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He was up at 6. They did some skyping and had french toast for breakfast. With the french toast they were working on fractions, then he did some number line. He went and drew shapes: crescent, heart, “spirally Spiral” He grabbed some french toast and said “I’m going to take french toast in the parlor, but I’m not going to do it on the carpet. I’m going to do it over here cuz it’s not carpet.” He ate a bunch, then said he was really full and sleepy. We read part of Gabriella’s Song, then he wanted to play mandolin, so we got that out. When he wanted it off it bumped him in the head, just barely, and he wanted to nurse. Carly was busy and they had nursed all morning. He got really sad and at one point went and grabbed What are Clouds Made Of? and brought it to her. Eventually they nursed. He then played piano with me singing Itsy Bitsy. Then back to mandolin. He said “I’m staring at Dada and dada is staring at you.” We did the Cookie Monster game, drawing our words on paper. He then played with the friends and had them poop and use the toilet. He then pretended there were sensors flushing toilets everywhere as he ran in front of them. We then drew on the paper and he drew letters with thorns on them. We then did color mixing with the markers, which worked pretty good.

I took a shower. When I came out they were starting to paint the (redacted) when I came out. He was humming as they painted and mixed colors. He made a “peachy red” color and called it “outside peach”. They had a discussion of (redacted). August kept asking for this ‘story’ to be told over and over.

August and I then skyped with my parents. He was playing GarageBand so was focused on that until I turned it off. Then he did a good job of talking to them. He did a lot of instruments, but didn’t actually play his piano.

After that we got ready to go and all headed to Teuni Teuni. Carly was kind of amazed by the transformation from when she last went and he had to be coaxed into class. Now, you could basically sit and he’d be fine in class for 40 minutes. He was screeching and running around as soon as we got in. When they did forward rolls he started counting them as he ran by us. There were so many though that when I asked, he just said “a lot”. I think it was 10. When they all sat down he was counting the group and including the teacher again. Carly tried to give him a high five at one point and he totally rejected her, just about hitting her hand, then pulling away. Class was all about donuts. When the teacher brought one out, August and the other kids pretended to eat it. They then rolled big donuts around, the teacher stacked them around August, there were walkways made of donuts for them to walk through, big donut bouncy things, and ramps to roll smaller donuts down. He was constantly moving the entire time.

When we went out to his bike he said he wanted to go to the soup place. We hadn’t mentioned lunch yet. We went down, but I convinced him to go to the food court, figuring there would be more choices for Carly. We decided on the 모밀도실악, which was dongatsu, cold noodles, a little soup, rice, and a small cold soup. We enjoyed it, and August got to have his cold noodles and soup, which he has been wanting.

From there we walked east over to the Alpha store. We got some more (redacted) and (redacted) and paint and some (redacted), and I found a music notebook for August. He found wooden maracas, and we got two of those. Had to wait while they figured out how much the maracas cost. It was a whole 2000 won each (less than 2 dollars).

We then walked a block south to 골마을근린공원. This was a park that I found on my very first walk around the neighborhood on my own, and August and I have played here once. But Carly had never been. They went on the swings, then August wanted to go on the play structure and wanted Carly to go with him. We took turns playing on that. He climbed up the little climbing wall, and the very first time he did a cool slide down it, on his stomach, using his hands to lower himself down the climbing holds. After that though he couldn’t figure out how to do it. Went down the slide several times, and once when going back up he took the stairs and I took the climbing wall and he slipped on the stairs and tumbled off backwards from 3 or 4 steps up. A big tumble. I managed to keep him from wanting to nurse by pulling out the letter cookies.

They went back to the swings. I left the backpack on the bench and it fell of a minute later. There were three teenage boys on the teeter totters (the crab ones – we had gone on them as well), and one came over and picked it up for me. Carly noted that that probably wound’t happen most places.

We headed back a little before 4 and went to the English class. It was kind of awful, although August did okay. It was more fun when we were learning the characters names, and the colors. We could translate them into Korean, and spell them. Today was about things like hose and crane and wheel and siren. If August was really into trucks it may have worked better (although he did like acting like a crane a couple times). Also, she only had one set of cards and had the kids come up to pick them, etc. If every kid had their own set it would have made a lot more sense.

Back home we ate some dinner and Carly and August painted the (redacted). He was really doing a good job of mixing colors: “That’s a nice plum color…Yours is lighter than mine?…I mixed it pretty well.”

We played some mandolin, and he had Baby Q strum the strings. When it was time for his bath, August took Baby Q in with him to the bathroom, and gave Baby Q some kisses. We watched several of the outdoor orchestra videos. He requested “Wake Me Up” by name (https://youtu.be/F1j2lK2H388).

After his bath, he and Carly (redacted) they had painted. He was then sleepy and went to sleep just after 7. Carly tried sleeping in the other room again, but at 10:45 he rolled over and I think got kind of stuck by the wall. He sat up and we watched him for a few minutes. He said “Let’s go” at one point and seemed to be asleep sitting up and kept almost lying down. But then his eyes were opening and he said “Dada” and Carly picked him up and put him back to sleep.

 

Photos. Q with thorns: 

Teuni Teuni: 

Lunch: 

Hats: 

Maracas: 

Park: 

English class. Being a crane: 

Choosing a card (Carly had to choose one for him): 

Baby Q: 

Carly slept out in the parlor, thinking maybe not having her right there might mean he would nurse less during the night. And it worked, in a way. Sometime during the night he got up and left the bedroom. When Carly woke up in the morning she was surprised to find him sleeping next to her. So he had gone out, then just lay down next to her and fell asleep. They were up 6 or so. Out at 6:30. When I got up he was playing Tinybop Earth. There was a lot of nursing and bothering Carly about it as she tried to clean through the morning. I did laundry. When they nursed they read more of Little House. Carly tried him out in the Ergo on her back.

He watched the pipe organ video, then I found a sousaphone video for him and I went and took a shower. He switched to Mouk, and was scared by something that happened in it and paused it. They skyped with Cherie, then after that I turned Mouk on a bit more. He sort of watched me watch it and said “Dada watch it”. But then he was done. We did chords on the piano, then he went to the bathroom. As he sat on the toilet he said “How do you count by circles? In going to count by circles: Circle, oval, triangle, rectangle…”

Carly left to take down the broken fan and go get boxes at the post office. He was sad when she left. I held him and he kept pointing towards the backpack, wanting to get in. She came back and we got ready to go and left at 11:45. On the way we sang some of the Mother Goose songs we haven’t sung in awhile and Yankee Doodle. As we waited at Taerung for the next train he had some of the lentil snacks. He knows they’re too messy to eat on the train, so he saved the last one to take on the train and eat. I didn’t think he could wait that long, but he managed to do it. Carly says we should do the marshmallow test on him.

On the train he was asking about directions again, and about mixing them (southeast, northwest, etc.) I remembered there is a compass on my phone and got it out, and he spent much of the trip turning it around and figuring out directions. Then we had time to read Click Clack, Moo before we got to Itaewon. In Itaewon he counted stairs as we walked up: 36 on the first flight, then I took 36 on the escalator.

In Itaewon we went to Coreanos for lunch. Had never been, but I’d talked to the owner with Derek once. We got two burritos, and August and I shared a cranberry juice, which he liked. It was good, but not quite what we had hoped for – a bit spicy for Carly, and August didn’t eat much. August saw an employee walk by with a box and said “That’s a big box. Looks like it’s heavy.”

We got walking, him in the backpack. He asked how to spell ‘Paddington’, then requested “Song Baa Baa Black Sheep with 200 bags. Do it.” He then was singing his own funny versions of Baa Baa Black Sheep.

The weather was nice today (in fact, earlier, when we said we were going to Itaewon, he asked if it was going to be rainy), so we went to the playground (한남동어린이놀이터). This was the one we played at with Chuck and Cherie when they went to Itaewon with with us. He went on the swing a bit, then the baby swing for a minute, then to the play structure: “Is the slide bumpy? I don’t…after I climb up this you must go down it.” He climbed up the climbing wall, then back down. Then up on the rope bridge and walked across that. The big accomplishment was the ladder going up to the slide. The first couple times I spotted him and helped him figure out how to do the top, but then he was doing it on his own. He did several laps, sliding down and then going and attacking mama, or with me resting at the bottom so he could run into me. Then back to the swing a bit, and some good cuddling with mama in the sun.

A bit after 2 we walked to the clinic so Carly good get the results of her TB test. August and I looked for the kimchi article at first but couldn’t find it, so we looked at a different magazine and he was flipping through the pages. A woman came over and complimented him on his diction (said he spoke more like a girl for his age). He was being silly and would only make a funny noise now, but she had been brushing her teeth in the bathroom on Monday when Carly had taken him in to the bathroom and had heard him talking away. I eventually found the kimchi article up on the counter and we looked at that.

Carly took him into the bathroom again, and this time he wanted the toilet to flush with him on it. She actually had to lift him up to get it to flush, since it had a sensor, then set him back down.

We headed out the back, thinking to walk up to the Namsan Botanical Garden. Out back Carly and August went and admired the parking tower. We then got in the backpack and headed out. But a wrong turn led to extra walking, then I realized it would be more of a hill. So it was close to 3 when we headed back.

On the train he played iPad with Carly. She would type a question, and August would read it and answer. When I asked what words they used he said “f-o-o-d. Food.” August and I stopped to look at bushes with new little leaves on them by the pink building. Carly went to Lucky Mart to do some grocery shopping and we headed home when he was done with the bushes. He wanted to look at chords using the iPad. Carly got home, and when he was done with chords he wanted to nurse.

We ate dinner, then he wanted me to sing songs so we read the Mother Goose book. He then had some milk with Carly and they watched cow milking videos – about the machines this time.

Carly got his bath ready and I joked it was a hair washing day. August said “Dada made a mistake?” Carly said I was making a joke, and August said “Silly dada. You’re funny.” Carly had left it too hot, so she had to add cold water. August kept asking “Is it ready? Is it ready? Is it ready?”

After his bath he composed music using Notion, then listened and hummed along to his tunes. Carly wanted him to head to bed right after 7, but he talked about me getting 10 books. But he happily went to bed and fell right asleep.

 

Photos. Trying out the Ergo as a backpack: 

Cranberry juice: 

Playground: 

Doctors office: 

Subway station piano: 

Little leaves: 

Sometime after 10 last night he sat up in bed for a few minutes, then lay back down, putting his head on my leg for a pillow.

He got up at 7:30, just as Carly started skyping with Cassie. Unfortunately, their attempts to Skype with people this morning didn’t go too well: first Vivian got hurt and cried. Then when they called back both Vivian and Colin wanted to sit on Cassie’s lap, so that was the end of that. They Skyped with Cherie, but she was babysitting Ava, who was putting shells in her mouth, so that didn’t last long. I got up and they did some hallway number line, then they ate some noodles. August was putting his foot high up on the counter, standing on one foot, being a stretchy flamingo. Cherie called back, free from babysitting and Skyped.

After skyping, August was on his pianos for a long time. First the toy pianos, then he wanted chords. I pulled up Piano Companion on my iPad to make sure I was teaching him chords correctly, but he ended up playing with that instead. He would find a complicated chord and ask me to play it on the toy piano. Then say “Stop playing, please…I’m being polite.” He wanted his electric keyboard, so we set that up and he used it with my iPad.

Carly started reading Little House in the Big Woods to him while they nursed, and would read more of it later. I took a shower, and when I came out they were hiding under the blankets. We then had a blanket fight. Carly made a funny voice and he wanted more. When she said she was out of funny voices he said “I put more voices in there.” like he does (or used to do) with ideas.

He and I played catch with the blankets. When he would throw a blanket on me he would say “Ka….BOOM!” He then did a headstand on the rocking chair and he caught the blankets upside down when I threw them to him.

We left at 10:50, headed for Children’s Grand Park and the children’s museum. On the train he asked which direction we were headed, then was asking why the lights were going the other direction. We explained it was an optical illusion: “But the lights are going north.” They did math on their fingers, then when he wanted to see a problem written out they used Paper on the iPad.

At Children’s Grand Park station we headed out the south exit and went to Subway for lunch. He and I got a seafood one to share and Carly got a Turkey one to share with him. We walked into Children’s Grand Park and sat on a bench near the children’s museum and ate. I gave him a cucumber and he ate it and said  “Thank you Dada for cucumbers.”

In the children’s museum I had to pay for him, adding him to our membership now that he is 3. He spotted a big group of kids walking in pairs and said “groups of two”. She ran over to them and started counting: “two, four, six, eight, ten, twelve…”

We started on the first floor, in the nature area. He mainly played with Carly while I did some reading. He stood on the thing that makes you look like a butterfly on a screen – he used to be afraid of that before. He’d watch people do it, but wouldn’t stand for it himself. He wore the butterfly wings outfit, and wore it for a long time as they did the pencil rubbing and he looked at the minerals and ran around.

Eventually he was ready to move on. He ran and got me and held my finger and said “Dada come too.” We went over to the Idea Transformer area. We’ve played there a couple times, but not his favorite area. Nor anyone’s, as it is barely used, especially compared to the ball area that was there before. But more success this time. We did the recycling area for a long time, then the touch ensemble, then recycling again. They built things for a minute, and he also posed as a girl and a dog in the cutout things. But mainly we built towers and knocked them over. A couple fell on his head and Carly ‘saved’ him once. He tried to get me to do all the work, saying “Build a tower, Dada.” as he cuddled with Carly.

Finally, we went upstairs to the third floor and were pleasantly surprised to find that they had installed a whole new water area. Not only is it new, but it is much more interactive than the old one was. All sorts of places to have balls float down streams, buckets to pour, etc. His favorite thing was a place where you place a ball in a tube with spraying water in it and the ball sprays out the top. Some water would also spray out the sides and hit him in the face, so he would push the ball on the track, then try to get away before he got wet. Did that over and over and over.

Once he took off the apron he headed to the rest of the third floor, where they now have air draft things that blow handkerchiefs in the air, then to the TV broadcasting area and fashion runway, which are old. Played there for a few minutes, then Carly took him to the bathroom. But a toilet usage error resulted in pee on his pants and underwear, necessitating a change.

On our way out we stopped at the coffee shop in the children’s museum. Haven’t really used that one (think I got a lemonade there once). He got an orange juice. We went out and sat on the benches and drank our drinks, then August jumped over the squares in the pavement. He went with me to throw away our garbage and smelled and counted the petals on the flowers.

We also ate the rest of our sandwiches, and he was as worried as ever about things throwing away:“I’m worried” Carly convinced him to let something blow in the wind to see what would happen, and it turned into a game.

From there we headed to the train and on to Costco where we got cheese and sour cream and a couple of free samples. That went smoothly, then we headed home. On the train he was eating crackers and bit his tongue.

We got home and they nursed and read more of Little House. He took out the piano keys and put them back in out of order, being silly, with Green Monster. We read The Fantastic Flying Books of Morris Lessmore and started Berenstain Bears No Girls Allowed.

We continued No Girls Allowed in the bath. Carly washed him, and I read. We then finished reading the story in bed. We then started The Phantom Tollbooth. He had lots of questions about all the books. He’s also been asking about the lyrics to Yankee Doodle a lot. He did a sweet good night. He leaned in for extra kisses, then said  “I got one on the cheek and the mouth.” He was asleep at 7:10.

When I asked him why he had been sad yesterday he said “I don’t remember.”

Children’s museum: 

New water area! 

Photos: 

Catching and throwing: 

Hiding Spikey: 

Children’s museum: 

He was up a few minutes before 7. When I got up a little later the first thing he said was “I’m a monster and I’m scrunching my teeth.” A bit later I started the beginning of the Formula 1 race. August was excited by it, to the point where he was screeching and I couldn’t hear anything. TUrned it off for the time being. He had Cheerios and shared some noodles with Carly for breakfast. I took a shower. They were starting to read Tickle when I went in. A few minutes later he opened the door and said “uh-oh” but then closed it when I asked.

August and Carly then played a door game, where Carly tried to block him from going into the parlor. She then got the spaceship thing and was pretending to chomp with them; he found it funny at first but was then scared of the chomping.

We headed out at 9. He was singing Skip to My Lou on the train and said  “I was playing hard rock guitar.” Today Carly had a dentist appointment at U.S. Dental down by the National Museum, then her health check for her new job at the international clinic in Itaewon. We dropped her off at the dentist a little after 10, then August and I walked to the National Museum. We sat by the mirror pond and had a snack. After that, August spotted some workers working on the drain and ran over to see what they were doing. They were very concerned that he not get too close. We watched them for a minute, then headed up to the museum and to the children’s museum. We looked at the flowers along the way, and at the poppies up at the top that we hadn’t looked at last time.

We got to the children’s museum just after 10:30. He first went in the house area and watched the video again, then we constructed a traditional Korean roof and ground some wheat. He went and played on the hills briefly. He saw a school group and said “All those kids look the same age.” We then went over to the wall writing area and he did some math on there. Carly called, saying she was done at the dentist. We headed out, went to the bathroom, and met her out by the poppies. In discussing the poppies and their petals, he made connections to other words: “Petal…like a bike.” “Poppy…pop, like a balloon.”

We went to the station and headed to Itaewon. On the train he was doing math like 10-2 and 6-5 pretty easily on his fingers. We headed to one of our favorite places in Itaewon for lunch,, Petra Palace. In looking at the menu August copied me: “So many options”. We got the lamb and hummus, and a falafel plate. August got a strawberry yogurt drink and I got the ginger and lemon tea. He was pretending to play the menu as an instrument and said “Maybe I didn’t set it up right”. I refilled his water bottle from the container on the table. He asked “You filled it up with that?” When I said I did he replied “Thank you.” As we finished eating and got full, he joked about getting sick: “soon get sick” And he remembered it was a Frog and Toad reference.  And at some point he started singing a “Paint another pancake” song. No idea where that came from.

From there we had an hour until Carly’s appointment. But it had started raining. We tried to go to the Beautiful Store book store, but it was closed, and appeared permanently so. We stopped by the office to see if she could go earlier, but they were at lunch until 2. While we waited for Carly to talk to the nurse, August and I read an article about how to make kimchi. We still had 40 minutes. Luckily, the rain had slowed. We walked to Whatthebook, the big bookstore. August and I went to the children’s book section. August wanted to read a book called Stories for 7 Year Olds, but I went to set down the backpack I kind of bumped his head. Don’t know if it was that, or that he thought I had said no to the book, or because it was too dark (a rather dim bookstore), but he started crying. Carly came over, he was better, and we started reading the book. But then out of nowhere he started crying again. A second visit from Carly and he was fine after that.

We walked back to the clinic and August and I read more about Kimchi while Carly had her appointment. Went pretty quickly and we headed home right after 2:30. At some point, as we were walking through Itaewon, we were talking about ice cream and August said to Carly “You’re dreaming of bubble gum ice cream?”

We were home at 3:30. The walk from the subway station was a wet one though. At first August liked the rain on his head and didn’t want his hood on, and took it down. But he changed his mind and when we got home he said “Dry me off.” They nursed, then shared a toasted peanut butter sandwich. When he wanted more he requested not toasted. Carly read The Grouchy Ladybug to him. He pretended to be a skunk (“Spray”) and all the other animals. She then read My Family Plays Music. We played music together. He created a little musical line, and told me to play it on xylophone while he played it on piano. After that we read Frog and Toad stories, then he wanted to type in Pages. He typed “We are living in a yellow submarine.” He said “That’s pretty cool.” when changing fonts. We did mah on the floor using the Duplos and talked about music as we listened to M83 remixes.

He went in on the toilet and sat there for a long time. Carly was showing him pipe organ videos. She asked why he was sitting on the toilet and he said “For funsies.” Got him out to the living room where we watched more organ videos, and found the organ in Philadelphia that I now want to go see.

I gave him a bath. Carly had started making a number line on the floor in the hall, so we made it a quick bath. He went out, and they did math on the big number line. He was very excited about that one. He was tired though and went to sleep at 7:30.

Photos. Running to see the workers: 

Poppies: 

Making a roof: 

Tracing the sign: 

Lunch: 

Lights in the book store: 

Hood in the rain: 

Typing: 

A long time on the toilet: 

He was up about seven. When I got up later he was having Cheerios and Carly had started the big cleaning out. We spent the next couple of hours going through old toys and books and papers and art supplies, etc. A lot of progress was made. August liked helping to take things to the recycle box, and he wasn’t bothered by the idea of getting rid of stuff, so that was nice. Carly made french toast for breakfast, and August and I played GarageBand. I took a shower, then he wanted bubbles, so he and I blew some bubbles.

We left for a walk at 12:40. We went and got juice at Juicy Juice – August chose strawberry – and we headed towards the stream. At the corner by the stream they were doing some construction work and August stopped and watched and listened. He said “I’m playing the viola.” At the sidewalk flower shop across the street he counted petals with Carly. We then walked up the stream, then down the other side to the river. He stepped on the stones, then along the way it was a bit breezy and he noticed the ripples on the stream: “It’s a group of ripples.” He was walking, and Carly did races with him to the tree and bridge. At the bridge, he looked down in the water and spotted fish. By the river we spotted a heron and an egret, then four ducks.

We walked back up our side of the stream, then down the street to the “playground with four swings”, which was August’s request for where to go today. We went on the swings for awhile and he looked up at the buildings and leaned back in the swing a lot. We then went up on the play structure and did a lot of sliding. He held hands to slide down with me and Carly, and he slide into my head and into the backpack: “I CRUSHED the backamapack! I’m strong enough.” It was getting cooler, so we did a quick addition of August’s extra sweatshirt, which involved taking off his coat and sweatshirt, then putting them all on really fast.

We headed home and as we walked through the apartment complex we noticed all the green on the bushes, and found a cut branch that had some pussy willow sort of things on it. I broke off a couple and August carried them home. We got here at 2:30. While he was on the toilet he was making a really loud hacking sound, very Korean of him, much to the chagrin of me and Carly. He had me be a robot falling down and getting hurt. Did some GarageBand, then read Itsy Bitsy and others with Carly. I made a chicken sandwich and he ate it with me, then we played mandolin and PianoMaestro. Carly had made fettuccini alfredo earlier, and they ate some together. She accidentally gave him a big bite, then asked if it was too big. He kept chewing, then said “I couldn’t talk because my mouth was full.” Afterwards, he said “I didn’t do my mmmm noises…I like it though.”

More cleaning out: We tackled the shoe closet. August had fun trying on his old shoes and then new (to him) shoes. He then used them as shoe instruments. He and I ended up making a couple of Cookie Monster poop songs, then read the Animal Tales book. He went to the bathroom, after which we did some stickers and tracing and writing in one of the Hangeul books. They nursed, then did more Hangeul. Carly then realized that his underwear was on backwards, which was why he kept grabbing at it – I had put his pants and underwear on backwards after he had gone to the bathroom.

We had been listening to Neil Young through the day, and he would occasionally comment on the instruments or ask what the songs were about.

Carly and August wrestled on the reading area, with August flapping his arms to fly. Glecy called, so we skyped with her. I gave August his bath while they talked. He went back out and talked to Glecy a bit more. It was to bed soon after that, and he was asleep around 7:30.

Saturday photos: 

Banana: 

Colors: 

Dirt: 

Helping unpack: 

QR book: 

My glasses: 

He was up at 7 and I was up a few minutes later. We had a pillow fight in the reading area, then he played piano. Carly is listening to the Trevor Noah book as an audiobook, and August was wondering what she was doing. So she put one of the earphones in his ear, and they listened together for several minutes. He asked what ‘prostitute’ means. I made pancakes and he helped mix them up. He was then asking about baseball rules (from Take Me Out to the Ballgame).

Carly took down recycling and went to get bread as well. As she left I made a joke about how we could the bread to make towers. Carly was confused, but then August came in saying “That’s silly. Bread towers. That doesn’t make sense.” and laughed.

He was slowly eating pancakes, quarter by quarter: “Were doing quarters with pancakes…see, I have two quarters.” “Pancake math. I like pancake math.”

We watched a couple videos of pedal steel guitar, then skyped with Vivian and company. She was very excited about showing off the new iPad and watching Sarah and Duck. We got out the wooden car and backhoe puzzles to show Colin. Cassie took Colin up for bed, but he wouldn’t stop talking about the truck, so they had to come back and see it again.

August did some drawing on paper, and said “I’m making designs just for funsies.” I took a shower and they were still skyping when I came out. For the next hour or two I did taxes and they nursed and played. Carly got him peanut butter and honey sandwich for lunch. We were then trying to get outside, but he didn’t want to go.We did kisses math on the reading area, then headstands. He untwisted part of the dog. I thought he was then going to want it back together, but he was fine with it. He was then being a woodpecker. And confusing: “It can peck you because it is in a fire.” He went and looked out the window: “Why we don’t hear recycling?” He was then trying to make fingerprints on the window, but I said that was okay. So instead “I want to do it on mirrors.”

We got him outside at that point, about 1:15. We stopped at the banana sculpture and played on and around them for quite awhile. Carly and I had been talking about potential car size for our car in Israel, and AUgust then transferred that to looking at all the kids on bikes and picking a bike size for himself: “Maybe a bike that size.” I asked if he wanted a bike or a scooter. He thought and said “Bike AND scooter.” “Or maybe that size!” He observed that his blue coat and pants matched: “My coat matches my cat pants.” Then to me: “Your shoe ties are blue? I thought of ANOTHER one!” as he pointed to the ground in emphasis.

Carly went ahead eventually to do the grocery shopping. We continued to play in the park and he wandered around a bit and be played in the dirt of the planting boxes. We talked about what he might want to grow in Israel, and he said fruits.

Eventually he wanted to head to Home Plus. We were singing Yankee Doodle as we went down the walkways. A woman asked me what the song was as she recognized the tune. We went in and found Carly and finished the grocery shopping, then headed home.

On the way home we stopped by the guard station to see if there was a package. A guy saw us and said “pal sam chil” (837). It was actually the delivery driver, who then led us to his truck and got the the box. He had simply recognized me from the few brief seconds he has seen me when dropping off packages when he brings them to our door. Impressive service.

At home August helped put iHerb away. We snacked on the baked lentils then I made a salmon sandwich. They nursed, then we ate our sandwich, then read some Kipper. Carly cooked a cheesy rice dish and August and I read Bob Books. We did lots of music time: mandolin, Piano Maestro, Dust Buster. August figured out how to make the instruments play pizzacatto in GarageBand, and he also played with the Itsy Bitsy app.

They nursed, then we played with the yellow alien and spaceship and introduced them to Bluie and Green Monster. August pretended to be an alligator and chomped on Green Monster. Carly didn’t like the idea of the feel of it – carpety, she calls it. So August found it really funny. They then played GarageBand together and August showed her how to change the instruments.

I gave him his bath and washed his hair. We watched hurdy gurdy and keyed fiddle videos in the Musical Instruments book. August was talking about diapers and underwear, and we talked about eventually not wearing a diaper at night. He decided he wanted to try it tonight, but when I said no, not yet he got really sad. We got him dried off and off to bed and he was asleep about a quarter to 8.

Oops. Sunday photos. Sunday will have Saturday’s.

Cleaning out: 

 

Looking at… 

Flowers on the trees: 

Construction: 

Flowers: 

Fish: 

Colors: 

Birds: 

Building: 

Home. Shoe instruments: 

Korean book: 

He woke up sometime after midnight and couldn’t get back to sleep nursing. Eventually, I got up and picked him up. I stood up with him in the bedroom for a few minutes and he rested his head on my shoulder. Eventually he said “book” and was grabbing at the door. We went out and walked around the house a bit, then into the parlor. He wanted a light on, and we lay in the reading area with a blanket on us. He just lay against a pillow for several minutes. More than five, at least. He hadn’t really been crying at all since I picked him up, but he kept rubbing at his nose and his breathing took a long time to return to normal. It almost seems like he holds his breath for a few seconds each time. I thought he was going to fall asleep like that, but eventually he wanted a book. We ended up reading Kipper A to Z and the first three stories in the Kipper Collection. At close to 1:30 we went back in and he fell asleep soon thereafter.

He came out at 7:06. Looked for Carly, then climbed up with me and sat on my lap facing me. A lot of eye and face rubbing but not upset. Eventually he asked “What (something) mean?” but I missed the word and he wouldn’t repeat. Then he was playing with his fingers and pointed his them at me and said “You’re pointing at Dada with the wrong finger.” I had been teaching him the names of the fingers a couple days ago. He climbed off and sat next to me on the couch for awhile.

We read “How Kids Grow” on the couch, then he lay with his head on my legs for a few minutes. Eventually he said “I want to write on paper.” Changed him into underwear, then headed to the paper. He said “I can write numbers up to…Let’s get a marker and find out.” I think he was thinking about the book we read, which said the seven-year old could write to ten. He started writing and kept announcing his progress “I wrote all the way to 37!” Then he kept going. He wrote up to 100, well 300, if you count when he switched to 100. We then talked about big numbers and I wrote out big ones like thousands and millions and we looked at how many zeros there were.

He wanted water and walked out into the living room where I had Sun Ra playing on the iPad. He listened for a bit and said he was playing the hurst gurdy. But when he was done listening he wanted the music off.

He was hungry and I offered Cheerios or a smoothie. He chose smoothie, but then immediately closed the door on me when I said okay. I made the smoothie and poured hims some and he started drinking. I found some chunks in the rest of it and told him I needed to use the blender again. He whined and ran to the parlor and started to close the door. I got his smoothie for him so he could drink it in the parlor.

He asked what the music (I had turned Sun Ra back on) was about and didn’t seem convinced that the song (called Space Jazz Reverie) was about space. After smoothies he wanted to play mandolin. But first to the bathroom where he talked about how ours doesn’t have a sensor un-“like Chrysanthemum Park”. I made the “flush” noise which even by itself he finds funny but also scares him a little and he says “No”.

We played mandolin and piano for quite awhile, then with the stuffed animals for a bit. He crawled in my lap and curled up and was a rabbit and we pulled the blanket around us. He was hungry so we went and had a piece of toast. He was still coming center about the blender and asked something like “You out the toast in the blender?” When I assured him I would t use the blender he agreed to have toast.

After toast he asked what gold and silver make. He then asked if they’re colors and I realized that he hadn’t actually seen gold and silver, the metals. So we looked up images of them and others, like iron and bronze and copper and steel.

He then declared he was going to make a puzzle by himself. He chose the Old MacDonald’s Farm one. Spent several minutes dancing around, listening to the song and pushing the button when it stopped. We finished the puzzle. He has a tendency to just look at it, and not try out pieces, but eventually I encouraged him to try out pieces in different ways and reminded him of the mistakes song and he listened to that.

He then wanted to watch Pirates of the Caribbean.

Shower

He talked about ages while on the toilet. “We look the same. But I’m bigger. Because I’m 16 and you’re 14.” “Sorry, I’m ten thousand…in infinity.”

He took apart the puzzle and made a guessing game of it, turning a piece around and asking me to guess what was on it. On the iPad was a song by Drivin N Cryin called “The Hardest Part”. He wanted to know hardest part of what. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make out what the singer says in the song and couldn’t find the lyrics. He wanted to listen to it a second time.

We ate our triangle kimbap for lunch. One of them had kimchi rice so I took that, but he ate two bites of it. He had a quarter of the peanut butter sandwich and started talking about shapes: “What’s triangle plus octagon? Do it with your shape fingers.” “What’s trombone minus violin? It equals bassoon.”

“What impossible mean?” Not sure what made him think of ‘impossible’. Perhaps he heard me say it. I supplied standing on the ceiling and flying as things that were impossible. Then he playing the piano as something that is possible.

He played with th balloon dog and we had it go to the bathroom on the toilet.

“What happens if there’s no flowers in Israel?” So we looked at Google Maps and photos of Netanya. He accidentally clicked on Telunas Beach in Indonesia, and we found that you can do a walk through of the resort.

Back to music: “I’ll play xylophone and you play mandolin and we’ll play Itsy Bitsy Spider.”

He wanted to sing Alligator Chomp from last night. I looked up the words. “Where are the other verses” “There’s fourteen verses…like Ants Go Marching.”

Getting ready to go, I gave him a choice between his usual grey and blue striped sweatshirt, and a blue hooded sweatshirt. He looked at his pants and shirt and was at first concerned that neither of the sweatshirts matched. He’d been so excited by matching yesterday. I assured him it was okay, and he chose the new sweatshirt.

Before we could get out the door there was one more thing: “I want to read Lost Button…No, Cookies. I really like cookies.” So we read that Frog and Toad story, then the sample of a My Little Pony book, then discussed smurfs and how tall they are (three apples): “Why not three mangos? Three pineapples?”

He looked at the How Kids Grow book on his own, then a minute later, as I was putting on his sock and shoes, asked “How you put on pajamas?” I started to ask if this was about the book (because the 4 or 5 year old can put on her pajamas by herself) but he cut me off, saying “No” to all my questions.

We left at 1. On the way down the elevator stopped at three. August said “It stopped at 3? Wait, my age is 3!”

At the station he was asking which directions each train was going, and we discussed that we were headed north. I said ‘northbound’. So he asked what ‘Bound’ meant. I explained, and gave some examples, and he said “We’re Megan bound. Yeah, I want to visit Megan.”

We went to the Iris Garden and we first looked at the flowers near the entrance. For one set of flowers he counted the petals, of another he said “It smells like cheese.” He spotted a butterfly, then a couple bees: “Bee on it. Making honey. I really like bees.”

From there we wandered through the park. We sat on a rock by the currently dry stream and I got out some of the letter cookies. “I have Y for yesterday and yo-yo.” “Q for quartz and queen and quitter…I really like Q.” We worked on similes, and he declared “Q and G are my favorite letters.” He wanted to spell ‘bridge’ and we discussed the letters G and J and their sounds. He asked “Why they have two letter that
are close?” Good question, kid.

Wandered and played on the rocks and made our way to the deck area where we’ve often eaten lunch. A guy took his photo and showed it to him. August looked around, remembered the log benches, and crawled through the metal bench several times. A woman tried to giver him a Snickers bar or something it, and I tried to wave her away before he saw it. He did, but simply said something like “Why the woman try to give you candy?” and kept playing. Other kids showed up, then after a couple minutes August wanted to head down the ramp and wander around. He had talked about finding frogs, but they’re not out yet.

More wandering and we finished the letter cookies. I used the Cookie Monster voice, but August said “Cookie is not here because it is Korea. Cookie Monster is not here because it’s not Sesame Street. Because it’s Zinnie and Dada…you’re back to Dada. Fine.” He said “Y is for yodel, yawn, yesterday, and yo-yo.”

I had talked about going up to the park and playground west of the station, but he had said he was fine playing at the Iris Garden. Eventually though he wanted to go. We went to the bathroom, then got in the backpack and started walking. Along the way, in the village area, we looked at hats where I had bought my beige hat (with Chuck?) and looked at all the aquariums. We saw squid and sea pineapples and sea cucumbers and octopi. And fish, of course. And a variety of shellfish. By another shop he saw a blue sweatshirt that looked like the one I was wearing and asked if I had got it there.

We got to the park (새동네어린이공원) and started by looking at the random kernels of corn someone had left on the bench. Then to the swings, where he had an argument with Cookie Monster about eating cookies, then on to the play structure, where we spent most of our time. He went across the shaky bridge a couple times (“its shakey so it helps my balance.”), then up the big rope ladder, needing my help just a little at the top. We went down slides a few times, after each other, and once holding hands in a tube slide. But mainly he played with a broken piano sort of thing. It didn’t make noise, but that didn’t stop him. Eventually, he just sat on the floor of it and played instruments on his shoes for several minutes.

We headed home. He sat on the train and sang. We got home just after 5. Carly got home a bit later. August initially ran into the parlor, but then came back to greet her. They nursed, then we had soup for dinner. We played piano and were learning Zero at the Bottom of the Sea. We then read Aaaaaargh! Spider! and Gabriella’s Song (from APIS). It was time for his bath, but he wanted to draw notes on paper, so we made an agreement that he could draw five, and shook on it. He of course got a few more than that.

Carly gave him a bath, then he came back and drew more notes with me. He filled a whole page with sixteenth notes. He was then asleep about a quarter to 8.

Only one sock all morning after he took one off: 

Puzzle: 

Counting petals: 

Q: 

Tunnel: 

Sea cucumbers and pineapples: 

Playground. Corn kernels: 

Singing on the subway: 

Sixteenth notes: 

We skipped his English class today so we could go to the band concert at APIS.

He was adding numbers in his sleep during the night. He was then talking and almost up around 5 but fell back to sleep. At 6 he woke up coughing. He got up and went straight to get his water bottle before going to Carly. He then stared asking me about fractions, and I don’t know where that came from: “What is 3 slash 4? What is 4 slash 6? What is 100 slash 2?”

He ate Cheerios and banana for breakfast and Carly headed to work. He made a racket on the piano to wake me up as Flynne, sleeping in my lair on the couch. We made a pajama person on the bed after we changed him. He was singing London Bridge with funny words, then listing rhyming words. So we went and read Dr. Seuss books. First the spot story, then the Zax. Then all of On Beyond Zebra.

We then played mandolin and PianoMaestro. He started to be able to push down and play notes pretty well, doing it on multiple strings and a variety of frets. So that’s a big step.

He did some stamp pad letters. Then had more breakfast. He went back into the parlor and lay on the floor. He took one sock off. I asked why he took the right sock off, and that led to a discussion of whether one was a right sock and one was the left, like with shoes. He wanted to switch the socks to prove they were interchangeable. We did that, but then he took one off because it was supposedly cold. So I put it on his hand. He then wanted the other sock on the other hand. He then tried picking things up, and did some more stamp pad letters.

Back in the reading area we read parts of On Beyond Zebra and Oh The Places You’ll Go! He then wanted to play the “feet game”, which involved hiding his feet under the carpet and is pretending they were a rock or a spider, etc. He then pretended to be May, the rabbit “I want to hide May!”

He was pretending to play music as he was wrapped in the blanket, so we ended up figuring out how to play the rabbit dance song on piano. He then played with GarageBand after that. He was asking about the scales and arpeggiator, so we played with those and discussed them.

We then played with the friends again and the blanket, and he ended up sitting and listening to Puff’s music box. He then wanted to build a tower. We ended up building a couple towers and a huge Q. Then, on his own he made a big R and lowercase r and spelled ‘on’ out of the blocks. We exercised together, then I took a shower, after which we Skyped with my dad. It did the thing where the other person sounds like a chipmunk and we have to call them back (only seems to happen with parents now – an odd Skype bug). August said he sounded like a giraffe and we my dad talked like that for awhile before we called back. Anyway, my mom was out for dinner, so he said they’d call back in a bit. We went and started to get ready to leave, and August was brushing his teeth when they called back.

He mainly played mandolin while we skyped, showing off how he can press notes. We then headed to class. Class today was all about watermelons. Didn’t learn anything about them, but everything was round. I think we were talking about colors, and which ones we know and don’t know in Korean and he said “I don’t know this one either…we have to find out.” As class went on he said “Watermelon!” a lot, as well as “uftah” a couple times. The highlight activity was a watermelon ball fight. August also really liked helping pushing the watermelon cart, and he made a watermelon tower of watermelon pieces and the teacher was trying to blow it over. At the end of class we got a Teuni Monster Spaceship toy which he really liked.

For lunch we went to the new kimbap place on the second floor of Brownstone: Honest Lee Kimbap (올곧은 Lee 김밥). He chose dongatsu kimbap and I chose the tuna salad one. We enjoyed that and discussed odd and even numbers. He’s catching on: “6 is an even number? Because you’re counting by twos?”

We went home and played piano and mandolin. I was getting kind of sleepy, which tends to happen when we lounge on the reading are in the sun after eating lunch. He was making up words and said “Humfor dumfor. I made a funny word.” He also played with the spaceship toy. I did some cleaning up while he played, and I think he saw. Because eventually he said “Let’s go to the band concert” and then he took all the pieces for the spaceship and put them away under the rocking chair.

On the bus we looked at all the Mary Had a Little Lamb lyrics and sang that. Then he got quiet and fell asleep sitting next to me. When I went to pick him up to get off the bus I actually fell down onto the seat as the bus driver dove into the bus stop. I was afraid I kneed him on his foot, but all he did was sort of wake up and ask “Where’s mama?”

Much a repeat of Tuesday, we went up to Tospia and got sandwiches and coffee drinks and looked at the plants again. We saw Emmalee, the orchestra teacher, and I had August say hi and “Good concert“.

He did more walking on the way to APIS this time, and when we got to the field he stated crawling on it. We went up to the fourth floor, and he saw Carly coming out of Megan’s room. He went down, and went in Megan’s room and she gave him an Earth sticker. Isra, one of Carly’s students, who he met on Tuesday, was in Carly’s room working and he said hi to her. We ate dinner, and he kept saying “I hear Megan” every time he heard her. Carly took him down to the bathroom, then on the way back they were talking to a couple of the other teachers about August learning things, and Carly mentioned making mistakes, and August sang the “I like to make mistakes” song. Oh, and another teacher made him a balloon dog and gave it to him.

We went to the concert and watched the jazz band, 5th grade band, and middle school band. Once again I took him down to the front beforehand to look at the instruments. Back up in our seats, he got folded up in the seat, but recovered as Carly played with the balloon dog and sat on her lap. He then had the dog pooping on everything, including the teachers sitting in front of us.

Anyway, the music for the whole concert was all music composed by James Swearingen. As soon as they started playing August was playing and humming along. We sat for the first two groups, then stood in the back for the middle school band. He wasn’t a fan of the talking in between, but loved the music.

We headed out, and August was playing the stairs like an instrument – something he had also done in front of the sandwich shop. On the bus home he and Carly made up keyboard instruments to play.

At home we shared a banana and discussed even numbers. He asked “What’s timpani plus trombone?”  And I said trimpanibone, to his amusement. Next he asked “bass plus trombone equals what?”

Carly started his bath and I gave him his bath. Banana in Carly’s salad. He wanted to make up songs, and we came up with three, all on subjects of his request: I Lost My Helmet in the Spaceship, Alligator Chomp, and We Are the Red Crabs. He made it through washing his hair and we straight to the bedroom and got him dressed for bed. I left at 7:10 and he was soon asleep.

 

Sock hands: 

Being May the rabbit: 

Towers: 

R: 

Showing gramma and grampa: 

Teuni Teuni. Helping push: 

With sangsaengnim: 

Watermelon tower: 

Monster spaceship: 

Kimbap lunch: 

Asleep on the bus: 

Walking to APIS. Fence instrument: 

Sticker from Megan: 

Recovering from getting his leg pinched in the seat: 

He was up at 6 again. He and Carly were adding negative numbers (like -4+(-5)) for the first time. Carly has taught him about ‘negativeland’ for math with negative numbers. So August started pointing around and asking “What land is over there?” He pointed towards me getting coffee in the kitchen and Carly said it was “Dada morning land”. So August then added 5 and 5 and said it was “Dada morning land 10”. He next wanted to watch Oma’s hand surgery. But first he wanted to sing a song. I sang a short “It’s morning” song but that wasn’t what he wanted. We sang Yellow Submarine, then listened to it on the iPad. August marched around the room and said “I’m playing a tomato”. During a Jason Webley song he said “I’m playing the bass viola keyboard…That doesn’t make sense?”

We ate fruit and Cheerios for breakfast and watched, at his request, the video on sea snakes, then one of a giant snail. We switched to instrument videos and watched parts of videos by the bass instrument guy, on the Keyes trombone and french horn.

We listened to music on the iPad, from the playlist I made him. He liked Yellow Submarine, Webley’s “Ways to Love”, and Icicle Works “Love is a Wonderful Color”, but vetoed a few others. When he doesn’t want a song he will just go over to the iPad and pause it.

We did some math with the blueberries, then exercised, then he wanted to play mandolin and pretend it was a bass. Then he played pizzicato. We did Piano Maestro and mandolin. He then said he was hungry and wanted crackers. I asked what kind, and he said “ilban crackers”. I said I didn’t know what kind of crackers he was talking about, but it sounded familiar. He laughed and said he made it up. I asked him where the ilban part came from and he said “garbage”. ‘Ilban sulagi” means general waste in Korean, but we haven’t talked about that recently at all.

He ate a couple crackers then some grapes. He played with his toolkit and sang Yellow Submarine with random words as he did some hammering.

He then did some yoga, pulling his feet up over his head. He wanted Marshy to do it, then he was throwing Marshy around the room. Then said “I want them to talk about their ages.” We did that a bit – he decided Green Monster is the oldest. He sang more random words with Yellow Submarine, then had the stuffed whale turning into an apple and getting things wet.

I needed to take a shower, but he didn’t want to play on his own. I finally said I needed to go and whined for a couple seconds, but he  went to his iPad and played the Dr. Seuss instruments. After my shower he was hungry, so we had some grapes and I got us ready to go. We did more mandolin after I changed his shirt. He was pushing down frets while I played it, then he pretended it was an upright bass, guitar, and cello.

We finally got ready to go and left at 10:40. As we left he made up an instrument: “Eraser tells me which note to play…there’s a bunch of erasers…it’s a brass instrument.” On the train down train down he started to talk about other people he saw. One woman had bandaid on her cheek. He pointed and said “Is that a bandaid? Maybe there was blood.” Another woman wore tights: “What’s that woman wearing on her legs?” And another had holes in the knees of her jeans: “Why are there holes on her legs?”

We got off the train and went to our usual CU or GS25 and got lunch. Another one of the lunch boxes – one with a little strawberry cake in it this time. Bonus: I got a free iced latte drink. We went back to where we ate lunch by the small lake last time and ate there again. Then we headed up the stairs to the museum. August saw the flowers up the stairway and kept talking about, smelling, and looking at them. “Nice flowers,” he kept saying.

We went to the children’s museum and got a ticket for 1:30. We then went and got tickets for the special exhibit on Egyptian artifacts. Our friend Meg, now in Russia, and seen an article about it and suggested it. She thought August might like the animal sculptures, etc. He did enjoy it, but wasn’t too fond of how dark it was (a couple hours later he would ask ‘Why was Egypt dark?’). Also, as usual, they were a bit jumpy and fast on the rules: we were told he couldn’t touch the display cases, couldn’t step past the yellow lines on the ground (even though there were then display cases, and everyone else was stepping over the lines). And though it was hardly busy at all, when he lay down on the floor one time a woman came over and told us there were chairs in the hall where he could rest. When he lay down in the corner of a second room a woman came over and asked him to get up.

But we found interesting animal sculptures for him (an ibis, Anubis, cat coffins shaped like cats, etc.), he saw his first mummies and sarcophagus, liked a cutout light sculpture thing (which, thankfully, he could touch), saw hieroglyphics, and said that the falcon mummy looked like a carrot (it did). And he seemed interested in the fact that Egypt is next to Israel and we might go there.

About 1:45 we made it to the children’s museum. Timing didn’t really matter, as it was far from full and they didn’t make people leave at the end of the session. Here, of course, the rules are entirely different, and he was able to climb on everything, and started by playing drums on things. He then ground some flour, then spent most of our time playing on the little hill things. He was climbing up them, and sliding down all over them in random directions. We took off his coat and I asked if he also wanted his sweatshirt off “No…What’s under?” He looked and saw what shirt he had on underneath, then said “Take it off.” He started hitting the hill with his hand and counting, and said “I bonked my hand eleven times.” Then he was bonking his head on things. He was playing on his own and I was studying Hebrew, and he came and poked me in the face as he sometimes does to get my attention. He wanted me to climb the hill with him. I said “Sure. Just don’t stab me in the face.” He replied “Fine. I’ll not stab you in the face.”

There is a display next to there where you put your head up in a bubble thing and see pictures of ancient jewelry. He played in that quite a bit and liked when I went in one and I went in another and we could see each other. He went and sat on a camel, and then tried on my hat before we left.

From there we went to where you can write on the walls. He wrote Zinnie, Niman, and Althauser in his crazy On Beyond Zebra-inspired letters and designs. He then went and played in the agricultural revolution-era house (“That’s the bamboo?” he asked when he saw it), and watched the videos on tools from the time period a few times.

We then went to the gift shop and he picked out a card for Carly to send to someone. I wanted one of the museum books, but they didn’t have it at that one, so we went to the big gift shop and I ended up buying the small museum guide. In between he had wanted to look at some of the permanent exhibits. He really liked the replica of some Joseon-era chimes. He wanted to touch them, but it isn’t clear if you can. But he wandered around and looked at other things, particularly the printing press stuff. He asked about musical instruments, but I realized I don’t think they have any musical instruments on display (which seems like an oversight).

In the prehistoric section, we saw petroglyphs and talked about how old they were. He said “Long before mama was a baby? Long before uncle Paul was a baby? Long before gramma and grampa was a baby?”

We headed home. No iPad necessary either direction today. Singing and looking out the windows and snacks instead. He talked about our version of Ants Go Marching: “Why when you get to Twenty the ant goes ‘ahhhh’?…Because we keep going?” When we transferred in Sangbong he did some more yoga on the floor, like he had done in the Egyptian exhibit. He said “That’s pretty easy”. On the
second train we looked at the subway route map and played the “How do you get to this stop?” game. He was getting a lot of attention and touching on the trains today. Seems to happen on that line. A guy on the left tried to offer him a Halls. A woman to his right touched his head about a dozen times.

We got home at 5:30. I heated water for tea and there was a miscommunication between me and Carly when she realized I hadn’t made tea for her. She acted sad and August said “Why are you sad?” “Maybe mama could make mama’s tea.”

He ate tea, then wanted to watch a string quartet. I put on a video of Apocalyptica, a cello quartet, playing Metallica’s “Unforgiven”. After that we watched the Metallica version, then, so he could see instruments more, the live video of Pearl Jam’s “Alive”. He and Carly were then doing all sorts of silliness involving Carly being a Venus fly trap. But he was clearly getting tired, on the verge. Carly gave him a quick bath, and he cried through it. Before he went to sleep he said, on his own, “I love you Dada.” He was asleep early, at 6:40.

 

Photos:-, 

Mandolin: 

Flowers: 

Egyptian exhibit: 

He liked the hippo: 

The falcon mummy looked like a carrot: 

Children’s museum: 

Art: 

More floor: 

Subway stops: 

He was grinding his teeth in his sleep at some point. Something he does a bit, but this was louder than usual. He was up sometime before 6. Watched one episode of Mouk and ate the last banana bread for breakfast. Carly headed to work as he was trying out Busy Shapes for the first time. After that we played some Easy Music and Discover Music. We got up and he played some toy piano, then I held hi and we were pretending to play instrument after instrument, repeating The Driver on the Bus over and over. He then made up ‘wedertone’ (or something like that), first telling me it was a Korean instrument he had learned from me, but then saying it was a made up instrument.

We did Piano Maestro and played mandolin, then had Cheerios and more banana bread. We sang Skip to My Lou and couldn’t remember all the words, so found the book and read it. Then he chose Snappy Little Monsters. We read that, and almost all of Cat on the Mat is Flat. He went to the bathroom, then wanted a nest with the friends, and was pretending they were going to the bathroom. This ended with him saying “I pooped Shapes out of my bottom: Heart, mango, molecule, square, diamond, hexagon, octagon, pentagon, circle, oval, and a quadrilateral.”

He played Artie’s World while I took a shower. We were playing on the electric keyboard. He played piano on my lap and made up a song called “Kite”. He then did some of dust mop piano game, followed by more mandolin and keyboard. At some point he asked me for kisses: “I want infinity kisses.” Did that a few times during the day.

We ate a salmon sandoo and grapes for lunch, then looked up all the words to “Take me out to the ballgame” and sang it. He picked up the last two grapes, said “Let’s share these last ones” and gave me one. We read My Family Plays Music and had to look up wind chime instruments, then he wanted to watch a harpsichord, so we watched a video of “Les Cyclopes” (which is about Carly’s favorite cyclops), then Scarlatti (https://youtu.be/71iUAFFQ8ik). He was then fascinated by a video about how harpsichords work (https://youtu.be/71x4MSlpGUk). We finished with a little Hendrix, then he wanted his iPad. I asked if it was in the parlor, and he said “No, but I still have my brush instruments.”

Then he wanted to watch a string quartet, so we found a Beethoven string quarter (https://youtu.be/oXLKu-HglnM) and he said “I’m playing along with my brush instruments.” I went to get our toothbrushes and he noticed the light was on in Carly’s closet and asked why. When I handed him his toothbrush, he then wanted to brush his teeth in the closet.

He joked around about hitting the wall with his hand and getting in trouble by the police: “Give me 16 flops, 10 kisses, and 2 nose rubs” was his idea of a consequence. And randomly: “Here’s a big Purple Heart. It’s from the kimchi store.”

He had said he was tired a few times (at one point he said “I told you I was tired”), so I wanted to give him an opportunity to take a nap, so I got the stroller. As we were getting ready to go he discussed getting too big for the stroller and backpack: “Then you’ll just walk?”But when it came to getting in the stroller he disagreed and said he wanted the backpack. He said the stroller was too hard, and showed me by going and putting his head on the stroller and saying it was hard. I suggested he could take a blanket, and he liked that idea and went and chose one of the baby blankets and we put that in. From that he started talking about pillows, and he said “But I like my head on mama.” I asked “On mama or her pillow?” He replied “Both”.

We walked for 25 minutes, doing a loop up on the stream, then walked to the playground by the pink building. He was up and singing most of the way, clearly not napping, right until before we got to the playground. Then he said he wanted to rest on the blanket. It had bunched down, so I pulled it up for him and he cuddled up in the stroller for a couple minutes. But he hopped up as soon as we saw the playground. This was the playground with four swings in the apartment complex. We had gone by the park close to the pink building, but even though the swings were open he wanted to continue on to this playground.

At the playground I suggested he put on his light blue coat that I had brought. He has never worn it. Completely different reaction to the one I tried on him a few days ago. I put this on and he said “I like it!” Then “It matches too because it has dark blue.” Earlier, he had liked that his shirt (the surfer shirt) matched his pants because they were both dark blue/purplish.

He went on the swings for several minutes, then we played on the play structure and the slides. Made a game of me taking up one slide, and the backpack the other, and he would slide down into the backpack. Also practiced his directions, north south east west. On the slide he said “I’m a big snake. My tail goes on and on.” As he climbed over me I said “For a snake you sure have big feet.” He replied “The end of my tail has big feet.” When we went up the stairs (he had been going up the climbing wall things) he commented they were short, and said “I don’t like a lot of stairs. Like at the pink building…because they are too bumpy.” He made some music and said “I was playing a drum machine.” We held hands going down the slides together, and then we went down in turns (“One after another”) and he would copy what I did going down. He worked on skipping stairs going up (pulling himself up by the railing).

We were sitting on the slides, looking up Korean words again, when a boy came over with pretty good English and talked to us. Through him I think I learned that there is a joke about the impeached president’s name. Park Geun-hye (박근혜 in Korean)’s first name sounds similar to the word for ‘swings’ (근혜 versus 그네). He also said “Koreans hate 근혜, Americans hate Trump.”

Eventually, we headed home, dropped off the stroller, and got ready to head to APIS. Carly asked if we could get the sandwiches for dinner. We just took the grey backpack. August walked or I carried him a bit. We went and caught the Nowon 15 bus and got off at APIS. Walked up to Tospia and got 3 sandwiches and drinks for me and Carly. While we waited we looked at the plants outside. August liked them. I could name a few for him, but he asked about one so I Skyped my parents for help. We went inside and sat for a minute, then took the food to APIS.

Ate with Carly, and Carly helped him use a stapler. We then went down to the auditorium for the concert. While we waited, I took him down to the front so he could see the instruments and things up close. He really liked that. We then went back up to Carly. The first group, 5th grade orchestra, was just 4 kids, so just like a string quartet, like I had introduced to him earlier. Then, one of the pieces they played was the William Tell overture, which we had come across in Piano Maestro.

At the end of each piece he clapped. After 5th grade, Carly asked if he wanted to stay or go home. Clearly tired. He said go home, but then we stood in the back and watched the middle school orchestra. Made it through that (and he got to say hi to Megan and Brett, and show off his math), then we headed home.

He was getting a bit crazy as we got off the bus and headed home, pretending to hit everything and everyone. Then while waiting at the elevators he actually went up and hit a guy. When we got up to the apartment Carly took him into the bedroom for a short timeout.

He ate a little soup for dinner, then joked “I’m eating my poop” before he got in the bath. Carly gave him a bath, and he went right to bed after that and was asleep at 7.

Photos. Brushing his teeth in the closet: 

Watching harpsichord: 

Resting in the stroller: 

Kicking the backpack: 

Slide selfie: 

Boy with the 36 year old bike: 

Sleepy on the bus: 

Plants: 

Stapling: 

Concert: