Blurry because he is moving around like crazy:
That is literally a (plastic) knife in his hand that he is attacking me with:
Caught falling down:
Evil stare. To go with knife attack:
Saying ‘all done’, I think:
Banana in mouth:
Carly and August were up a few hours before me again, and when I woke up they had gone for a very early walk through the park and down to the stream. He did some more garbage pickup in the park, but also just spent a lot of time wandering around and looking at things.
He took a nice long nap in the morning, then we headed to Children’s Grand Park. It was our first outing with the new backpack carrier, so we didn’t know how it would go. But it went really well. He fought getting into it both times, but was instantly fine once I had him on my back. And the subway wasn’t crowded, so I didn’t have to worry too much about hitting people with it as i get used to having more bulk behind me.
The first place we went at Children’s Grand Park was the zoo. We saw the primates with him in the backpack, then went to the children’s zoo and let him down to walk around. He was happy wandering around and looking at a little pond and a grate that had water beneath it. We finally got him to go watch the otters for awhile, then he wanted to walk out of the children’s zoo. So from there we went and looked at the water birds, then went to the children’s museum.
The children’s museum was packed. We went to the book room for awhile and decided to leave, but then he saw the toddler area and got excited by that, so we went there for about 20 minutes.
We came home and went grocery shopping in the pink building. Back home, August stayed awake, somehow, until close to 7. We did a lot of cutting of his plastic fruit, ate some real pineapple, and then he got really into using the new reading corner I set up. He would sit on the blanket and grab a book out of the basket. He still had a ton of energy, and would get really excited by the ‘no no area’ of the plugs in the wall, and would do a little ‘no no area’ dance as he chanted the phrase. Got a little of that on video.
I changed him and dressed him in one of the old nightgowns that were from me/my brother. I’d been meaning to try one on him all summer but kept forgetting. He was hilarious in it. And at one point he was literally attacking me with his plastic knife while wearing it. Finally, he calmed down and wanted to nurse, and he and Carly both fell asleep.
His new words of the day were ‘larva’, when he saw the statues of the cartoon characters in the subway station, and ‘pineapple’ when we ate pineapple.
Looking at the chimpanzee:
Water area:
Children’s museum:
Headed home:
Home:
My/my brother’s old sleep shirt:
We are getting back on track here and all on different schedules. Carly woke up first, sometime after midnight, then August around 3am, and I slept until close to 6.
Before I got up they had skyped with Cassie and Vivi and read the cat book and Skip to My Lou a lot. They were skyping with Cherie when I got up. At some point last night, when August sort of woke up, Carly came in to find him holding Marshy.
Despite both carly and I feeling groggy today, we got outside three times though.
We went out at about 7am and the big things were going on the teeter totter, throwing away garbage in the garbage can, and walking towards cicadas when they started singing. Carly went back in first and August and I stayed out another 30 minutes until it started raining.
When we went back, he stood on his own and then walked out of the elevator and to the apartment. A small thing, but remarkable.
We went out the second time to get groceries at Home Plus. We also picked up a class schedule so I can sign him up for a class or two come September. On the way back, he spotted the dog statue and was very excited.
We went back to the park a second time at 1, after skyping with my parents. August was a little afraid of the fountain and just watched it. He started to do better wen I held him and walked up to it, but then it had a big burst that surprised us all and he got a little wet and that was enough. Again, I stayed out longer with him while Carly went in (this time, to rest – earlier it was to finish the stir fry she was making). We did more teeter tottering and trash pickup.
Carly and August basically both slept the afternoon and on into the evening. We will see how that affects the night…
New words: bathtub (pointing to my bathroom door, later out in park), garbage (hoo-guh), swiffer, backpack, food, hungry, shoe
Skyping in in the morning:
Reunited with the dog statue:
‘Hungry’:
‘All done’ with the park:
Brushing his hair after his bath:
Mama and baby exhausted by the afternoon:
Preparations and the trip to the airport all went smoothly. He was up about 6:30 and we left the house right about 9:30. We kept him entertained on the ride up – I did the lip thing with him and Cherie and I sang him some songs. There was a little traffic before the airport, but we got to the airport right at 11. He took his first nap at the terminal, sleeping on Carly. I went and brought food back for us.
He did really well on the flight. A little fussing before his second nap on the flight, but otherwise he was always in a good mood and enjoying the flight. We had three bulkhead seats on the right side of the plane, so we mainly kept him contained in there as a play area. We walked the aisle a few times, but he always wanted to go back pretty quickly.
His second nap of the flight was about the last hour and a half of the flight. I finally finished the one film I watched, Papillon, from 1973, with Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman, during this time.
We made it off the plane and through the airport and caught a bus right before it left. August and I both napped on the bus. Carly had napped a couple times on the plane, but I don’t think she did on the bus.
Back in his home, he quickly found the swiffer and remembered playing in the sink. I let him sit on the edge of the sink and play, and that has started a new favorite thing to do. While sitting in the sink, he shared two other words he now knows: ‘scissors’ and ‘soap’. He also found the fruits and veggies and remembered cutting them.
Carly was exhausted and trying to sleep, but August made it to close to 10 before falling asleep.
Nap 1 in the airport:
On the flight:
Still asleep after landing:
Back home:
Knife in action:
Not letting Carly sleep:
Today was mainly about getting ready to fly out tomorrow. In the morning, August played with Cherie, and really got into combing his hair and looking at himself in the hand mirror. We had to go down to Chuck’s office to sign our updated wills, so we made a quick trip of that.
After we got back, I went shopping at Eddie Bauer to get some shorts, and tried to get my haircut. That turned into quite an adventure, as I had to go to five different places before I found a place that existed and was open on Wednesdays.
Mission accomplished, I headed back to the house. Carly left on her own shopping mission, and August and I played around the house and with Cherie. He continued to carry around a rubber spatula, play with the fan, and be fascinated by the salad shooter and vacuum cleaner. He bumped his head on the stove while climbing onto the brick area, and when I asked if I should kiss it, he leaned forward so I could reach his head. He did this again later when he pinched his finger in something and he put it to my mouth so I would kiss it.
When Carly was home, he shared an orange popsicle with her. He appeared finished with it, so when he went off, playing, Carly finished it off. He was upset to find it all gone. He was happy again, however, when Carly brought the car down and we washed it. He helped by sticking his hands in the suds and wiping the front of the car.
Before dinner, we headed to Steve and Claremay’s house to visit him out of the hospital. We found Steve doing quite well. His energy was high, he was eating, and he was in good spirits. He told us about the claustrophobic experience he had had that night in the hospital; I was impressed by how well he told the story and wish we had it on tape. He had enough energy to tell Brad to “Shut up, son” when he tried to interrupt his story.
While Carly visited with her grandparents, August and I walked downstairs, then outside. While out there, Brad and Claremay came out. They gave us a fig, which August really liked, and showed us a tomato plant that August could pick tomatoes off of. Brad was then watering plants, and August helped by holding the hose with him.
Back at Chuck and Cherie’s, Cherie let August have some naked time. He played all around outside, from the back porch around to the driveway.
His new words today included ‘bathtub’, ‘backpack’, and ‘popsicle’
Morning:
Driving downtown. You can see his scraped elbow from yesterday:
At Steve and Claremay’s:
Helping Brad water:
Back home:
We drove out to Roy today to visit Sam and her family. August slept until 8:30, and we were headed down the driveway about 9:30. That’s pretty quick for us, but August had time to walk around the house, playing with two of the stacking cups from the bath.
We got to their house right at 11. We made it there without watching any videos on the iPad. We were greeted by Sam in the yard and the two kids sitting on rocking chairs on the front porch. August was instantly excited by the rocking chairs, and his excitement would continue through the entire visit. In particular he loved the chickens, which he found scary up close, but managed to touch once before saying ‘all done, all done’, a hammer, which he instantly recognized as a hammer and used to pound on the concrete, and a small red chair, which we took over by and inside the house, and which he kept practicing sitting in. He also ate well: he liked the tuna sandwich, and tried some of the homemade venison sausage.
And Madison and Tony entertained him and us by showing us their work site, Madison’s garden, and a bunch of their toys. I was particularly amused when Madison showed me the tomato plants and told me she had to find and eat all of the ripe tomatoes so that her mom couldn’t get any.
An added bonus was Sam’s parents showing up for much of the visit, and her husband Pete showing up for the last few minutes.
At 1 it was time for all the kids to take a nap. Tony and August in particular were getting ramped up and starting to feed on one another. In the car, August and I started watching the “Take Me to Church” video, and by the third viewing he was asleep.
We stopped in Rainier at the cookie shop and bought 3 cookies. August slept through that, and kept sleeping for a little over an hour. Carly took a slightly longer way home because of it, and he slept until she stopped in the driveway. As soon as the car stopped moving, but with the motor still on, his eyes popped open.
At the house, we took some time to play while Carly got things ready to mail. He wanted to sit on the bench guarding the big flower plant, and he wanted Cherie to sit in the chair next to him. He kept talking about the flower plant and generally playing around on the bench. That lasted quite a while, then we went outside, where we smelled both the mint (which we’ve smelled before) and the lemon balm (which Cherie just showed us).
We left and tried to go to the post office in Galvin, but realized too late that it closes at 4. So we then went to the hospital, where we visited Steve, Carly’s grandfather. We were happy to see him doing well, and hopefully we will be able to visit them back at their house tomorrow. While Carly was talking to her grandparents, August and I went out in the hall for a few minutes, where he was fascinated by the industrial fan being used to dry the carpet after they were done cleaning them. He was afraid of it at first, but was eventually touching the case.
From there, we drove to Safeway and went to the shipping store next to it (where August spent his time smelling the fake flowers on the pens, and made me smell them as well), then went to Safeway to get a few things we wanted to take back to Korea. I also grabbed a container of raspberries, as those were the one berry that August was really eating yesterday and we were out of them back at the house.
We went back to the house and ate dinner: salad, beets and greens, and tamales that Cherie had picked up at the Centralia farmer’s market. August had eaten 6 raspberries in the car on the way home, and he now ate several beets and a good amount of tamale.
After dinner, August ‘helped’ Chuck wash his car. He loved the spraying of the car, and liked putting his hands in the sudsy water and playing with the suds.
We then all went for a walk down the road. August was excited about the backpack, in theory, but hated getting in it. He warmed up after a few minutes as Cherie started singing him songs. We walked down the road, past the nature area (Carly doesn’t want me in any nature areas right before our flights, given my history), and back. Cherie sang him “The Ants Go Marching…” I’ve sung it to him, but months ago. Now, he was picking up the words as she was singing. On the way back, we stopped and picked a few blackberries along the side of the road. August ate a few.
Back at the house, Cherie and Chuck stayed outside with me and August and we did some sidewalk chalk, working together to make a nice picture of a house, thunderstorm, dog, tree, and river. August, of course, helped out. Cherie went in, and we let August play with the hose. He liked getting our feet wet. Chuck then had a screwdriver and hit it against the basketball hoop pole to make a noise. August liked this, and liked holding the screwdriver.
Back inside, August ate a little apple crisp (mainly he liked using his finger to get the ice cream in my empty bowl). He then started walking forwards and backwards on his own, saying ‘forwards’ and ‘backwards’. These joined three other new words for the day: ‘hammer’ (when he recognized the hammer on the ground at Sam’s), ‘necklace’ (referring to Cherie’s necklace), and ‘danger’ (which Carly and Cherie have been teaching him).
Before he went to sleep, Carly was singing him the “Momma loves August” song. In it, you can replace ‘momma’ with other people. Today, August started calling out who should come next. He named pretty much all of the family members.
Back in Centralia:
Admiring the fan at Centralia Hospital:
Smelling the fake flowers:
Carwash:
On a walk:
Back from a walk:
I had a pretty full calendar, for me at least, as in the morning I had a 9:30 appointment at the Apple Store in U Village, and at 3 I had an appointment with our insurance agent in Chehalis. So I left the house early and made it to U Village 20 minutes early. Enough time to get a little walk in and see how the shopping center has changed since I’ve lived around there. A mild success at the Apple Store, although they weren’t able to replace the dying batter on my phone today.
I got back to the house to find it empty. I texted Derek to find that they had gone on a walk. I walked and met them halfway and walked back with them. At the house, August kept pointing to a wet glove of Thatcher’s and saying a word. I think it was ‘yellow’, but I’m not entirely sure.
We left at 11, and stopped at Ken’s Market for lunch, sitting on their high stools to eat, with August on my lap. From there we drove to Centralia, only stopping briefly to drop off Glecy’s keys at her friend’s house in Lacey. August took a nap on the way down, and woke up when Carly stopped the car in Centralia.
We unloaded the car, and I ran off for my meeting in Chehalis. While I was gone, August scraped an elbow for the first time by tripping over the hose while he was using it.
When I got back, they were downstairs. I sat on the couch with Carly, and we watched August just play by himself for close to 10 minutes.
I took him up to change his diaper, then let him sit on the counter with his feet in the sink while I washed his hands. He then proceeded to play with the water and I used the opportunity to comb the knots out of his hair. It didn’t seem to bother him as long as he had his water to play with. When I got the comb wet, he decided he was interested in playing with it, and he tried combing his own hair.
Before dinner, August made a game of pulling a scrunchie off of Cherie’s wrist, and after dinner I took him for a walk in the backpack. A good sign was that he let me place him in the backpack. But he got upset when I started doing the straps. He cried for a coupe minutes, but calmed as we got up to River Heights Road. We went to the right about a quarter mile. He had calmed down, but decided that was enough. So we turned around. He started to cheer up, and played with the hose for the hydration system, giving it to me to take a drink, and attacking my ear with it. We kept walking past the turnoff to the house, and went around the corner, walked by Brenda’s old house, and then came back.
We did some more playing outside, then I took him up for a bath. I didn’t get in with him. He did fine on his own, but didn’t sit down at all. Although standing allows him to play with the items on the ledge above the tub.
He had a lot of energy and was silly before bedtime. Took 3 attempts to get him to sleep. Before the last one we took him down to the basement and played, mainly with the noisy ball toy. Carly went up and took a shower. After a few minutes he decided he was done, and started saying ‘all done’ and going up the stairs. He was truly done this time, and went quickly to bed, although Carly said he still tried popping up from nursing once and saying ‘all done’.
Driving to Centralia:
Centralia:
Eating berriers:
Still playing:
We had to hurry to get ready in morning and get on the road by 9. But there was still time for August to play with the toy syringe I refound in a box yesterday, and to show him a young buck that was out in the yard.
The drive north went smoothly. August made it fine thanks to singing a lot of songs, a quick break at the rest area north of Tacoma, and snacking on banana brew and broccoli.
Our first stop in Seattle was REI, where I bought a child carrier backpack and supplies. While I did that, Carly took him to play in the children’s area and to nurse.
We then drove out to log boom park in Lake Forest Park. August fell asleep right after we left, so when we got to the park we sat in the car and read. When Carly’s friend Colleen showed up, she got out to go visit and I stayed with August.
He woke up after about an hour. I tried putting him in the new backpack, but he wasn’t having that. So I took him over to Carly and Colleen and her daughter Vivian. We walked down by the water, and my friend Peter and his son Micah showed up a few minutes later.
It was just a few minutes before it started pouring. So we all headed over to Third Place Books.
There, I watched August most of the time while Carly visited with Colleen and then her friend Carolyn, who showed up at 4. She took him in between, however, and near the end when I ate dinner.
August really liked the big chess set they have, and Micah played with the pieces with him. August also played in the toy area, where at one point he really focused on the big Lego-type blocks and managed to put several pieces together by himself.
After a quick walk through of the actually book store, we left a few minutes after 6 and headed to Derek and Andrea’s house. August was excited to see them all, although Eddy scared him a bit by being too rambunctious. He and Thatcher played with play dough together, as well as with the vacuum cleaner.
We took August out on a short walk in the backpack. At first he allowed us to put him in it, but he didn’t like the straps and started crying. He was unhappy for a block, but calmed down and seemed to enjoy it well enough by the end.
Back at the house, he snacked on apple and cheese that Thatcher gave him, and some of the fresh smoked salmon that Derek had just made.
Carly gave him a bath and he was asleep around 9:30.
His latest new words include ‘girl’, ‘chair’, and ‘feather’. He twice pointed to girls in TPB and said ‘girl’. He also used ‘chair’ there and Carolyn heard him say feather. I didn’t hear that, but he said it when I was teaching him ‘feather’ at the beach the other day. There were also multiple times during the day where he would very clearly attempt to use a word, but I couldn’t figure out what he was trying to say. In particular this happened with a parrot finger puppet we looked at in the book store. He used three separate words that I didn’t catch. One may have been ‘cockatoo’, which I had taught him at the zoo in Seoul.
Log Boom Park:
Third Place Books:
Thatcher’s house:
Kind of a rainy day, so not a lot of outings today. But we made it to Shaeffer Park with Chuck and Cherie for a nice outing and took August for a short walk in the stroller(!) – the first time he’s been in a stroller for months.
Carly and August slept in quite late (close to 9, I think) and August seemed a little off – he did a lot of nursing and clinging throughout the day, although less so as the day went on.
In the morning Carly made a smoothie, which meant that August wanted to watch the blender, and then walked around with the lid to the blender for awhile. We played downstairs with the fan (he likes making noise into it. Or, more correctly, he likes me to make noise into it, and will pull my head close to the fan so I will do it), then he came back up and had fun watching videos on the blog with Cherie. He particularly liked the video of him using the vacuum cleaner, and she played it again and again.
Carly took him out on the deck, and he spotted two deer. He held onto the railing and made noise at the deer for a few minutes. I got the last few seconds on video, and then he went off saying ‘mama’ and ‘oma’ – I think because he wanted them to see the deer as well. He then wanted to sit at the table outside and play with his tea can for a few minutes.
From there we went down to the carport and played with bubbles and water. He used the squirt gun things by pointing them to the ground and pushing down on the handle to squirt out the water on the ground. I then changed him, and by that point Cherie had started skyping with Vivian and Cassie. August was thrilled to see Vivian again.
After lunch, we all went to Shaeffer Park, the first time August and I have been there. It is a nice park, with a beach on the Skookumchuck and about a half mile of trails through some really nice trees. For a half hour or so, Cherie played with August along the water, and then they walked up by the playground and picnic area. Carly and Chuck lounged and chatted on a picnic table that had been placed in the river. Cherie and August found some old fireworks in the grass, and August quickly picked up the word ‘firework’. She carried them in her pocket for the rest of the time we were in the park and would take them out when he said ‘firework’.
Then we all went across the bridge and walked the loop out in the forest. As we finished up, it started to rain and we hurried back to the start of the loop and stood under trees until the rain stopped. Cherie and Chuck had been entertaining August by saying ‘aagh’ and putting up their arms, etc. and we continued that and Carly chased him around us as we waited.
We walked back to the car, only to find that August wasn’t really ready to leave yet – he wanted to go back into the park. I let him play for a minute, then we left. On the way back, he really wanted the banana. He hasn’t eaten a ton of banana lately, so we were surprised when he wanted to hold it himself, and he ate over half of it.
After a few minutes at the house, Carly put him in the stroller and we went for a little walk. He enjoyed it for awhile, and as we passed the entrance to the nature area on the road, he made it clear we were supposed to go that way. Kind of surprised us that he picked up on that. But the stroller is a small one and doesn’t do well in the gravel, so after a minute of bumping in the gravel he wanted to turn around. We headed back, and he decided he was done with the stroller, and so he walked back from where Tall Cedar meets River Heights, helping push the stroller along the way, and then pushing it around (and into Chuck’s car) back in the driveway.
We sorted baby clothes (thank you, Andrea!) to take back to Korea. August tried on one hat for a few seconds, but wouldn’t try on any more. Then I took August downstairs to eat some banana bread and play again while Carly started to do some initial packing.
We all gathered for dinner (Ahi, spinach, and salad), but August wasn’t wanting to sit down. So Carly took him down to the carport for awhile and I ate first. When I was done I got him and we skyped with my parents. He was thrilled to see Gramma and Grampa again, which actually made talking difficult, but was very fun to see.
Another walkabout outside led us back through Chuck and Cherie’s room, where there is a ball that acts as a doorstop. He wanted the ball, so I suggested we get the one in our backpack. We got it out, then August started saying ‘fuv uhh’ again and again. At first I thought he was saying ‘flower’, then, as he walked back to the entryway, I thought he meant ‘outside’. But then he went back to the same pocket and pointed in and kept saying it. Then it clicked: he wanted the shovel that we used to keep in there. So we went down to the carport and to the sandbox and got the orange shovel. He was content with that, but then went back to the backpack and started saying it again and getting frustrated. He even put the shovel back in the pocket. The only thing I could think of is that he also wanted his blue shovel, which we couldn’t find.
At any rate, it was clear he was tired, so Carly took him for a bath. She sat with him for a couple minutes, but he then played by himself again.
In addition to his new words for firework and shovel, he also said ‘grass’ while pointing to grass at the park.
Schaeffer Park:
Headed home:
Walk with the stroller:
August woke up with a lot of energy. Just a couple minutes after waking up, he was down with Cherie happily playing with an old deck of cards, dumping them out and picking them back up and making a lot of noise.
She had to go teach a yoga class, and we were going to leave for Olympia before she returned. However, that changed as I was sitting here at the living room table and looked up to see a Stellar’s jay come flying in the door. Carly stood at the entrance to the steps with August in her hands for a few minutes. He thought it was great fun to watch the bird flying around, and kept asking for ‘more’. She took him downstairs, and after about 20 minutes of chasing the bird around the living room and kitchen, upstairs and down, I cornered it behind the couch in the corner and used pillows to block its escape and the window screens to direct it towards the open window, and then a broom to give it a slight nudge that sent it flying up and out of the window.
Anyway, that and other delays meant we didn’t leave until after 11:30. We first drove up to the BECU at Lacey to make our annual $2000 contribution to August’s Coverdell account. What should have been a 5 minute visit turned into more than 20, as the guy who set it up last summer apparently didn’t know the difference between a CD and an IRA. Luckily, BECU has these little kid toys on handheld boards, and those kept him pretty entertained. Carly did take him outside for the last few minutes. Oh, and when Carly was depositing checks/cash in the ATM, August liked the noise it made when it took in a check and would ask for ‘more’.
We then drove to Olympia and parked around the corner from the camera shop so I could pick up the cassettes I’d had transferred to CD. While riding with August in the backseat, I’ve found that he has ticklish palms: a little press with a finger on the palm of a hand will send him into fits and giggles.
After picking up the cassettes/CDs, we went for a walk along the waterfront, walking north from the playground area to the dock and observation tower up close to the market. August walked around the area close to the tower for several minutes, showing himself to be surprisingly adept at spotting each cigarette butt on the ground. Carly and I ended up trying to cover them up with our feet whenever he got close to one. He also revealed he’s still fascinated by drains, especially when there is water under them. A group with several school age girls went by while we were there. They were quite loud and running around. As they went by, August signed ‘more’ and wanted to follow them when they left. And he liked to stop and look at/smell the flower boxes the city has along the walk. There was one in particular, on the way up, where he stood on the bench and studied them for several minutes.
Before we left, we stopped back by the playground for a few minutes for bathroom and changing purposes. He also nursed and had some banana bread. He then played in the playground for a few minutes, holding banana bread in one hand, and playing with wood chips with the other. It confused one adult into thinking I was letting him eat wood chips, until she realized it was actually food he was holding.
He was having a grand time in the car as we got back to Centralia, talking up a storm. As we pulled into the driveway and stopped, he got really quiet and stared out the window. We played in the driveway for a good long time. He’s gotten pretty good at using the hose, and now walks around with it, painting circles in the air.
He played around in the house for awhile, and then I took him up for his bath. We had fun in the bath, but he wouldn’t sit on his own today. Anytime I stood up, he would stand up.
His latest new words are ‘berry’ and ‘all done’. He said ‘berry’ while pointing to the berries in Cherie’s oatmeal, and he’s started to say ‘all done’ when he is finished with something. He’ll give the ‘all done’ sign (waving two hands) and say ‘all done’ in the same voice he uses for ‘bye bye’.
The bird adventure:
Waiting at BECU:
Olympia:
Covering cigarette butts:
Snacking:
Heading back to Centralia:
The house:
