a heptagon, then a nonagon. He then wanted ABC songs, and was drawing letters and numbers in the air. We ate oatmeal and strawberries for breakfast, AND he ate a good amount of carrot pancake. We made letters out of Duplos and then downloaded a new letter tracing app that he liked. It also lets you trace different shapes, so he called the crosshatching “tricky crosshatching”. It forces him to be more accurate than the other letter apps, so he had to pay attention to getting all the way to the next dot, so he was telling himself “down to the dot.”

As we were getting ready, he started talking about taking Smokey to the zoo (I haven’t mentioned that in a couple weeks), and wanted Smokey in the backpack. I explained we weren’t going to the zoo today, but he wanted Smokey in there anyway. On the subway, I told August Smokey had never been here before and should show him around. So August spent the whole trip showing Smokey things on the train, saying “What do you see?” He made sure to show him the handles several times.

As we got off the train and made our way to the park, he kept saying “Walk with Smokey this way.” We went to the east playground (the one we’ve always gone to) and he played on a low structure with some turning toys. He then wanted food, so we got out the picnic mat and food. He wanted the egg, but then spent several minutes walking around and playing with it. He then wanted Smokey out and again was showing him things. He then started saying things like “Have a hamburger.” and “Find a hamburger.” which I don’t really have an idea where they came from. We changed him, then walked over to the garbage cans to throw things away. On the way back he wanted to play on the whale play structure, which is the biggest one. He wanted to climb on everything, but it was too big. He made a good effort at a walking across a rope bridge and climbing up a a rope ladder. We ended up sitting underneath it on a little bench, where he confused me by saying “make a pocket right here” and pointing to the bench. I think he may have been wanting to write it, but he wasn’t clear about that.

Anyway, it was close to nap time, but he wanted to play in the sand first. So we went over there. That mainly turned into him covering his pants and shirt with sand for several minutes. Very amusing. We walked, to the east end of the park and back, to put him to sleep. He slept from 1:13 to 2:40. Went into the spirally building only to find that the coffee counter was replaced by a nice sitting area. Went up and sat on the 3rd floor for his nap, but no coffee for me. I woke him up at 2:40. When he was awake we looked a little at the animals, but could only see fish – couldn’t spot any crayfish, frogs, or beetles. Nor could we last time we were there. Pretty sure the cages are empty.

Took him to the second floor and changed him. Then went into the library. He chose a few books, including one on anatomy. For a picture with lungs I was explaining lungs and having him breathe in and out. I was also trying to feel his heart beat. He said “ribs” on his own – don’t know where he learned ‘ribs’. He was hungry, so we went outside and set up the picnic mat on the grass (I wouldn’t use it all the time, but he really likes it now) and we ate some more. We saw the playground to the west, so walked over there. He saw a bunch of pigeons and was ‘counting’ them as we walked by. He wanted to go see the garbage, but wanted me to carry him. I said if he wanted to go all the way over there he should do more walking. He complained a bit, but then acted like it was his idea, saying “Zinnie do the walking.” or something of the sort. At the playground he wanted to “Take smokey to the water.” So we went and saw the water fountains and turned them on. Garbage and faucets before actual playground.

When picking him up we’ve been saying “I got my Zinnie” and “I got my dada” again. But he often makes a joke of it, saying “I got my Zinnie” or “I got my mama” instead of “dada”. Anyway, as we walked back he was saying all three of them, and then saying “You say that.” He hasn’t really used ‘you’, so maybe the start of more pronouns. He wanted to “Take Smokey to the stairs” and went up on the play structure. He then dropped Smokey down the slide. This became a game, with August going down as well. They went down together a few times. Seemed like a big big kid moment, as it was no longer me or Carly taking him down the slides, but him taking something else down the slide – even if just a stuffed animal.

One time, as he was going back around to climb up to the slides, he came back a bit upset, saying “No popping.” I wasn’t sure what he was talking about, then he said “Finger popped”. I think he had jammed it grabbing the bar/railing.

Now past 4 and time to head home. Changed him outside one more time, then headed out. Realized we were missing our stick, so kept an eye open for it as we walked to the garbage cans by the first playground. Found it on the ground near where we first ate. So he carried the stick as we headed to the subway. He sang the ABC song and was writing in the air and on my head. On the platform he found a heavy screen on a window that made a good noise when he ran the stick over it.

On the subway he is very aware (or wants to be) of where we are on the line, always asking which stop we are at. Today he would claim a station was Hagye, but then I would tell him it wasn’t. Eventually he would say “This is not Hagye. Going to Hagye.” Carly was going to the store so I asked him what he needed. He said crackers, tomatoes, and peppers. Not sure what he wanted tomatoes or peppers for. At the station he said “See the garbage on the way out.” all on his own.I’m sure I’ve used the phrase ‘on the way out’ many times, but here was on his own.

Got home a little after Carly. I fed him some of my enchilada and then rice and zucchini and peanut sauce that Carly had prepared. He ate a lot. I started his bath, then we traded and Carly took over. He was doing a lot of writing on the paper, and that’s what we were doing while she took a shower. After that, however, he was attached to Carly and didn’t want me to take him away from her. They did a lot of reading, and for some reason he was sad about the balloons in Marvin K. Mooney. But then he wanted to keep looking at them, but then he wouldn’t let her open the book to it… He was very confusing this evening. After Carly took him out of the bath he wasn’t sure if he wanted “More dada” or “No dada”.

Anyway, eventually he and I did play on the bed a bit, and he was trying to shove the orange balloon in the crack next to the bed. He took a bunch of books in on the bed and lined them up near the foot of the bed. While we were playing, Carly had done some rearranging because we had gotten a new couch today. Carly had asked about our old couch, asking if we could simply get it patched, as the upholstery was cracking. We didn’t really want a new couch, because of August, but they gave us a new one. Anyway, we had August eat while sitting on the table because of it. We will see how that goes. So he and I came out of the bedroom to see that she had removed the reading area so that the new ottoman would fit next to the couch. August wasn’t too happy about this, as he couldn’t slide off the end of the couch onto the reading area. He was saying “Want the blue reading area…more fall, more fall, more fall.” He asked “Where is it?” and Carly said she put it in the closet. So when he wanted to nurse he said “On the reading area” and went in and was pointing at the closet.

He was still acting pretty hyper, but she took him in about 9:20 and it worked today. I think they were both asleep by 9:30.

New words/phrases: spelling ‘park’, 인반 (garbage), rib
s, Ryan, Carly, spelling ‘gone’

I finished the first season of The Returned today. Very much liking that. Haven’t done much of this personal stuff for several weeks. Will make an effort to do more.

Drawing letters in the air:

Subway: 

Playground: 

Egg: 

Showing me a little rock: 

Snack after his nap: 

After we found the stick. This is his serious sing ABC song face: 

New couch, so eating on the mesa: 

Warmest day of the year so far. Saw up to 84. 7:30. Stood in the doorway between the living room and parlor waking up today. A little sadder, but not bad. Cheered himself up after a few minutes and then went to drawing. After that, he sat on the table and wanted the letters from down below. We got those out and alphabetized them, then he wanted the play dough, so we made play dough letters. I had music on, and when he was done with the letters he said “Pause the song.” I did, and asked why, and he wanted to read. So we did a little reading, of Maisy’s First Numbers, then he was hungry. While I was getting the cereal and strawberries ready, he threw a couple books and I asked why he did that. He started asking himself “Why throw the books?” After breakfast he finally spotted the iPad, and watched a few songs before we got ready to go.

We left right about 10. Stopped at GS25 for kimbap and soy milk. He wanted some of the triangle kimbap so we got a couple of those as well. We sat by the rectangular pond again and ate there. He liked being able to see the workers fixing the building, and had me look up “new song” a couple times. He tried the radish in the kimbap again. Ate a little bite, then gave the rest to me. I suggested he might like it more if he he ate it with some of the tuna from the kimbap. He tried that, chewed it for quite awhile, then spit it out. At least he keeps trying. He also tried the seaweed that comes with the triangle kimbap and that we never use. He didn’t like it at all – I think it immediately stuck to the roof of his mouth. He started counting backwards from 10 over and over. While he was doing that he was sticking his finger in his water bottle to get it stuck – he does it for fun now and it doesn’t make him upset. Finally, he started to pour his water out and I said he couldn’t. He started to screech, but then turned to me and said “Why?”

I changed him and we put on sunscreen. He said no to this, but then say patiently as I did his arms and legs. We walked to the new playground, where we looked at the garbage, then found the one shady spot in the sand and played there. We took his sandals off. He was finding pieces of shell in the sand, and found a pretty big piece. He was burying it and said “That’s a silly thing to do.” We had the shovel and I started making a sand mountain. He had fun destroying it. He was talking more about finding ladybugs today, and wanted to write ‘ladybug’ in the sand. I think his interest in ladybugs partially comes from the Elmo Loves ABC app, which has a clip of the song “Ladybug Picnic” for L. Later, during his bath, I would look up the words and we would sing it a bunch. Finally, he was saying that the big piece of shell was “shell from an egg”. I was trying to explain that it wasn’t, but I’m not sure he believed me. He also found another one that was part of a spirally shell and he called it a “worm”, which it kind of looked like.

Getting him ready for his nap went smoothly, except for having to try 3 bathrooms to find an open handicapped stall with changing table. 15 minutes or so and he was asleep. Slept from 1:25 to 2:22. He woke up and said “play on iPad” so I took him out. He didn’t want me to set him down though and instead put his head on my shoulder and fell back to sleep. Walked around the cafe with him on my shoulder for 5 to 10 minutes until he woke up again. Think he still woke up grumpy, as he was sitting on my lap and playing Elmo Loves ABC and eating ice. We dropped one piece of ice on the floor and he was concerned. I said it was okay and reached for a new piece of ice and he screeched for a couple seconds. I picked him up and quickly took him outside. He didn’t really do anymore screaming, it was just talk time. He cuddled with me and yawned. We went back in the rest was fine. Noted a Muzak version of Billy Joel’s “For the Longest Time” playing – their music is really quiet so I never notice it, but that song I did. Finally, right before we left he was standing on the chair and trying to play with the straw. I asked if he was being uncouth again, so he started saying “Be uncouth!” Not exactly the reaction I wanted.

We had left because he was hungry. He wanted to go to the children’s museum and eat, so we did that. Nice because it was warM – now up to 84. Went up to the 3rd floor family room and had a snack. We needed to fill his water so went to do that. From there he saw the exhibits on the 3rd floor and wanted to play. Had to coax him back to the cafeteria to get our stuff. Spent a little time on the 3rd floor (the balls and air stuff), then we went down to the book room to read Oh No! We never actually got to that, as he wanted to go to the little kids area. We went there, and the first thing he wanted to do was “soup”. We went up there and played – had the place all to ourselves as it wasn’t busy today. He wanted his watering it was back downstairs he agreed to stay there and play (“Zinnie stay here”) and I went and got it. A bit later, he spilled some water and I went back down to get a paper towel. This time there was a mother up there with a 12 month old or so. August started walking to the stairs and she stopped him, which is kind of funny because he can totally go up and down those stairs on his own now. Anyway, we went to the room under that and played with the colored sorting objects. At one point a ball rolled across the room and he wanted me to get it. He was a little demand-y today, and said “Dada walk.” I reminded him to ask nicely and he said “Dada get it please.” in his sweet voice. An announcement came on the loudspeaker and he asked me to “Look it up.” Sadly, couldn’t do that one (actually, I’ve used the Google Translate voice translation to get bits of the announcements in our apartment before, but this was too muffled with background noise).

We went out and went to the puzzles. Place wasn’t busy at all, but all the pieces were mixed up and missing. August noticed a piece missing from the shapes puzzles and said “Dada find circle.” We never did find that one, but sorted out a lot of them. Before we left, we took some things that belonged back up in the kitchen area up there. Going down he counted stairs, as he usually does. But he got creative: “1, 2, 3, 100 million.”

We went to the reading room to put on our shoes, and someone had left out a book called “I taste…” We read that several times, then changed him and headed out. On the way to the subway, he was spelling ‘bingo’ but changing the spelling, mainly the first letter and vowel, and seeing what that made: “cingo, ango, mango” He figured out he had spelled ‘mango’ at one point.

Sat on the floor of the subway on our way home. When we got back to Brownstone he stopped me outside, wanting to read Hangeul on the building map. He has pointed it out before but we haven’t stopped. Took me a minute to figure out what he wanted. Turned out he thought the shape of the building itself was Hangeul, as the left part of the building looks like ‘ㅏ’. It was about 5:20 and I had been telling him mama probably wouldn’t be home, but when we got home he was really, really sad she wasn’t there. We’ve gotten in a habit of being pretty late returning in the afternoon, so he isn’t used to getting home first. I tried to take him out of the backpack and tell him we could walk back to the elevators, but he didn’t want to get out of the backpack. He wanted me to get back in and “dada walk”. But he was being demanding, so wasn’t going to give in to that. Took several minutes until he would let me take him out. He calmed down as we walked to the elevators. Carly called and was going to go to the grocery store, but decided she didn’t need to when she heard August still sad in the background. We went down and met her by the building entrance and he was much happier.

Carly gave him dinner and they were drawing on paper. Carly got his bath ready and August heard the water and said “More dad
a and Zinnie have fun in the wawa…get stool.” He wanted the kitchen sink. Instead, I changed him and then gave him his bath. Didn’t play much with the letters today, instead wanting the cups to play with. After his bath he started saying “Oh my goodness!” He likely got that from Carly, but I’m not sure why he started saying it. They nursed, then he was sitting with Carly and she was quiet and he said “More talking.” So Carly asked him what he had done today that was fun. He said “Fun drawing letters.” She asked which letter was fun and he replied “K!…Fun with K!”

So they started drawing again. He started to ask her  “Do you want to trade?” She started drawing dots as he drew letters and he would follow the dots, meaning that she could get him to write words and the alphabet in a pretty straight line. I took over while she took a shower. He then wanted to play in the sink, so I finally let him do that, but just standing on the stool. He did that for quite some time.

Carly took him in to try to sleep a little after 9, but he popped up all hyper. I suggested we let mama sleep and go read and he said “Mama slept sleep. Bye mama!” We did a little reading, but then he wanted iPad, then Duplos. When I said no to those he decided he wanted to sleep and nurse. He went back in about 9:30 and they fell asleep.

New words/phrases: reading ‘please’ and ‘puddles’,  spelling ‘mango’, oh my goodness, do you want to trade?

Getting to it:

Table and letters and play dough: 

Children’s Grand Park. His reaction to seaweed:

Playground: 

Children’s museum: 

At home. Playing in the sink: 

He came out at 7:47. Walked out to the living room and directed me to the parlor, then stood over by the couch, waking up. Did a lot of good stretching. Then wanted to be changed, and spent several more minutes lying on the changing pad and waking up. He wanted his shirt changed, and picked the CWU shirt (we call it the ‘puma shirt’) for the first time today. But no pants for now. He ate leftover carrot pancakes for breakfast. He was coming up with random words he wanted to spell, like ‘Hagye’ and ‘after’. He continues to turn things into verbs, asking “How bout altering?” Then declaring “Name!” when I say it isn’t a word. He was watching ABC songs, then wanted me to come watch with him, so said “More dadaing.” I called him or something else “wacky”, then he wanted to spell “wacky Zinnie”. We did the elephant puzzle, then got him ready to go. He objected to shorts at first, but once they were on he was fine. We sat at the table and watched the new video from his 5-Touch class (we’ve had it a few weeks, but this is our first time watching it) and brushed his teeth. He was so enthralled with the new video I let him watch 10 minutes or so, which gave me time to get the scissors and do a little trimming of his hair to get the hairs I missed last time. We left about 10:30. It was going to be warm, so we were both in shorts and sandals. He complained about the sandals too, but only until they were on, then he was fine. I used the same sandals as last summer/fall – they were full, but still fit.

We headed up to Dobongsan. I had initially planned and trying to do a little more of the section of the Fortress Trail that we couldn’t complete (going from the other direction). But then decided all the travel time wouldn’t be worth it. I had asked August what he wanted to do, and he actually said “New park.” So I settled on going to the stream at Dobongsan – not new, but we haven’t been there in months and months.

We got up there and to the stream. He talked about going in, but only ever touched it with his fingers. He climbed around on rocks – both more sure-footed and more confident of himself – which actually made me more nervous. It didn’t help that the water was a bit higher now. Just a couple inches, but more current as well – there was no playing on the hilly part where we played with Chuck. Eventually, we settled on him standing on one rock and me gathering rocks from up above and bringing them down to him. He threw and dropped them in the water. When close rocks became hard to come by, we both went up to the trail with a bag and collected rocks. We also saw a dragonfly that landed on one of the big rocks. We watched it for a couple minutes and could point out all the body parts. Sadly, while we were up gathering rocks, a man walked through and squished it. When we came back I saw it and brushed it into the water. August then proceeded to ask where the dragonfly was several times, and later said “Sad bout the dragonfly” – either because it was gone or because I wouldn’t let him actually touch it. Anyway, it was now noon and I needed to change him and have lunch. When I talked about eating he said “Go to Dobongsan” a couple times. I was confused, because we were already in Dobongsan, but then I deduced that he meant (I think) he wanted to go to our lunch spot that we’ve used the last 3 or 4 times we’ve been up that direction, slightly up into the park and in the trees. I gave him a cracker to hold him over until we got up there, so he made up another word: “crackering” is now the verb for eating a cracker. I was telling him he could make up words, so he started saying “Made up a word.”

We walked up there, got out the picnic mat and had lunch. There, he played with sticks, and I took him down to see the stream. He spotted a “flying” thing, then wanted to “look for butterflies…dragonflies…ladybugs” I told him the ladybugs might be hardest to find, and he said “Keep your eyes open.” I’ve said that to him in the past, but hadn’t said it today. As I put away the picnic mat he looked at it in the case and said “P cut off” where he could only see ‘-ororo’ sticking out.

We went and filled his water, then started a nap walk. But after a couple minutes he wanted his diaper changed. I figured he had peed, so we went back to the bathrooms and changed him. I then figured I should go as well, so did. As I was at the urinal, another man came into the bathroom, stood at the one right next to me (he didn’t need to), and started talking to August as he peed. That I could handle. But then, while peeing with one hand, he reached out and grabbed August’s hand with the other. That was too much and I told him as much and got out of there as quickly as possible (after washing my hands, which he probably didn’t do).

That was an ill omen, because the next 20 minutes or so involved a lot of annoying people. I noticed this last time I walked up the steep hill into the park – people coming the other way would see August and like dive across the trail/road to see him, and sometimes even get in my way. We made it off that main path and onto the Dulegil trail, and his eyes closed. Then a couple totally tried engaging with him/me and I said “shhhh”. I then heard “How bout ‘shhhh’” from August. He kept asking, and roused a bit and had his eyes open. A second group did the same thing. After we passed them, I muttered “Be quiet” to myself. August heard that too, and said “How bout ‘be quiet’”. We then passed some women sitting along the trail and they started talking and calling to him, and August loudly said “Be quiet!” Oops.

I kept walking on the trail, headed south, since it was taking a bit longer to put him to sleep. Only one more incident – I stopped to let a couple pass, and as they did the guy reached out and tried to grab his hand as he was almost asleep. But after that August fell asleep and I found a lone bench just off the trail to sit at. We had first started walking at 1:10 (before the bathroom incident). He slept from 1:52 to 2:43, then I thought he was awake, but he fell back to sleep. At 3 I got in the backpack and started walking and he woke up a couple minutes into walking. He was still very sleepy though, and didn’t talk for the next 20 minutes or so. We got to a viewpoint tower and climbed that. He started to perk up then. He pointed to the railing and said “See railing…sad about the railing.” Remembering the time last week that he wanted to climb on the railings but I wouldn’t let him. Back down, he started to talk about getting out of the backpack. I convinced him to wait until we got to a playground. As we were walking he started saying “This is? This one…” and pointing to the strap of the backpack. It was a little inchworm. I saved it and put it on a tree. We kept walking, and it was another 20 minutes or so until we reached a point where we could get off the trail.

Made it to a little children’s park about. Set out the picnic mat again and had another snack. He was content on the mat for quite awhile and I kept encouraging him to play. He even play hid on my lap. Eventually he got up, first wanting to find letters and shapes in the tiles and lines on the ground (up at Dobongsan he had pointed out an ‘M’ fence). He then played in the sand. First drawing letters, then he discovered pieces of styrofoam which he eventually started picking apart into little pieces. There was a little girl that stood at the railing to the sand area and just watched him. Eventually, he went over and showed her a piece of styrofoam. Then he started saying “How are you?” I’m not sure where he picked that up, but I may have taught it to him awhile back. It was time to get going, but he was fascinated by the styrofoam, saying “More styrofoam.”

Eventually we headed out. At the bus stop he saw a bit of paper attached to a sign with tape. It fluttered in the wind, and he said it looked like a “butterfly”. On the bus home we saw an
APIS bus and he was looking at names on buildings. He started saying “Name of a company”. He also randomly started saying “Cookie starts with C.” from Cookie Monster.

We got home at 6. He nursed, then ate strawberries with me while Carly read. She changed him, then they played “Donde esta”. He then started drawing, saying he was doing a “Mosaic” and then writing letters in Spanish, saying “Donde esta…” and saying the name of Spanish letters. He and I then read, looking at the I See 100 book and reading Rub-a-Dub. Carly got him some dinner, then got his bath ready and I gave him a bath. He peed 3 times – the first time I got him on the toilet, the last time was on the floor towel. We were in there a good half hour. We put the letters away (him drying a few on a towel) and I got him out of the bath, and he saw two little dots of dust floating in the water and really wanted me to get them out: “Get out the two dusts”. Finally he let me take out the plug so they’d drain out.

It was now 8:45. Carly took a shower and August read almost all of Maisy’s First Colors on his own, and much of Maisy’s First Numbers. We then read Picasso’s Trousers. After Carly was out we went into the bed and played fort and he wanted to make the bed, so we did that. He and Carly read some Go, Dog, Go then it was time for sleep. He was asleep by 9:40.

New words/phrases: reading ‘mart’ on poster, styrofoam, how are you?, cut off

Hard to wake up:

Stream time,  in the shirt from Paul:

Lunch: 

View on our walk: 

Playground. Making a V: 

And X: 

Being watched: 

Styrofoam: 

Headed home. He was very amused by this: 

Home: 

He walked out at 8:10 and surprised Carly in the kitchen with a loud “Mama!” She changed him and nursed, then I suggested he hang out with me: “No dada…no reading…do with mama.” So he did puzzles with her. Asking himself “Where do you think this goes?” Carly made carrot pancakes for breakfast. Took a moment to get used to them, but I really liked them with the cream cheese sauce – basically like carrot cake. August liked them too. He was then playing with me on the xylophone. He was making a lot of noise, and we played “The People on the Bus” – I made up lines for Jeff and Andrea. Also figuring out the tongue twister song. I started playing the Basho and Friends Spanish songs on Apple Music – August knows them from YouTube videos. For each song that came on he would want to know what it was called. He particularly liked hearing the ones he knew from YouTube and he sang along. He sat on my lap and brushed his teeth. We were at the computer, and he saw the little box under it that holds cords. It says “Je Veux Toujours Etre Avec Toi” on it, and he wanted to know the words. So he started learning French. He in particular got ‘Je’ saying “Je is I”. In the evening he would see it and repeat it. When I changed him before we left, I sang the “Sailor went to Sea” song. He really liked it this time (you say ‘see’ or ‘sea’ a lot, which sounds like the letter), and he would sing random letters instead of ‘C’ while I sang. He requested it a few times through the day.

Carly had made enchiladas for Nathalie and Rex, so we headed down a little after 11 to deliver it. As we walked from Junghwa Station, he requested “More done esta” – that’s his favorite game with Carly nowadays.

There, he got to meet the 8 day old baby – patting his hair and pointing out his eyes and nose, etc. He also got to look at a 26 Letters book that they had and drink some pumpkin juice. He and Chloe did some coloring – he was intrigued by her and her coloring books, and also the sound she made for a sheep when he was coloring a sheep. We left a little after 1 and headed home for his nap.

He slept from 2:10 to 3:05, but then fell back asleep awhile with Carly in the reading area. They read a Bob Book about lollipops and he thought it was really funny – particularly the line “Polly wants a lolly-pop!” – which he repeated over and over. He was then typing on Carly’s computer and typed Mama, Dada, and Zinnie. He then came out and we did some more puzzles.

A little before 6, I got him out for another walk so Carly could do some work. We walked up to Chrysanthemum Park. As we entered the park he said “No mama right here.” as if he didn’t remember being at this park with her. Although later, over by the sand and water fountain he would claim “Mama here!” – and he has played with her there, although it has been quite awhile. As I got him out of the backpack we were on a bench against a wall and window that was really dirty. He touched it and got some dirt on his hand, and he started talking about when he had gotten some grease on his finger while riding the bus a couple weeks ago: “Grease from bus…Hands ok…Grease from a window. Remember that.” We went and played with the water first (“This is a drain.”) then played in the sand: destroying hills of sand from other kids, looking for and burying garbage, etc. He felt something in his shoe, so came and sat on my lap on the edge and we took it off and he shook it out. But then he started reaching down from my lap to the sand below and playing in the sand with his shoe. Finally, I got his shoe cleaned and back on, and he went over to the play structure. This is the structure that is rather tall and difficult to access – no easy stairs here, just climbing walls and rope ladders. Of course, he wanted to go up, and wanted to go down the big slide with me. We couldn’t both get up though, so he had to settle for me helping him up the climbing walls and me placing him most of the way up the slide. We went back to the sand and played. It suddenly got chilly when the sun went down so I forced his sweatshirt on him. We then had a little snack to distract him from it. He got interested in the wooden toys you can sit on. He didn’t want to sit on them, but would keep pointing around saying “See a snail…see a worm.” and would go over and shake them. He played a little longer, nice and independently, then wanted me to lift him back up the climbing walls. We left around 7:15 as the street lights were coming on. There was a brick wall along the way with bumps on it. He had been counting the bumps on the way there. When there was a set of 4 bumps he counted “5” a couple times and I would say “Count them again.” On the way back, he was saying it to himself. We stopped outside 7-Eleven to read a sign in Korean. He particularly likes the double consonants now (ㅃㅉㄸㄲㅆ) as they are kind of rare, so was excited to spot aㅆ. I was carrying our stick, as we had almost forgotten it, and he asked for it and was poking the sign with it.

Back home, we had some dinner. Carly gave him a bath, then he came out and wanted to play in the sink. He was content standing on the stool for awhile, then wanted up on the counter. He played up there for quite awhile. At 9:10 or so I tried to wrap it up and wanted to go read books with him. He started to get upset though and seemed tired. So Carly took him in to bed. Alas, it didn’t work and he was back out at 9:50. He went in the bathroom with Carly and came out with the ducky from his bath, excitedly repeating “K with the ducky!” He set the ducky by the paper and got a crayon and started drawing Ks for the ducky. But he quickly switched to coloring in shapes, all on his own – I think watching Chloe and seeing the coloring books had really made ‘coloring in’ click for him. He was coloring in shapes on the paper, saying “Do mosaic…color the shape…see some white” all on his own. Sometime after 10:30 I suggested we go read in bed. He hopped up and said “Get some books”. He then took 3 or 4 books in to the bed, one at a time. We read the lollipop book and a little of the Korean textbook and another Korean book I had just gotten of the shelf earlier today. He and Carly fell asleep a little later, around 10:45.

Walking home:

– “count them again”

Playing in sink

In bed at 9:10. Back out at 9:50.

“K with the ducky.”

Doing mosaic

Reading on the bed

Asleep 10:45

New words/phrases: single G, double G, con (with), reading Pepsi, je, anneyo

 

Morning:

Meeting the baby: 

Home: 

Park: 

Him taking the selfie: 

The worm: 

Hangeul on the sign: 

Home. Playing in the sink: 

Mosaic and K with the ducky: 

He was up a bit after 8. Read and nursed, then they Skyped with Cassie, ate oatmeal and mango for breakfast, and played on the iPad. At one point he was drawing in the air and started joking “Line down, sideways V turns to Z…O…zero.” A bit later Carly skyped with her parents. We left the house a house just after 10:30. As we left, he was spelling ‘picnic mat’ again as I had mentioned going to a picnic.

We walked down to the bus stop and he sat next to and on (he was pretty squirmy) Carly while we waited, spotting bus numbers. We got two seats on the bus, but by the time we got to the park it was packed, and I had to force my way off – I believe I lost my hat at this point as it was attached to the back of the backpack.

In the park, August first spotted the flowers by the building and said  “Remember flowers.” (the ones in and by the broken flower pot). We had to look at the garbage cans, then walked up to where the party was. He was a little shy at first (I keep thinking we should get to these things early, so we don’t walk into a crowd of 10 people), but soon said “Have food” and was excited about that. But we put sunscreen on him, which he wasn’t happy about, and Carly took him off to nurse for awhile. When he came back he had some pasta and pesto, then spotted the lemon bars and kept repeating “This one, this one, this one…please” etc. So I shared one with him. He found it interesting and had some interesting looks and took several nibbles, but didn’t want more. He also liked the bubbles that people were blowing and the balloons that were around. Two of them popped, startling people, but I think he liked that more than anyone else.

When we started singing “Happy Birthday” to Cora, August suddenly jumped up and took off. Carly had to go and chase him down. I caught up and asked if he had escaped, and he liked that. He was saying “Zinnie escaped!” several times. Cupcake time, and he shared a blue one with Carly, then a purple one with me. He really wanted more, and when he was off playing with Carly a bit later he kept talking about the “yellow one”. At one point he was walking around and tripped but kept his footing and said “Stumbled!” He went with Carly to throw away some garbage and they played around a bit while I talked to Rob from APIS.

We left about 1. On our walk back to the park entrance August started saying “See 8 Os”. He was referring to the sign on the fence around the apartment complex across the street that is still under construction. It says “outdoors” and the two Os are an infinity sign. He really liked it when we were here with Carly several weeks ago. Anyway, he couldn’t see it yet, and I don’t think he saw it when we got off the bus, but he remembered it.

He was ready to fall asleep on the busses (took two on the way home, as the direct busses were a long wait). Mainly just stared off into space, but I also sang to him. He complained a little, but did a really good job of waiting until we got home. At home he napped from around 2:20 to 3:20.

After his nap, we opened the box of puzzles we got yesterday at Costco. They were pretty perfect: animals (which he loves), in Hangeul (so he can learn animals in Korean), and 5 to 7 pieces. We put 3 or 4 together, and he was very talkative: “Puzzles for you” “Where it go? Right here.” “Where do you think this goes?” Carly brought him some soup, and he wanted to spell “Oma’s lentil soup” I got him using the apostrophe to spell ‘Oma’s’.

We went on a walk about 5. We went to the women’s business center, but the coffee shop was closed. So I mentioned going across to Tolerance Cafe. August picked up on that and definitely wanted to go, and was pointing across the stream saying “This one open…think so.” As we walked up to the building, he pointed to the first floor restaurant and said “This is a shop. What is it?” We went up and ordered coffee drinks for me and Carly and a dalghi smoothie for him. Carly paid, and August pointed to the signature pad and was, I think, telling himself not to cry when he couldn’t use it, saying something like “No cry…writing.” I took him outside to wait, but then he wanted to go back up and we read words on the door while waiting.

We got our drinks and headed up to a park. I let him have a couple drinks while in the backpack, but then told him to wait until the park. He kept asking for more, and was very polite about it. It was tough for him to wait, but he made it to the park. We were going to go across the stream to Chrysanthemum Park, but he said no, wanting to go the other way to Madeul. So we ended up there and sat on the platform of the piano sculpture and drank our drinks. He climbed on Carly a bit, then wanted to walk back and forth on bench round bench like he did last time we were there with Carly (he remembered that, pointing to the bench and saying “Mama here”). He got Carly to walk him back and forth, and he was walking more without holding our hands. It was a little chilly, so we convinced him to wear his moose sweatshirt for the first time this spring. He wasn’t happy about it, but once it was on he started lifting up his sweatshirt and shirt and poking his tummy. Played a little more, then headed home.

At home Carly made peanut sauce. He ate a bunch of that with mushrooms. Then I gave him a bath around 8 and after that Carly made spring rolls. He’s not big on raw vegetables, but worked on that a little since he likes the peanut sauce. Carly took him in to bed after that, but be came back out at 9:05. He didn’t want to play with me though, and he dragged me by the thumb into the dark parlor. He then asked for his water, which I was holding, then ran off, back out to the couch, saying he “escaped”.

We also looked at the I See 100 book I got at the Rubens art show a couple weeks back. He really got into that, looking at the pieces of art to see what we could see. We spent a lot of time on the Brueghel “Numbering of Bethlehem” pieces. It is set in the winter, and their are people walking across the ice, which I explained, and sliding around on boards, like they do on the ice here in the park. He started to say that was “sad”, and the best explanation I could get out of him is that it was sad that the boats couldn’t go on the river.

Carly took him back in around 10 and they fell asleep a bit later.

 

Riding the bus with mama:

Party: 

Back home: 

Spelling on the door: 

Madeul: 

Spring rolls and peanut sauce: 

7:10. More “See Dada” as he looked out the crack. Came out and we sat on the floor by the door to the parlor, playing. We were counting his owls and he noted that “both” the wall and my pants are messy, but that his hands are “clean”. He suggested the stains on the wall are “tea”. He then spent several minutes sitting on my lap typing to Carly, before getting up and wanting the iPad. Changed him, then we played Classify It! together on the iPad. Later in the morning we Skyped with my parents. August was still playing Classify It! then switched to Paper where he showed off his K writing. He then started importing photos of himself and drawing on top of them. He was making scribbles and playing “What is it?” and answered one on his own, saying “Grandma.”

We went to class and he wanted me to hold him during the beginning songs, but when roll call came we were able to sit and he raised his hand. We did stickers, then the activity today was about flowers. They got a bag of fake flowers and a rectangular block of foam to press them into. August really liked this and liked arranging his flowers – saying something like “Zinnie’s” or “Zinnie do it!” when he was done. When it was time to put them away though he was happy to do it and took both the bag and the block up to the teacher. He then insisted on putting everything in her large bag, including the extra blocks she had sitting on the floor. He made it all fit, then on his way back to me did a sort of double fist thing, like “I did it!” which made Soh Na’s grandmother laugh. We then played a Red Light, Green Light sort of game. At the end of class, he was excited by getting a handstamp – especially so given our recent playing with the picnic mat. He wanted “the green one” but was happy when it turned out to be Pororo. I then reminded him to say thank you/kamsamnida and he said “Kamsamnida!” for the first time, nice and loud. She really liked that. He also did a really good job saying goodbye to Soh Na and her grandmother (they are also in the Thursday class, so we see them more than anyone else).

We headed to Children’s Grand Park, buying kimbap, little eggs, and soy milk at GS 25. Along the way, he started making up variations on ‘bingo’, spelling ‘ingo’, ‘singo’, ‘dingo’, etc. and declaring “Name!” if it wasn’t a word (so he now knows about dingos). He wanted to eat by the rectangular pond again, and today was very interested in the music playing on the loudspeakers. He’s never done that before. He started by hiding to “Bingo”, then started pointing out every song that was a “New song” he hadn’t heard before and asking me to “Look it up” using Shazam (he’s starting to think that everything can be looked up – later when we were trying to remember words that end in -ey he also said “Look it up!”). They do play an interesting mix, from Korean kids’ songs like “Pig Song” to Annette Funichello’s “The Monkey’s Uncle” and “Let’s Get Together” by Hayley Mills. A crow came close, cawing, and August watched it and asked “how bout aah aah aah?”

A Korean guy came and talked to us for a couple minutes. August was getting impatient to throw our garbage away, so when he left we did that. I then realized I’d let August throw away the lid to the soy milk, which we still needed. I said “Oops!” and August thought it was funny, asking for “More dada oopsing!” We got the lid, washed it, changed him, and went walking. He protested for a second but let me put the sun shade up before he fell asleep today. He spotted one set of faucets from quite a distance so we turned those on, when he was done he actually said “Sleep” and we got walking. Didn’t take to long and he slept from 1:11 to 2:26. He woke up and played some Elmo Loves ABCs and ate my ice. It was now around 3, so we got going as we needed to go to Costco. It was suddenly very grey and a bit windy. Threatening rain, but it never came. We noticed that the fountains by the robots were now on, so he watched those and threw some rocks in the pond. We walked to the other end, him on tippy toes, then watched the fountains in the folktale area. We then headed out, changed him, and made our way to Sangbong and Costco.

A pretty quick trip at Costco, and not many people. We basically got a bag full of different cheeses. We also got two chicken bakes, and August really wanted one. I put them in the bag and he was very concerned to make sure we still had them. We went out and sat by the statue and ate one of them. August kept eating and eating, so I actually had to start eating it to keep him from eating the whole thing. He ate everything in it, but if he specifically saw a piece of spinach he would take it out, call it “Yummy” but then give it to me, saying “Not eating spinach.” Hard to tell, but I think he ate at least half of it. We were calling it ‘turkey’ at first, and I remembered we had spelled another -ey word earlier in the day. I finally remembered it was ‘Mooney’ from Dr. Seuss, then August wanted liked saying “turkey and Mooney” and requested “Another -ey word”. I thought of ‘joey’, so taught him that, then back at Hagye Station he saw the Goo Goo store so I taught him ‘gooey’. He had spelled ‘picnic mat’ earlier in the day, but was then chanting picnic as “P I C K N I CK” as we walked.

As we left the station he saw some graffiti on a bus sign and said “Who did that?” So a lot of new words I was teaching him today: in addition to ‘joey’ and ‘graffiti’ I had been teaching him ‘uncouth’ when he was trying to stand on the chair and get on the table in the coffee shop, and he spotted a little stream joining the bigger stream by the robots so I was teaching him ‘tributary’.

We got home about 5:20, after Carly. He was attached to Carly again for the evening. After his bath he was playing around with me for a little while, but then said “No dadaing!” It started to fall asleep and Carly took him in about 8, but he popped back up again. At one point he was reading the ‘namu’ sign on the wall, then turned off the light saying “Bye namu!” He came out to the living room and was writing on the paper. He started drawing a little line over the top of his J – he’s always just done lowercase ‘j’ before – so he was proud of himself. He wrote J and K over and over for awhile then was reading with Carly. She had brought home “presents” for him from the APIS library yesterday and they read more today, including Marvin K. Mooney. August wanted to “nurse and read”, so I read Hop on Pop. He wanted to skip to the eating page, so I read really fast. He found this funny, so I read the entire book as fast as I could a couple times.

Carly took him in soon after that, but it took quite awhile for him to fall asleep, sometime around 10.

New words/phrases: spelling ‘picnic mat’, kamsamnida, sangsaengnim blows bubble (he said this several hours after class, randomly), spelling ‘more water’, reading ‘exit’, another GS25, pretty funny

 

Sitting on the floor:

Classify It!:

Class: 

Lunch spot: 

Aaa aaa aaa like the crow: 

Tippy toe: 

Watching the bigger fountain: 

Costco. Signing “more”: 

Pigeon: 

Headed home: 

Trying out the teething ring again: 

When he woke up at 5 or so to nurse Carly heard him say “More Hangeul. More nursing.” He woke up at 7:36. The door opened slightly, then closed. I went back to typing. It cracked open again, and I heard him say “See dada.” As I got up and headed down the hall he said “I see you.” So he was in a happy mood from the start. We played sleeping elephant and Eep and Eeb on the bed, then I got the Korean book and we read that, while he kept freezing me. Finally, a little after 8, he left the bedroom and went out to the paper, then the iPad. We had Cheerios and strawberries for breakfast. The iPad froze, so barely any iPad time this morning. Tried to Skype with my parents but they weren’t online. When I mentioned them, August walked into the parlor and said “Remember the presents.” He then played with balloons and we blew up and tied the last new balloon, the pink one.

We headed to class right at 10. Light drizzle, so stopped to put the cover up and put on my hat. He didn’t complain about the cover. In the park we saw Preacher, so just said hi to him since we were in a hurry. Class went very well. No knees to the head. And he participated from the beginning, going down the walkway, then letting the teacher do a forward roll. Then back for a second. The third time down he gave August two forward rolls, for a total of 4. August was ready to go back for number 5, but we moved on. The activities were perfect: the first was big foamy Tetris-shaped blocks. The intended purpose was stacking them and trying to fill them in (like Tetris), but August preferred to make a big long “arte abstracto” piece on the ground – and he kept pointing and asking “This is a?” then would add more pieces. After that, it was big foamy dice. Again, August focused on the numbers, but he also liked stacking them and knocking them over.

We then packed the dice, 4 at a time, into containers that look like everyone’s favorite non-straight Tetris pieces. They stood and climbed on them, then the teacher made two walking paths using them, and we walked around in circles on the two paths. Class ended with getting a treat from the penguin container, as usual. August was really good at going and sitting by the teacher during all the toy introductions.

The rain was still hanging around, longer than the forecast was suggesting earlier, so I decided to go to Home Plus and get some things and go home for lunch. I asked August what we needed as we headed down and he said “Pepper…hobak (pumpkin)” When we got down to the first basement, he wanted out to look at clothes. Well, to “Find names, numbers.” He started looking around and said “What you need?…socks.” He also said “Mama was here.” and at one specific spot was talking about either sitting on the floor with Carly, or being sad that she wouldn’t let him sit on the floor. He also sounded out and read ‘fresh’ on a shirt. I don’t know where he learned that one. We walked home, rain had stopped. He didn’t like me also holding the diapers and groceries while holding him, so set him down to walk. He didn’t want to get down, but then I pointed out the puddles, and he stomped in puddles along the way.

We ate our kimbap at home for lunch, then changed him and headed out. He said he wanted to “Sit on the names on the picnic mat.” when we got to the park. At Hagye Station there is a store called SN that he always notes. Today he saw it, then said “S N O T. Snot!” Took the subway up to Dobongsan and August recognized the park from the station window. We walked into the park, and August said “Where’s Hangeul?” He noticed that the huge letters to the left as you walk into the park were no longer there. It took me a few seconds to remember that and figure out what he was talking about. Put him in the backpack and started walking for a nap. Took less than 10 minutes. At one point he saw water and said “Throw rocks” but fell asleep a minute later. He slept from 1:32 to 2:26 up in the coffee shop. Still kind of cool, so we sat inside. He woke up and sat on my lap, and we played the very cool Classify It! app. It’s an app from the American Association for the Advancement of Science that is free. You classify animals in various ways (like choosing all the birds, or all the mammals, etc.). It starts easy enough that August could do it with help. We played that for quite awhile, getting up to level four. He learned the phrase “Think so”, as in deciding on whether an animal fit a category or not I would ask “Do you think so?” So he started saying “Think so” every time he, say, chose an animal that eats plants.

We then went out to the park. He wanted to go to a picnic table, but I walked us by a stream area and got him interested in that. Found some rocks he could climb on, then he wanted rocks to throw. I was finding rocks for him, and he made up a “Dada go find rocks” song. I think I fed him the first line, but he finished it. That went on for quite some time. August also spotted a bunch of pigeons that got close. We then went to a picnic table. A different one this time. We put out the picnic mat on the table and had a snack. He looked at that, and wrote the alphabet in the air over and over again, wanting me to say the letters as he wrote them. Sometimes he would be clear with writing them (I could tell the E and F and M, etc.) and other times he was just waving around wildly. He nearly fell of the bench a few times, but managed to keep his balance.

Before we left we went into the changing room, which was open today. You wouldn’t think a changing room would be too exciting, but he wanted to stay in there. He read ‘push’ on the garbage can, then wanted to play with the drawers and the water, and read the backwards letters he could see through the window. It is called the ‘Happy Mother’s Room’. Meant to take a photo, as it is ‘Happy Moder’s Room’ on the door. He also read ‘Coway’ off of the water dispenser, saying it had a “Funny Y”. We then sat in the chair in there together for a few minutes before putting on his shoes.

On the subway home he was counting the people across from us. There were 7. He was then counting them in all 3 languages. His shoe had come off getting him out of the backpack (we had run to make it on the train, so didn’t get him out on the platform), and sitting on the train he started ‘eating’ his sock. This reminds me that he often bites the handle on the backpack (in front of his mouth as he sits there). A couple days ago he gave it a big bite and said “Refreshing!” He’s really been chewing on things recently, like his fingers, or the counter yesterday. But has all his teeth. So don’t know what that’s about.

Pretty easy evening at home. He was stuck to mama. She did some reading with him and they had a nice bath – up until she washed his hair. I said hi as they came out of the bathroom and he said “No dada!” He fell asleep a little after 8.

New words/phrases: reading ‘made’ ‘parking’ ‘Korea’, steep, ‘reading push’, Dobongsan, think so

Class: 

Home Plus. He was fascinated by the spices, as they each have a big letter on them: 

Waking up:

Throwing rocks: 

Picnic table: 

Hungry: 

6:49. Closed door on me. When I got him out and changed him he wanted the Spider Man shirt off. Eventually chose the Chelan animal shirt. Lot of sitting in the floor in the changing room. We finally came out to the living room at 7:09 to write K. He led me by the hand to the parlor though and then went out to the paper in the living room, as if he was getting rid of me. Spent some time with the paper, then transitioned to the iPad. After some of that, he got up and went to the parlor. We got the painting sponges out and played with those on the reading area, stacking them and arranging the alphabet a few times. He then wanted to take photos and took several. We worked together to take photos of him holding out numbers with his fingers. We have a whole series from 1 to 5. We did a little Bob Book reading, then he played in the sink. Somewhere in there we had oatmeal and mango for breakfast.

We left the house a little after 10, headed north. 3 short train rides. Along the way I asked, as we were spelling words “Does Zinnie like big words?” To which he responded “Zinnie likes gargantuan.” When we got to the Uijeongbu elevated line, we traveled one stop east to Balgok and went to Balgok Neighborhood Park. No playground, but some nice tile walls, an open basketball court area, and plenty of garbage cans to look in. We played a little with some big pine cones, then sat on a bench and ate. We used the Pororo picnic mat, and he went crazy examining it: “Poby foot. No hands, just foot.” “Picnic mat in backpack.” “This is a robot dancing.” “Got a handstamp.” while pointing to Eddy and Krung, as he has gotten hand stamps of them at the end of his classes. “Eddy’s a fox.” We were also spelling words and singing, of course. While eating the egg we spelled ‘yolk’, and he asked “How bout ‘yolking’?” His first created -ing word of the day. We also spelled something with ‘e’ and he said “Write an ‘e’ in the air” and drew it.

There had been older kids playing on the basketball court area (watching them had been a source of amusement for him), but they left. We got out the tennis ball and played a few minutes. There was one point where he chased the ball rolling across the ground for several seconds. Sadly, I only got the last moment on video. We then changed him on a bench, he threw away our garbage, and we headed out.

Cross the river and walked up to a second park (Golden Children’s Park), which did have a playground. He fell asleep there, and we sat on a bench. A long nap, from 12:45 to 2:20. When he woke up he was very quiet and didn’t want to get out. He wanted me to walk. So we didn’t play in that park. We figured out how to get down on the stream path and walked upstream. We saw some duckies, which he liked, but besides telling me to “Walk” when I stood looking at them for too long, he was very quiet, up until about 3 when we got to our final park, Baekseokcheon Neighborhood Park.

This was the best of the 3. We gave it a tour, then he played with the water faucets for quite awhile, standing up on the ledge. A few of the faucets had hoses of varying length on them that he could play with. One came off a few times, getting his hand and arm wet, which he would then want immediately dried. He started saying “Enormous!” for wanting me to turn on the water full blast (he used to say “Big!”). We walked over to the playground and had a second lunch/snack. He then wanted to sing the tongue twister song over and over, so we did that and wrote the letters in the sand. We then drew shapes, with him observing “Oval has zero sides.” Another snack, and this time he started eating raisins. And a lot of them. When he was done, he started feeding them to me: “Get one for dada.” Next was the play structure, where he tried valiantly to climb the pole ladder thing. He wanted to do it himself but was getting frustrated. Finally, he let me help him up. He then sat on the top of it, then wanted to sit on the lower platforms, which didn’t work so well. While sitting on the top one we took a selfie and he saw the photo. He pointed to his own fingers in his mouth and said “Yummy!”, then joked “What you eating?” He stood up on the structure and talked and sang from there, but never went anywhere else.

We revisited our letters in the sand and said hi/bye to a couple of other kids before we left. He was reluctant to go, and was in full energy mode. As we left, he said “See diaper with poop” and we looked in the garbage can as we walked out. When I got him out of there he was constant chatter about the Hangeul and words he saw on buildings, pointing out any writing that looked “funny”. He had spotted ‘Lotte Super’ earlier and we had sounded it out. He was now reading it easily, and asked “How bout ‘suping’?” His second -ing word. At some point during the day he also wanted to turn “Mooka” (his made-up word) into ‘mooking’.

We passed a construction site and he said “Ooh. What is it? Workers.” We made our way home, missing connecting trains just barely each time, and were home 5:30ish. Dinner, nursing, etc. then Carly gave him a bath. I had been emptying out some old spices, etc. we didn’t want, and he came out and played in the sink and used the empty lids and containers to play with. Carly took a shower and I tried to get him to other things. Instead, he started chewing on the counter and just wanted the water back on. He kind of melted down, and when Carly came out she took him in and he went to sleep at 8, but as soon as she left the room he was calling for her. Happened again. The third time he got up and wanted water. Now he was really up. He came out and spotted the Korean language book I had gotten out and placed in the reading area. He sounded out/read the entire cover, in English (Korean Made Easy for Beginners) then wanted to “Read Hangeul”. Not the most amazing connection, but still a bit surprising as he hand’t actually seen any Hangeul on the book yet. We spent the next 40 minutes or so finding Korean words and learning them. At one point I tried to go hang up laundry, but he said “Dada do sit. One more time” So Carly went and did laundry instead. I was also teaching him some of the finer points about Korean vowels that he didn’t yet know (like the ‘A’ sounds and the ‘Y’ sounds – “Where the Y?” he would say – “There…the second dot” I would answer.) His favorite part was ‘leaf’ (eep) and ‘mouth’ (eeb). I said “Don’t put the eep in your eep.” and he loved the sentence, so he wanted me to repeat it over and over, and was saying it himself. I was then getting tired and pretending to sleep, so he brought back the sleeping elephant game and would pretend to put a leaf in my mouth (we’d been listing animals that ear leaves).

Carly took over and they nursed and read Moby Dick. We then played fort on the bed and Dada be Frozen. At 9:26 he declared he wanted “More pine cones”, remembering the pine cones we had briefly played with earlier. He nursed again, but started singing the ABC song loudly on his own. After a few more minutes I left the room and Carly wrangled him to sleep, although it took awhile, a bit after 10.

New words/phrases: spelling ‘not’ and ‘snot’, mirror, hear pedulgi, reading Lotte Super, reading ‘juice’

 

Taking the wrapper off the pastel: 

Sponges: 

Some Zinniegraphs: 

Sink: 

Subway: 

Park 1: 

Park 2: 

Park 3: 

Home:

He woke up at 7:18. First I heard was the door opening. Then he closed it. I went back to typing, then he opened it again  and I went down to him. I sat in the bed and eventually he closed the door yet again. We played with Green Monster for a minute, then out to the couch and pastels. He then turned to the iPad and mainly played Elmo ABCs – he is fixated on the letter ‘W’ in that game for some reason. We had Cheerios and strawberries for breakfast, then when we started getting ready to leave he requested oatmeal, so we had some of that as well.

We left the house before 9:30. On the subway down he did more Elmo ABC and then we drew shapes on Paper. He is getting better at the shape tool, making triangles, ovals, circles, and rectangles. And, once, a trapezoid. He still likes erasing all the time, so I showed him the ‘undo’ button, which he started to get ahold of.

At Children’s Grand Park, our first stop, after buying kimbap and an apple cookie, was a bench in front of the children’s museum, where we had a snack. It was a bit chilly, but sunny; he admitted he was cold, but wouldn’t wear his coat or sweatshirt – mainly sat close to me. We ate the apple cookie and kimbap, then played around (did some stepping on my shadow). He wanted to take a photo of the wrappers, so we did that. We took our garbage over to the cans, then we were back playing in the O-shaped bench. He wanted to sing Bingo, so we were doing that when another little boy came over and sort of danced around a little as well (but mainly stared at us).

Once again, no children’s museum for us. He wanted to go to the old playground. I carried him up the path, and thought he had pooped. I asked him a few times, and he said “No…No…No poop. No change diaper.” But when I set him down and checked, I found otherwise. I think this is his first really clear, not just joking, fib. That I’ve caught, anyway.

As we entered the playground I took a sadly symbolic photo: the last drum had broken off of the plastic drum kit. Someone had set it up like a garbage can by the entrance, and it was full and surrounded by garbage – more than a day’s worth. A good indicator of just how abandoned this playground is (all the musical instruments are coming apart) and of the poor availability of garbage/recycling. There is a set of them out on the main path, but nothing by the huge playground area.

At the playground he looked for garbage in order to cover it with sand. We did a little writing in the sand as well. He wandered around on the play structure, reading letters everywhere, and throwing off the shovel, while I stayed on the ground and hid behind the panels. He was having difficulty with his hat, taking it off quite a bit. I let him keep it off while we went over and played with the musical instruments. He tried them all out on his own, using our stick for the one that no longer has any of its own. He wanted to sit on the drum, but there was water on top. I brushed and dried it off, but he still didn’t trust it, so never got on it.

I tried to get his hat back on, but he got upset. We took a break and went and sat on our bench. He calmed down and sat on my lap for  few minutes, then lay face down and was looking around, playing “This is a?” I eventually started saying “Mookah Mookah (his new made up word)” for everything, which he found very funny. He wanted to climb on the rocks behind the bench, then found a drink container he wanted to throw away. He walked it around to the garbages by the path, and on the way back saw the water faucets. When he saw them he exclaimed “Remember!” and pointed. We played in them for a few minutes, with him splashing in the puddle.

I got him away before his shoes got soaked. Changed him and got him ready for a nap and did our walking. Took close to a half hour. We went to the upstairs cafe and he slept from 1:06 to 1:49. Woke up early, I think, because he had leaked. Left our stuff in the cafe and took him out and changed him (diaper #3). Went back and he sat on my lap, playing iPad, drinking water, and eating my ice. Eventually he got down and walked around, and sat on one of the low chairs. We were sitting there when he looked at the books and said “Want this one” and went and grabbed a book, which happened to be a Korean book about Picasso. Don’t think he could tell that though, although he was able to read ‘Picasso’ on the cover when we looked at it. Looked at that several minutes, then we were spelling words. I asked him if he could spell ‘shoe’, and it turned into a joke, with him saying things like “S H O 14!” He started singing ABC and getting rambunctious so time to head out, about 3.

He walked/ran, spelling ‘queen’ as he went, and led the way to the new playground. There we played in the sand (more garbage burying), then I helped him up on the hill. There, there were two girls that were really interested in him. He was counting them, and one went down the hill he said “Only one!” He really liked the pants of one of the girls, as they were covered with letters. I pointed out a boy carrying one of the dinosaur balloons they sell in the park and suddenly I realized August had his sad look. I picked him up and he cried on my shoulder for several minutes. When he calmed down I was asking him what made him sad. He wouldn’t tell me, but if I asked if it was the balloon he would say “No” – to everything else he just wasn’t responding. Eventually, as we sat on a bench, he was saying  “sad about this one (pointing to nothing at first, then a piece of cardboard or the arm of the bench)…sad about the bench.”

Finally made our way out of the park, changing him one more time (diaper #4) and headed home. It was a slow walk from the bathroom to the train platform though: August said “Dada be frozen” about 50 times. He walked the entire way, except for two stairways he decided he wanted to play and sit on and I had to pick him up and take him down. Later, he would tell Carly “Sad about the stairs.” One nosy woman on the subway home (she stood, bent over August, to see what he was doing on the iPad – I tolerated it all until she started stroking his cheek), but otherwise a day of pleasant interactions with people, including an old woman at the elevators who was pretty funny with August when we got home about 5:40 and Carly wasn’t there and simply turned around to go back down to find her. We started walking, looking for her.

After the morning hat difficulty August had been better with it. But as we walked into the building the first time it twice blew off his head and got tangled around his neck. When it happened the first time (August somehow managed to also get his arm stuck in it) I had offered to simply take his hat off, but he wanted it back on. It then happened again, right as we were entering the building proper. This time, as we walked back through this area, with no hat on, he said something like “No wear hat here” – a good idea as it is windy as you enter the building due to the hole through the building and, I think, drafts from the parking garage.

Anyway, we walked down by the pink building and saw Carly crossing the street with two co-workers. We had to wait about 10 seconds before they crossed to our side. I told August to call out “Mama!” and this time he did – in the past I would say that, but of course I’d be whispering it to him, so he would whisper to. This time he said it loudly and actually got her attention.

At home he requested mango, so ate some of that. He also had some soup. A bit later he requested oatmeal again, so Carly made him some, and put mango in it, which he found exciting. He took a long bath. Today they were writing the names of shapes on the door – afterwards he could spell ‘oval’ and ‘star’ when I asked him. They nursed and did a lot of reading. At one point they moved from the couch to the reading area. August likes to take the shortest route – i.e. over the arm – and I was in the way, so he said “Walk through da
da.” Carly took a shower and he and I looked at In the Garden and played with Green Monster and Marshy and Bluie  on the bed – he wanted them to do the Bluie dance and sing him happy birthday. We also started making up mooka mooka song. We were back out in the reading area when Carly finished getting ready for tomorrow and picked him up. He was ready for bed and fell asleep a little after 9.

New words/phrases: spelling ‘down’, photo of wrapper cookie, spelling yo-yo, find some garbage with the shovel, foil, something to recycle, bury it, just one (girl), both wearing hats, spelling ‘star’ and ‘oval’

Morning:

In front of the children’s museum. Trying to step on my shadow:

Photo of our wrappers: 

Drum cum garbage can: 

Playground: 

After his nap. Picasso book: 

Headed to the playground: 

Playground: 

The hill: 

Sad: 

His 3 favorite robots (although the dancing ones are a close second): 

On our way to the subway: 

Wearing the yellow pants for the first time: 

Up at 7:25. Soon out on the couch and drawing Ks, then working on our mosaic. We got out a new pad of paper and started a new mosaic and kept working on K: “Got the line down, sideways V, turns to K.” For breakfast he ate green pancakes, left over from yesterday. At first he wanted them cold, but then agreed to warm them. I made the mistake of asking if he wanted syrup, to which he replied “Honey!” So he ate them with honey. He then turned to the iPad for awhile, watching YouTube videos. I had mentioned getting the Elmo Loves ABC app, and after awhile he wanted that. It was being slow to download, however, so we put the iPad aside and got ready to go. While doing so, he found the elephant on a wire book in Korean, and we read that 3 times, with me reading the Korean. He looked up at the wall and saw the mandala and asked “This is a?” I told him, and then asked him if he knew who made it and he said “Oma”. We were then doing a little “Answer me questions of letters” game and I was asking him names and got to Glecy. When I helped him spell it, I said the ‘c’ makes an ‘s’ sound, and he said “Glecy…like juice!”

We left the house at 10. Walked down to the bus stop for the 172 again. He was spotting bus numbers and having fun climbing on the bench while we waited. On the ride down we started playing with the Elmo ABC app, then moved to the Elmo and Cookie Monster cookie/word app. In that app you make cookies with vowels or letters on them, then feed them to Cookie Monster or Elmo. When he was done feeding them to CM, he would excitedly say “All gone cookies! Bye cookies!” When doing the vowel option with Elmo I noticed that every time he was making 3 of the 5 cookies ‘i’. I pointed this out, and then he started saying “Like ‘I’s” every time he did it. Finally, we read all of Green Eggs and Ham.

We got off at Anguk and walked up behind the MMCA. We ate lunch behind the MMCA, although in a different spot, at the top of a little hill. We heard a rooster off in the distance, which he kept calling “Hard to see” (because we couldn’t). We also saw a magpie, butterflies, flies, ants, and a ladybug that landed on me. He was asking about the trees, which was easy to answer as they were Japanese maples. I got one leaf for him to look at, and he played with it for quite awhile. We then got out the tennis ball and played with that, mainly with him throwing it off the bench and me retrieving it. Next, he wanted to take photos. So we did that, taking a lot of photos of things on the ground and our shoes. He liked just sitting next to me on the ground, on the path or on the grass, and would get upset if I tried to get up. He saw 3 Chinese characters on the building behind the museum and thought the one on the right looked like a face.

Eventually it was time to take a nap. The museum was closed as it was Monday, so we walked across the street and into the Folk Museum to change him. Did that, then got walking north. He was half asleep when we got to a soldier who asked where we were going. I told her I was putting him to sleep and she didn’t understand, so I just said we were going to see the Blue House. That worked and we kept walking. I crossed the street a minute later and walked back to the book cafe I had planned to go to, only to find it was closed. It is right in the ‘Y’ of that main street and the fancy street we walked up with Chuck and Cherie. So prime real estate. Surprised they could afford to be closed a day each week. So I kept walking. A street with 20 coffee shops, but the first one I came to was small and loud, then I found one that looked promising, but a latte was close to 7 bucks. I walked a little further, then saw a church that had some picnic tables and benches next to some trees to the left of the entrance. They seemed to be open to anyone (there was a ‘No smoking’ sign, but that was it), so we sat on a bench and he slept there. He slept from 1:15 to 2:07.

After he woke up we walked back to the Folk Museum. We went into the lower play area (the one with the tiger story) and played there. There was a little girl (16 months or so), at first sitting by the fake stacking rocks, that was very interested in August. They interacted a lot. She is at the touching-everyone’s-face stage, so was touching August’s cheek and nose, which he found funny. She beeped my nose, and I told August to beep her nose, but he beeped his own instead. At one point she gave him a big hug, and touched her shirt. August was excited that she liked his shirt (the alphabet shirt from Myanmar) and said “My shirt!” They also played with the big leaf/stick wall puzzle together – she would hand me or August a piece and we would figure out where it went. We also played with the tangrams and ramps a bit, then he wrote on paper and took it under the black light. He also just climbed on the play area in the middle a bit, and we looked at the horoscope wheel. I had let him take his shoes off on the play area, and then let him keep them off while doing the black light thing. One worker, right as we were going back to the backpack and shoes to leave, was very concerned about this for reasons that will remain a mystery.

He was getting hungry, so we went outside to eat. This was his real lunch, as he had barely eaten anything earlier. We ate both eggs, string cheese, grapes, and some other stuff. It was getting windy out, but he was just in short sleeves. It was supposed to rain today, but kept getting pushed back, but clearly something was coming. We also sang the tongue twister song and he danced around a lot. He spotted a magpie and said “One magpie. Supposed to be two. Just one.” I have no idea why.

It was now close to 4 and we hadn’t been upstairs. I talked him into going back in and we went up there. Went straight to the big rubber stamp area and started doing that. A worker swept in and wanted to show him how to do it. Unfortunately, she was the controlling type. When our first stamp was blurry, she grabbed the stamp and did it for him. He then asked what it was, and I turned the stamp over and we looked at it. August reached out and barely touched it with a finger, at which point she reached out and grabbed his hand away. There was a little ink on his finger. I told her it was okay, but she reached into a pocket and pulled out a random tissue, grabbed his hand again and started rubbing off the ink, at no point asking either him or me if it was okay. He got upset, and I pushed her hand away. He started screaming and when she still stood there, still trying to engage with him and laughing, I shooed her away.

When he calmed down we went to the other end, where he wanted to get into the round block play area. In there we made letters and towers. There was one other boy, I believe Russian, a couple years older. August knocked over a block on his tower, but after that I kept him apart and he just watched the older boy and marveled at the tower, which August kept calling a “Mookah Mookah tower”. August also made eye contact with the boy’s mother, who waved. He was then having fun hiding from her behind the wall of the play area. Also from the block area, August spotted video playing with three monsters that were sad, then happy. August pointed them out and called them “sad monsters”. When I asked how he knew they were sad, he said “the face” and pointed to his own face.

We left, and so did the Russian family. We parted ways, as we went out the back, and they went the other direction. I then took August back to the changing room and changed him. Outside, August didn’t want to leave. He got down to look at the flowers, then did some running around. He wanted to take a photo of one of the monsters (the same ones from the videos) so we did that. He also talked about taking photos of the bus and of a “rectangle” (paving stone), but we didn’t do that. Finally, I picked him up and took him out to the street entrance, where we sat on a bench to put him in the backpack. We saw the Russian family again,
the boy playing on the bizarre sculpture thing of boys with their pants falling down sort of bending over doing leap frog, with the front boy’s head between the legs of a standing boy facing him…I should have just taken a photo of it. Anyway, we said bye to them again, then as I was putting August in the backpack a tour bus pulled up. I looked up from putting him in to see cameras pointed at us, a woman grabbing his hand, and a guy standing right up against the bench so I couldn’t get in the backpack. He gave me the thumbs up as I pushed my way in and we got out of there.

We crossed the street only to find ourselves walking with the Russian family. So one more goodbye as we walked across from Chicago. We took the subway home. Carly Skpyed, hoping we weren’t stuck in the rain. When we came out of the tunnel it was indeed raining. We took the train to Kwangwoon, where we only had about 10 feet from the station door to the bus stop. Bus came a few minutes later. Really raining by the time we got home, but just had to hurry from the curb into the building.

Don’t think he ate much for dinner due to the late lunch. Carly gave him a bath. Spent a long time playing with the letters. They then nursed and read books in the parlor. He was reading a lot, particularly the Y page of Kipper A to Z. It was mainly a Mom and August evening – Carly went to the bathroom once and August walked past me and said “No dada!” But later, when Carly went to take a shower, he had had enough mama time to let her go, saying “Bye, mama!” as we started to do some more mosaic and writing of K. At one point I was sitting by the desk and he was by the couch and he wanted water. There were two water bottles on the table and he wanted me to get him water. He was actually standing, so I made him do it. At first he wanted the one farthest from him, as it was closer to me. But eventually he did it. A bit later he ended up on the couch with both “Two wawas!” Soon after that Carly took him in and he was asleep about 9.

New words/phrases:  maple leaf, what do you see?, saw the bear inside with the animals, answer me questions of letters

 

Lunch behind the museum: 

Some of his photos: 

This is a HDR photo as the camera moved. Check out the people and building: 

Chinese. He thought the one on the right looked like a face: 

Walking out of the art museum… 

And flying to the folk museum: 

Folk museum: 

Play area 2. The monsters’ faces: 

On our way out: 

Home. Two wawas: