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He was up at 6:10 after nursing a little earlier. After nursing he was hungry, so I made eggs with mushrooms and cheese, toast, and a mandarin orange. He ate a lot, then we were doing the Silent E game and he asked for more examples of fire (this had started yesterday when leaving the play area when he saw the fire extinguisher and wanted more examples of what it is for). We read Mr. Gumpy’s Outing. He saw that word ‘chase’ and said “That’s a good C H word.” After that he said “I want to go play with dada with Duplos.” He spent a lot of time watching Peppa Pig and writing words that he saw in the subtitles: all, the, tree, etc. Later we Skyped with my parents. Talked about the election. We did play dough mixing while we talked to them. Afterwards we found the Minions emoji video thing that he was quoting yesterday (Ah, no). We did more play dough then watched the Winnie the Pooh ABC episode, first while I hung up laundry, then as we brushed our teeth.

We left about 11:30. A lot of leaves falling and being swept up. On the train, he got his foot stuck in the backpack moving from my lap to his own seat. He started whining, but I thought it was his diaper. The guy next to us saw the source and helped free his foot.

We got to Children’s Grand Park and ate lunch by the rectangle pond since it was warm enough. He saw another girl playing with it and was intrigued. He threw a couple leaves in. He didn’t want lunch though. Instead, he found the chalk in the backpack and wanted to do sidewalk chalk. So we headed to the playground. On the way he talked about how he was going to draw shapes. We first started with words and letter. This was part of it: “Can you guess what that is?” Me: “A rectangle?” Him: “That’s close.” Me: “A square.” Him: “Yeah!”

It got windy and he got frustrated with the  leaves blowing into him and the sidewalk chalk rolling away. Near the end: “Can you you draw ‘chwachwanicall’. It has two Ls remember?…I taught you that.” He then traced it. All was good until he was getting silly writing “11, 11, 11, 11, 11, 11…” and then the chalk broke. He wanted me to put the piece back together and was sad when I couldn’t. We went to the bathroom by the stage – first time we’ve used it in quite awhile, and changed him and offered him more food. Still not eating. We got walking and he fell asleep from 1:24 to 2:54. A good nap. He woke up pretty happy. We had been in the downstairs cafe this time. He wanted to do sidewalk chalk again, so we headed that way.

As we walked, I asked him if he had dreamed. He kind of said a couple of things as he woke up. I didn’t catch it, so thought it might be dream-related. I’ve asked several times before and he always just says ‘no’ to any question. But this time, when I asked if he remembered his dream, he smiled and started writing letters in the air. I asked if he remembered what his dream was about, and he started singing and drawing letters, randomly. Asking more questions, I got that he dreamed about letters, but not letter songs, and that the letters were random, or making words maybe, but weren’t in order.

We got back to the sidewalk chalk area and added to our art from earlier for 15 minutes or so. Didn’t last long. We were in the shade now and I think he was a big chilly, but didn’t want to put on another layer. I found a bug on me, and he helped me take it to the bushes to brush it off. A couple odd interactions as we were leaving: I went to pack up the chalk, which we had had out the entire time. 12 pieces of chalk, and as there were two left, a woman hurried over and grabbed one right before I grabbed it. Didn’t ask or anything, just grabbed it. I was all about sharing earlier, but that was crazy. I told her we were leaving and she gave it back. Then, August had had me write the name of the playground and had traced it. He then traced it in another color. He asked me to blend them together. I started to do so, and another boy was walking by. He came over and started smearing it with his hands. I said something to him, then looked up at his parents who were standing right there and smiling at him. I said “So this is okay with you? Alrighty then.” And then turned and got August and we left.

It was early, so I asked if he wanted to go to the children’s museum for awhile. He said yes. We went in and he first wanted the light blocks. We went there, but he just briefly played with the light shapes, then went in to the floor magnets. He made Hangeul with them, then randomly asked “What does ‘rude’ mean?” I’m not sure where he heard it. I may have said it to myself/him in talking about the chalk interactions, but didn’t remember it. But it may have been a Pooh reference or something, the way he said it. Although he said it may have been Piglet (“maybe piglet said it.”), but that doesn’t sound right. Anyway, I explained, and, predictably, he wanted “another example”. So I kept giving examples, and pushed him out of the way, etc. He thought that was funny, and it turned into The Rude Game. We left just before 4. As we walked out he said “you played the rude game.”

Had some trouble getting on the train, as he decided he wanted to step over the gap on his own, and I wouldn’t let him. He kept saying “No, no, no” for a few stops. Finally calmed down and we played ShapeKit the rest of the way. He was making some cool shapes. Getting off, he agreed to hold my hand this time, and he stepped over the gap himself. He was happy about that.

He was disappointed when we got home and Carly wasn’t there. I suggested he make a sign for her and that cheered him up. We made a sign that said “Hi mama.” While coloring it he said “Cuz peach is my favorite color today.” We decorated it with a bunch of stickers then hung it on the door. He stood looking out in the hall for a few minutes, then I convinced him to come in. I put soup in a mug to heat it up and he thought that was funny: “What soup in a mug about?” he kept asking, and laughed. Carly got home and he went and looked at the art with her again. They nursed, then he ate some soup and we showed Carly the Rude Game. He then wanted to play Duplos, so we went and added to our tower. I asked if he had a good nap today and he said “No.” I was surprised, as he had slept 90 minutes. I asked why not, and he said “Because I was too warm.” Very cool how he can remember and communicate things now.

He ate some sandwich and soup with Carly. We then gave him a bath. I did the playing part – we played with the squirt cars – but when I tried to start washing he wanted mama, so we traded. They then played together a bit, and he and I did more ShapeKit.

But the big event of the evening was the music lesson, divided into two sections. We read Snoozers and he said he wanted to write the music notes. So first he learned to write the quarter note and half note. The tricky part was to not make them look like ‘d’. Then we went back, and this time he learned the whole note as well, and I taught him the beats of each. We then counted and sang them while I drummed, and he totally got it. We got to the point where I could do whole notes and he would count the quarter notes or half notes. Oh, and we also drew quarter rests and included those in our counting. And he asked what the treble clef was and liked the word, so was chanting “clef, clef, clef” for the notes.

Carly took him in soon after our last music lesson and he was asleep about 9:20.

Contemplating the tower: 

Picture for mama: 

Writing music notes: 

 

He was up at 5:40. We started with some typing on Carly’s computer. After that he did some writing on paper before saying goodbye to Carly. He was asking for Spanish words and we looked them up in the Spanish dictionary app. He did some of that on his own and some typing in search. After that it was an arts morning: we did some painting, played with the slime, and mixed play dough colors. He wanted brown, and in discussing it I used the word ‘tan’. He said “Tan. I haven’t heard that in awhile.” Wr made worms of it and did the worm dance, which he and Carly had invented. He saw me look at my foot and asked about it. I said there was some dry skin and he said “I like dry skin.”

“Hey dada, lean over…cuddle, cuddle. We’re cuddling.” He pretended to be a snake and said “I’m Paja the snake.” Not sure where that name came from.” We played hide and seek with the play dough worms, with August hiding them around the house. Did some more translating and typing on the phone, then it was back to play dough. August was singing a “I’m a dancing worm…I broke apart!” song.

We watched part of a Puffin Rock episode and August made a nest against me and pretended to be a baby seagull. He then moved to Paper and did art while I took a shower.

More play dough and iPad art after that. He then played with Figure and I got ready to go. One of the sound is called dolphins and lava and he didn’t know what lava is, so we looked it up on YouTube. He was pretty fascinated.

Before we left he spelled “achoo” on his own. He wanted both kimbap and Pink Burger for lunch. The latter was closed. We got to Home Plus, and he still wanted a burger, so we got shrimp burgers at Lotteria. He saw signs under the counter and asked “I wonder what that says.” We ate our burgers. A cart went by, and August copied the sound of the clattering wheels.

We then went shopping for some fruit for lunch. We were getting some mandarins, and a guy who works there opened one for August and gave it to him. He ate the whole thing. We also got a nut/yoghurt bar. As he walked around he said “I like walking around.” And he was talking about the knocking over water from the Oh No! book, although I’m not sure why.

We went up to his class, and it was starting as we parked the stroller and got out. He heard a noise, and said “Let’s go see!” and ran in. He did great today, running around a lot at the beginning of class and walking the path and giving the teacher a high 5 instead of doing a forward roll. Today was all about 무지개 – rainbows. First we made a rainbow hat, which August liked wearing, then there were rainbow walking path activities, and one where you pressed raindrop shaped pieces into a rainbow. That was probably his favorite thing.

After class we ate the yoghurt and nut bar and got walking. After 15 or 20 minutes we stopped at the park by the stream and ate some mandarins. Then walked some more, exploring random streets we’ve never been on between Nowon and Sanggye. We stopped after another 20 or 25 minutes to watch a guy spray painting a new building. August really liked that. We tried one more stint of walking, walking to the train tracks and back in to Nowon, until we got to the department store. No sign of sleep, and we’d had 60 minutes of walking, divided into 3 chunks.

So we went to the play area in the department store. As we walked into the store, he said something to the woman who helped us with the door, then said “’You can go slow.’ Something like that. I said that to that woman, dada. I was joking to her.” We went up to the Ppippi House (삐삐하우스) play area. We went there once last year. A small place, but with a coffee purchase you get to play for an hour. He went in and played with the trains by himself for 3 to 5 minutes. Then came over and played with the magnets for a bit. It was pretty amazing – he hasn’t been in a playing alone sort of mood lately. And he hasn’t been interested in iPad much the last two days, except on the subway. After that he wanted me to play with him: filling up the trains and trucks at the gas stations, pretending to make phone calls, making tea, building part of a puzzle, spelling things with the magnets, etc. He asked what the Barbie dolls were, and gave them a long, odd stare. There was a girl there, and he paid a little attention to her, but not much. When they first met, he had been curious about a spot on her face. Her mom said mosquito bite.

I had to change him twice there: once right after we got there at 2, then again as we left at 3. The first time I changed him, he wanted to lay down, and was very thoughtful about it: “What’s that baby crying about?” Me: “Maybe it doesn’t want its diaper changed. Sometimes August doesn’t want his diaper changed.” Him: “But NOW I want my diaper changed.” “Sometimes I like like to lay down for a diaper.” The diaper at 3 was perhaps the messiest I’ve changed in a long time. And had to wait for a table the second time, then had a long wait for an elevator. Got out, went to Daiso, only to figure out that the big one is now gone. We hurried to the second one on the way home, and as I got there at 3:40 he was falling asleep. I got him out of the stroller and carried him downstairs against his desires, only to find they don’t have the big pads of paper. Sigh.

He fell asleep right away, with his head hanging out the side of the stroller, as is his wont nowadays. It started to rain as we walked home, so I hurried. I stopped to get his head in the stroller more comfortably, and literally as I was moving his head with my hands, a woman stopped at started telling me his head was uncomfortable. I did not take kindly to that one. By the time we got home I had the umbrella out. Not heavy rain, but enough.

At home I let him sleep until 4:40, then got him out. I let him lay on me in the reading area, and he was trying to go back to sleep as I read some Winnie the Pooh. At just before 5, Carly called. August heard her and started to whine. She heard and took a cab home. In the meantime, he had climbed into the stroller and wanted to go outside. But down on the first floor he refused to put on a coat, so we came back up. I was just getting his coat on him to try again when she got home.

They nursed and he recovered. He refused any dinner. Carly wanted to go shopping, and so did August. So I went with them. While Carly shopped at the pink building, August admired the meat. He really liked all the meats. But the dried fish/octopus/shrimp/etc. he called “disgusting”. Couldn’t blame him. He knows I don’t like the smell of it. We were waiting for Carly outside the market, and she went back in to get mayonnaise. He spotted her back inside and loudly said “Mama! Where you go?” Or something to the sort. As we got back up on the first floor he noticed it was dark and said “I love it during the night.” He was then a baby owl on our way home.

At home, he said “Mama eat cashews.” when she sneezed. Luckily, that was not the case. He and I watched some Puffin Rock. He was excited by the word ‘young’ in and wanted us to go back and rewatch that line a couple times. He pointed at it (in the subtitles) and said “That’s an NG word!” Still not eating dinner. Crazy, as he hadn’t had any food – crackers or anything, since a little after 1. He kept requesting breakfast foods instead. We are doing eggs for breakfast tomorrow, so will try to break the cereal routine and see if that helps.

Carly took down the compost and August played with the sink as I finished the dishes – Carly had done most of them earlier. I took his clothes off for a bath, which was ready, but he said “Mama wash you!” I was about to dunk him in for a quick bath when she returned. He recovered and had a very fun bath, but at the very end he refused to help put the letters away and got sad instead. They nursed, then she tried to go take a shower. He got upset, and she decided to take him in to bed and put him to sleep ins
tead. He was asleep by 9:30.: 

 

Slime: 

Shrimp burger: 

His cubby: 

Paint sprayer: 

Play area: 

Asleep: 

Closet fun: 

Spatula: 

He walked out at 6:59. I said good morning and he held out his hand toward me and said “No”. He wanted mama. He went in on the reading area and laid down and I let him have a minute. He wasn’t upset though. I tried to go in a couple minutes later, but he said “No, no.” At 7:06 he came out and saw me typing. He watched and saw me type a period and whispered “No period. I don’t like the period.” Then wanted me to “come to the nest”. I went in to the reading area but he went to the Duplos and quietly played by himself for awhile.

He wanted to paint, and did so, but just for a minute. When getting him red paint, I said a rhyming line from Dr. Seuss. He noticed it rhymes, then decided he wanted to watch the Winnie the Pooh about rhyming. Luckily, I found a YouTube play list that has it broken into chunks. So we watched all of that. After that, he started to asks me for rhymes, pointing his finger at me as he finished each question:

“What rhymes with blanket? Now, what rhymes with spider? Now what rhymes with tiger? Now what rhymes with painting? Tires?” For each I would make up a rhyme like “Tigger is a really brave tiger, he likes to walk on a wire.” I took him in to change him, and he made up a rhyme. Something like green and clean. He said they sounded like Korean and said “What they sound like Korean about?” I said Korean and English shared a lot of the same sounds, so then he went around listing them: “ㄱ is G. ㅂ is B…”

We read The Wheels on the Bus and Buenas Noches a Todos books. I took a shower and he was doing art on the iPad when I went in. When I came out he was typing and wanted to show me what he typed.

He seemed pretty hi energy so I asked if we should start getting ready to go, and he said yes. He walked by the piano and asked for “Green Marshy” – a funny oops. We went in and got Green Monster and were singing the We Like to Make Mistakes song and August wanted GM to make mistakes while he sang it, which August thought was really funny.

Back out, August was making a noise and wanted to know the tempo. Opened up the metronome app and August was tapping on it, singing to the tempo, and started noticing the tempo words, like allegro.

I made a sandwich and August ate peanut butter on a spoon, then stated he wanted to go outside. So we finished getting ready. But somehow the word ‘bug’ came up and he asked what it meant. I explained ‘bug’ and ‘insect’ and listed insects he knew. He added “spider” and I said “Actually, they have 8 legs.” He kind of insisted on spiders; then crawled behind me. After a minute he said “Want the nest.” We went in on the bed and had a nest for a few minutes. I brought the spiders back up, and he said “Supposed to be six legs.” But a minute later he was singing the I Like to Make Mistakes song.

We went out and he rolled on the floor and pretended to cut the couch with the  playdough knife. We brushed our teeth and left about 10:30. Before we walked out the door he was putting his head on the floor and looking through his legs and saying “I’m upside down” then standing up and saying “I’m right side up.”

On the bus down he made up “chegga mega” for Daniel Tiger (instead of ‘ugga mugga’). In Sangbong he said he didn’t like parentheses now. I asked what punctuation he did like, and he said colon is his favorite. Then “Maybe dada’s favorite is ampersand.” On the platform his hands were getting cold, so he had me hold them a bit. He was then putting them in my hood.

On the train he was impressing a woman with his reading of Hangeul. In talking about our route, I said we were transferring at Sangbong and he said “That’s a slow train…that train goes rrrrrr. R sound.” I really don’t know how much of this he makes up, and how much he remembers, but that seems pretty accurate – it is a slower, above ground train and has a quieter hum to it that our noisier 7 line. He also talked about how he had been upside down before we left.

We got into the museum at 11:40. Went and got a ticket for the children’s museum from 12 to 1:30. Perfect. We went into the infant room and ate our lunch, and went in to play. He did some writing on the walls, some duplos, then went and briefly played with the blocks he loved last time and the rubber stamps. Really thought we’d get back to them. He went and was climbing on the little hill things. He was crouching on top of one when a bigger boy (about the only other kid there) came up the slide of it. August was telling him “No, no, no” but I said it was okay. But then, in what I think was some unthought out plan to play with August, he kept going and kind of kneeled on August’s knees, put his hands on August’s shoulders, and August fell over backwards, and likely would have fallen off the hill if the boy hadn’t been crushing his legs. I was able to catch him, and the mom came over. August started bawling and I picked him up. I wasn’t too upset, except all the mom did was say one thing, basically “Be careful with the baby” and let the boy go back to playing.

August should have been getting tired anyway, and wanted to go home. We walked around a couple minutes, and a woman who worked there pointed out there was an infant play room. It was kind of a boring room, with a couple little hills and some bench steps to climb on, but it worked. August calmed down and played in there for 15 or 20 minutes. There was a smaller girl, and August touched her foot and hands and cheek. She started to get a little worried so the mom came over and I had August scoot back. We talked for a couple minutes – they just moved here from Hong Kong 5 months ago. But then August was rubbing his eyes and asking to go.

We packed and changed him and headed out. It was at this point that the election, which I had been frantically following all morning, was starting to look bad. I didn’t feel like staying around and looking at the musuem, so we walked west, towards iPark Mall.

Got there, then headed north, and wandered some back streets, seeing the west entrance to the U.S. base. August had his head back and was making small noises at one point, but then popped back up. After 40+ minutes I walked to Sinyoungsan Station and we headed home on line 4. On that train he said “mmmm This train makes an M noise.” And he said (kindly) “What are you doing?” to a woman who sat down next to him.

We got off at Changdong and started to walk to catch the 1144. But he pooped and needed to be changed right then. So we went to the little stage area where I’ve changed him before and changed him. Went and caught the bus (he really likes the solar-powered KakaoTalk wobbly head things in the machine and has figured out you can by them (sort of – it is a game of change thing), so I was glad when it arrived) and headed home.

Randomly, on the bus he said “I want a lizard.” I asked “Wait, you ARE a lizard, or you want a lizard?” He replied “I’m not a lizard, but I want a lizard.” We then talked about where he would get a lizard and why. His first real pet request.

At home he first wanted to paint, then we did play dough, making more marbles of mixed colors (more lessons in the color wheel). We then went down to get some Mama Juice. In the elevator, we were having a discussion about why two words DIDN’T rhyme. This really impressed a guy in the elevator, saying that August speaks really well. August got a mandarin juice and I got a coffee. August had said we should get “high” ones and I figured out he meant ‘large’ (he knows the difference between high and low musical notes, so he’s gotten these confused before). We settled for ‘medium’ (which is their ‘small’ – it is confusing to be a little boy). We went for a walk around the park. His hands were getting cold, so he used the blanket on them in the stroller.

We went to the art museum and saw some of the new art in the main gallery. We dropped the blanket. Went back, he got out of the stroller and cuddled on it like a nes
t. Tried to go to the play area, but it is closed. Good news though, as they are turning the gift shop into a larger kids area. We went and looked at the coffee shop. August wanted to head home. I said I needed to get the stroller. He said “I’ll wait here.” I made him come with me. He sat in the middle of the lobby floor and laid down again.

We headed out and went home. He was hungry, but requested Special Flakes and was passing up all the actual dinner choices. He decided he did want a mandarin though, and I turned for a few seconds to get them out of the backpack. When I turned back, his face was all orange. Like really orange. And there was a streak in his hair. He had drawn on himself with the glass crayons. Carly had just messaged saying she would be back in a few minutes. I was going to wash him, but we decided it would be more fun to meet her at the elevator that way.

Oh, and before that he had randomly started saying “Oh well. Oh well.” in an Eeyore voice. This was as Derek and I were texting about the disaster of an election. Derek said “Now there’s a kid with foresight.”

We met Carly at the elevator. They came back and nursed. August was having a tough time, and being very contrarian, doing his opposite word thing when we were talking. I told Carly about his request of a lizard, and he started to cheer up. I got out the Pete the Cat book and he got excited about that. He and I read that and carly slipped off to eat some dinner. He was in a much better mood now and they nursed, but he was laughing about things this time.

They had read Wheels on the Bus. He and I then read Mother Goose. We played hide and seek with Turkey, with him hiding Turkey and me finding her. He’s getting better with his hiding skills.

Carly gave him a bath. He did more iPad art, and at some point was making a point of snuggling with both me and Carly on the couch, saying “Snuggle, snuggle…You’re snuggling.” They did more hide and seek with Turkey and August Jr. and he was asleep about 8.

 

Children’s museum: 

Play dough: 

Art museum: 

Sleepy: 

Orange: 

He got up at 6:10 and went out and found Carly. First activity of the day was play dough mixing, which he was really into. He made one that was a beetle, another was a chomebahdi spider, etc. Before Carly left she gave him th iPad and he started doing art. I noticed he started using ‘why’ when talking: ‘Why that is pink about?’ Still has his unique sentence structure, but that is slowly going away. Will miss that. As he was mixing colors he added yellow and said “and makes that goldenrod.” Didn’t know he knew goldenrod. When he finished it, we typed the date and he made up a name for it. He liked that, so we went back and dated and named a few from yesterday. He then kept going, adding random dates and making up names for older pieces that didn’t have them. He said “Hey dada, you need to learn to spell chwachwanicall.” So we sounded it out and spelled it together, and he declared it has two ls at the end.

 

He then wanted to read stories, and he chose Pooh. He was pretending to be Spikey, the hedgehog, and making a nest while I read. When piglet talked about being a small animal, August said “I’m a small animal.” At the pockets in suits part he said “I always do funny ones.” At some point he decided to be a bird in the nest instead. We read much of the Kanga and Roo story, then the poem about Christopher Robin having weazles and sneezles- August caught some of the rhymes and thought it was funny. He then really got into nesting mode so I went and got another blanket and pillows for him. He wanted August Jr. and Turkey and cuddled with them, saying “I have the two friends…we are cuddling.” We did some cuddling in the fort, and then played hide and seek with the two stuffed animals, hiding them in the nest area and finding them.

I went and took a shower and he did more iPad art. We watched some Puffin Rock, ate some pineapple, and did more hide and seek with the stuffed animals and Puff.

We headed down, got some lunch at GS25 across the street, and went to the children’s museum. During lunch he said “strange fungus…from Winnie the Pooh…I changed it.” He was referring to Kanga and Roo being a “strange animal”. He got out his broom and was sweeping and throwing away garbage in hallway. He walked in the changing room and sat down in the chair and said “I’m going to sit on this couch for a little while…now I’m done with the rest.” As we went down the stairs to the reading area, I noticed him grabbing his pants and mentioned they were loose. He agreed. Then said “Piggies like pajamas just a little loose.” That’s a line from Snoozers.

In the reading area, we played with the new rotating game, which involves colorful pieces and penguins. August immediately had an idea how he wanted to play with them and showed me, and said “I just showed you this game.” We then actually played it as a memory game, like it is meant, then we got down a wooden puzzle. He did the puzzle “funny”, then said “Let’s do it quite right. ‘Quite right’ rhymes. What they rhyme about?” We did it correctly, then he went up in the reading area where we found Oh No! A nice surprise since we couldn’t find it last time we looked. We read that three times, and he used the pillows and dinosaurs to make a burrow to cuddle in while we read. Then he found a Korean book about animals eating an apple. He translated much of it himself, using Google Translate on my phone and typing the words in himself and translating them. Very cool.

Got ready for his nap and headed out. A regular walk, and he was asleep 1:41 to 3:06. After his nap, he liked the idea of looking at some animals before we headed to Costco. As we walked out, he heard a Korean song on the public broadcasting system and was repeating words from it. And he thought it was funny that it sounded like there were English letters in it.

We went and saw the donkeys and discussed what they eat, then went and saw the seals. We decided against a snack there as it was too cold. He sang quietly to himself as we walked out. We walked past the aviary and checked in. It was always closed because of bird flu, and now is just closed closed. No birds in it. Near the exit he said “바지 is dinosaur.” I was confused and said that it meant pants. He replied “I did a joke.” and laughed.

Pretty straightforward trip to Costco. We have it down. Got in, got our cheese, got a few free samples, paid, got some food for dinner, and headed out. On the way home he kept singing variations on the “Snake is in the grass” song from Jolly Tunes: “the can is in my cane, …in hagye, …in yellow, brown is in my pink, ladder is in my tea…”

We were home about 5:15. I got him out of the backpack and he sat on the couch, looked at me, and said “You need some tea, dada?” We ate some chicken bake, and Carly came home. He nursed, then was typing on her computer. He was sad when that was taken away. He was whispering, something he seems to do when he’s sad now, and got carly into the parlor and kicked me out and closed the door. A bit later they did some painting. Carly got his bath started, but he was resisting going in, and told me “because it is not fun.” So I talked about how it was our job to make it fun, and we talked about ideas. We ended up going and getting several of the plastic balls and putting them in the bath, and that worked. Carly took over and washed him. He played with letters, the spoke Spanish, and read the Boynton Spanish book.

He came out and we played in the parlor while Carly took a shower. We cuddled in the nest (he said he was a bird) and read several New Kids on the Block poems, then some Pooh poems and

Much of the first story. He then wanted to play with Duplos. We made Hangeul and a tower, then he went and nursed. He did some more painting, then made a game of stepping back and forth over the painting. He then sang a song: “This is Mongolia. This is Myanmar. This is China. This is watermelon…” We added to our Duplo tower, and August wanted to take a photo. We worked together on a couple photos, then he tried holding the phone and taking photos himself. Getting better, but still awkward for him. Carly took him in to the bedroom and he was asleep by 8:50

 

Reading Pooh together: 

Cozy: 

A rest: 

Playing memory game: 

Seals: 

Jumping over his art: 

Blurry photo of our tower: 

A photo he took: 

He didn’t wake up to nurse at all during the night. He was up about 5:40 and they came out at 6. When I came out a few minutes later he decided he wanted to go play in the hallway. Carly got him distracted by typing on her laptop instead. He typed ‘hope’ on his own, the vowels, and lots of other stuff. When Carly was getting ready to go we got out his iPad and read the message she had sent in response to his video last night. He was then typing to her, and she called, but August wasn’t ready to talk to anyone. After that, he was sad when we found out the ghost emoji doesn’t work anymore, even if you type it. He sat on the floor for a minute, then decided to move to play dough. We made several letters out of play dough, then made oatmeal for breakfast. He remembered the ‘rhymes with autumn’ question about Pooh and wanted to watch that. However, the episodes we had been watching on YouTube have been taken down. He then wanted to watch Peppa Pig, so we watched some of that. We saw the Windy Fall Day and Bedtime stories, which was exciting since we have those books.

He leaked on the floor before I changed his diaper. He told me there was pee on the floor, then said “I like leaks.” He did iPad art off and on, and typing, of course. On both Paper and in Skype. We decided on Ttukseom Resort as the rain was supposed to hold off and it might be the last day in the 60s. We got ready to go, but then kept getting distracted by things. He wanted to take out the piano keys, so we started by having Puff play the piano (he apparently likes to scare me by playing loudly), then August wanted to put the keys back in in a random order. We happily did that for quite awhile, until he wanted to X key (the one on the very right) to fit in a certain spot, but it wouldn’t because of its shape. He got sad about that, and wanted me to hold him.

After that, he was being a snake in the nest (reading area). He wanted to get even more pillows, and went in and grabbed mine off the bed. He also grabbed August Jr. Back in the nest he said “I’m cozy. I’m cozy too.” He then told a story about the Smurfs. Part of it was “Come on smurfs, let’s go to a mooka moo party…there’s a bridge and there was lightning and it scared them boom boom crack crack.”

He started to sing a funny ABC song, replacing letters with random words, such as potatoes, punctuation, paint brush, and backamapack. He looked in the utility closet and started looking for a fuzzy, pointing and “Is fuzzy there? Noooo.” Then, we changed him to leave, and we ended up spending a lot of time reading the Tigger birthday card. Sadly, the music has stopped working. But he wanted me to read it in an Eeyore voice over and over, and sometimes as Tigger. For some reason he decided he didn’t want me to say ‘P.S.’ He really wants to know what ‘aloha’ means and told him he needs to ask Aunty Glecy for a better explanation. Before we left he wanted a 귤, a mandarin orange.

We headed out. As he was in the backpack he started to come up with “konglish” versions of words, like “sock-uh” for ‘sock’. He started working on a big piece of art on the ipad on the way down that he would continue to work on on the way home.

At Ttukseom we first looked at some sculptures in the J-Bug. There were some wooden Hangeul blocks you could play with. August wanted to play with them, but was hungry so we ate first. We ate on a nearby bench then brought them over and played with them. He said “chwachwanical” and I asked “Where’d you learn that?” He replied “Maybe the imagining, but I. Don’t. Know.” Then, he randomly said “I like people.”

We finished up with those, changed his diaper, and he was ready for a nap. We walked just north of the park and he was asleep in a few minutes. Went to a coffee shop called French Quarter and he slept from 1:11 to 2:36. He woke up and we walked back into the park and to the big play ground. He wanted to play in the sand area. He pretended to be a fox and hedgehog, and used the broom to sweep the bench and chase away the flies. He found some garbage and was burying it and said “I like burying things.” He was using a plastic sandwich container to fill it with sand and pour it on me. Did it a few times and then said “I’m not going to play that game anymore…Dada do it.” So I poured sand on his foot. He took the container and says “Don’t play that game anymore.” as he waved his finger at me. We then dug a big whole, and August stepped in and sat in it, pretending to be Spikey the hedgehog. He was pretty much Spikey the rest of our time here.

We then went and played on the whale-shaped structure, climbing up into it. There is a wavy floor there, and he pretended to be the hedgehog, climbing up and sliding down the waves. I pointed out it was a sine wave, and he chanted “Sine wave! Sine wave! Sine wave!” Some college students asked to take a few seconds of us playing for some video they were doing. We were literally the only people playing in the park, so would have really felt rude to say no. They did that, and gave us a lollipop and an apple-flavored spray candy thing. We opened the spray candy. I tried it, and warned him it was a bit sour, but he loved it, and kept declaring that he liked sour things. We also laid in the trough of the waves and looked up at the sky. I said we should be getting going, and commented that the rain seemed like it might finally be arriving. He then kept saying that he likes it when it rains, and I think he was a little disappointed that we only felt one drop before we left.

Back around home we didn’t know if we hadn’t beaten Carly home. August really wanted to find her, first by the pink building, then going into the park. But I called her, and had him ask where she was, and she was already home. We went up and they nursed, then he was playing around and said his “Now get off!” line. I asked him where that was from, and he said “From Vivian.” I asked who she had said it to, and he said “To Zinnie.” But then he couldn’t explain why she had said it. It made sense though, and sounds familiar. I think he had been playing with Duplos or something and she had been wanting him to do something else. It also might explain why he’s talked about ‘timeouts’ a few times recently, and used the same voice. The voice, scrunched face, and finger wagging totally look like Vivian.

He wanted to go make a nest, but wanted Mama to go with him. He told me to be sad, and to stay sad “because he doesn’t have any paint.” They went in and read Mother Goose and nursed and did some Duplos. He came back out and ate some soup with me, then did another piece of art in Paper and then sent messages, mainly to himself, on Skype. Carly went and took a shower and he and I went into the parlor to read. We read a poem from New Kid on the Block called “The Flotz”, which involved a monster eating punctuation marks, so August picked up on some of the rhymes and found it really funny. We then read Peppa Goes Swimming and Elmo Goes Potty before moving to Skybrary where we found a book about Alexander Anteater. Alexander stands on his head, which August liked and was trying to do. August then said he wanted his shoes (because Alexander was wearing his shoes). I told August he didn’t need his shoes, but he went out to get them. But then he got really sad. It wasn’t clear why and he wouldn’t tell us. I guess because I said he didn’t need the shoes. He just kept whispering “I want to nurse” to Carly until they did. After awhile he recovered and wanted to paint.

I gave him a bath, then we were in on the bed. He counted the stuffed animals, then we talked about which other animals he could get to make bigger numbers. Eventually, I listed Turkey, the turquoise-colored elephant he had picked out at the Salvation Army store our first year. Turkey has been in the toybox for the last year or so, and August had forgotten the name. But when I went and got him he remembered and was excited. Played a bit more in bed, then Ca
rly came in and they were asleep by 9.

 

He and Carly were up at 7:30. He came and found me a few minutes later. He and Carly had slept on the reading area as she is feeling sick. Kind of an eventful night. When I went in to go to bed last night he woke up, having a dream, saying “No, no, I’ll do it, I’ll do it, no…” probably dreaming of HS not letting him use the iPad or erase a restaurant sign. I got him to calm down, and he sat there a couple minutes and seemed to be falling back to sleep but wouldn’t lay down. Eventually Carly had to come in. Later, he woke me up and I carried him in to Carly, where he spent the rest of the night. But he woke up a couple more times. One time he didn’t see her next to him and he started walking back to the bedroom another time she was sitting on the couch and he walked by and headed to the bedroom and was startled when she said something.

Anyway, once they were up I measured him st his request – about 92cm now. Carly made him oatmeal, but he still won’t try to feed himself. I helped, and joked about when he would learn by. He assured me he’d learn by the time he was 10.

He sang “There’s a 100, there’s a 100, there’s a 100, there’s a 100, there’s a 100 at the bottom of the sea.”

As Carly said something August said “ai, ai, ai” and said that mama says that. I mentioned Skippyjon Jones, which we haven’t read in a long tie and he wanted to read it. I found it and we read some, but he wanted to know more about ‘siamese’ and ‘chihuahua’. In discussing those he said “What civets eat?” I was impressed with myself when I figured out what he was saying as it was rather off topic. So we looked up civet on Wikipedia.

He was then doing the Silent E song and wanted to know what ‘site’ means. So we were discussing ‘site’ and ‘sight’ and he was asking for more examples.

He then wanted to draw on my iPad, and wanted to ‘share’ by having me use his. I figured out that he really wanted to use the stylus, so I got the blue stylus out for his iPad and he happily did art for quite awhile.

August and Carly Skyped with Oma and Opa. Afterwards, he sent them a video by himself and watched Cherie’s reply on his own. He was then sending messages to my parents and Paul. He was typing a lot of words on his own: boo, Zinn, hi, kit kite

We Skyped with my parents while Carly went to the store. “Why don’t you like the spaghetti. “Because I don’t like the sauce…the sauce is too spicy.” I asked him something else and he was coughing and said “I’ll tell you in a minute.” We ate some kimbap and made playdough marbles while we Skyped. He wanted the play dough knife, but we couldn’t find it. While looking for it he said “The play dough knife was around here, but I don’t see it now.”

Carly was home about 11. She started making soup and her rice stuff. August wanted to go outside, but I needed to change him. He forgot about going outside after that and wanted to do art instead. So I got him set up with the paper and I hung up laundry. Later we were playing in the parlor. He had a running monologue of what he was doing as he was playing on the reading area: “Maybe the playdough knife began hiding under something but I don’t see it…it’s not hiding in my nest…I’m going to type on my computer. Look at my typing. What did you type. Anything…maybe I typed a baby or mooka moo…but I don’t know. Maybe I was making a joke.”

They nursed and then August saw me typing. He then read ‘doll’ and Carly got out Baby Q. August said “She’s sad because Oma…she’s sad because Opa is in Mexico.” They also played with Puff, and August was laughing a lot as he played the music and moved around and Carly made fun of him. I was playing with him and he was talking about a fish. When I stepped in the ‘water’ he said “The fish will say ‘Hey, you’re in the water. You can’t be in the water. Go out there. Leave us alone. You have a time out.’”

Eventually, he and I finally headed out to let Carly finish cooking and get some work done. We first walked down to the stream and down to the river and back. On the way down we stopped to look at a bunch of fish. August was putting his foot through the fence and drawing a ‘K’ for the fish. On the way back up, we saw an egret and watched as he struck for fish 3 times, succeeding at least twice. We then continued on to the park near the pink building. There, he was singing portions of the Big Numbers song, things like “1 billion, 2 billion, 3 billion, 4 billion…” Out of the stroller, he said “My favorite game is finding beads.” He went up in the area where he and Carly looked for beads, and was wondering why the leaves were falling of the trees. I mentioned hibernating animals and asked “Do you remember animals that hibernate?” He said “Yeah! Hedgehogs. Spiky hibernates.” Spiky is the hedgehog on Puffin Rock. We looked around for awhile, finding a few. I looked up and he had climbed back out of the area over the little fence. It wasn’t huge – maybe up to his waist – but I was surprised he just did it. He then tried to squish an insect and when I reminded him that would hurt it he said “sorry” to it.

We went over to the rocky things and he went to the train one and said “That’s a 기차” (train in Korean). Also, he’s regularly saying “yeah-yo” for yes nowadays. Don’t know where that came from. We climbed on the play structure and shaky bridge, then went down the slide together. He spent a couple minutes sort of wandering around and singing, then dancing. He then said “I’m running around.” And did. He climbed on one of the cars, rode it, then got off and wandered around. I asked “what are you doing?” And he responded “I’m the silent E.” He then walked around singing a new song (“That’s leaves, l l l, that’s the kids, k k k…”). A boy said he was cute and I said thanks. August said “Hi! I love your art!” That’s a line that Elmo says on Sesame Street Art Maker. He followed it with a few other random sentences, but I didn’t catch those.

We then went to the grocery store for a few things. August had slept a lot last night, and I didn’t expect a nap. And so far he hadn’t been slowing down. He helped at the store, getting out of the stroller right away. He remembered the slurpy things and went and got a peach one on his own when we got near. Then he started crawling on the floor – I think he was a puppy – and laid down and looked up at the ceiling. Suddenly he was acting tired. We finished up and got him in the cart and headed home. He yawned once.

At home he nursed and showed some signs of wanting to sleep, but rallied. We shared two mandarins, then read Skippyjon Jones. Or part of it. He kept wanting me to fall asleep so he could wake me up. That continued through the day. And he’d want me to go to the bedroom to fall asleep. He typed messages to gramma, then ate some soup with mama. We then played the falling down game where we each kept falling down in the parlor, and falling on each other. We played with Duplos, making an exhibit for all the herbivores and letters and Hangeul out of bricks. We typed on the iPad, and I taught him about ‘autocorrect’. So then he was trying to spell words slightly wrong to get autocorrect to kick in. That’s his sort of game.

He ate some rice, then read Amelia Bedilia and Pete the Cat with Carly and did some more typing. We played with play dough, mixing colors together and making brown and printing letters. Suddenly, he got the idea of pretending to pee on me. Very random, out of no where, creative, funny, and slightly disturbing.

As we headed to his bath he said “you can try sitting down again.” And he did try, for a few seconds. Before he was in though, he was running around naked. He stopped in front of the mirror and was repeating “what just happened?” In the bath, we were trying to remember what Pooh rhymes with autumn. He’s starting to catch rhyming words. There was then a couple minutes where I tried to wash him
but he still wanted to play with letters and he used his ‘attitude’ voice to say “NOT washing. JUST letters.” He also wrote in the air and said “잠자다”. I asked what that meant and he said “to sleep”. It does.

He acted like a puppy dog after his bath. He was cuddling on the bed (in the reading area, as that was where they were sleeping tonight) under the soft blanket and “I’m right here cozy.” Carly came in and out of the blue he started saying to her “I like cashews. I like cashews. I like cashews. I like cashews.” I think I told him that was a good way to test his mother’s love. He then was making up a game and explained it: “you hit this bar and you catch a little toilet. it’s not a real toilet, it’s a pretend toilet. It’s like this tall.” They finished by reading some Winnie the Pooh and were asleep about 8.

 

He was up at 5:30. Carly was stuffy and had already gotten up and was in the parlor, so when he woke up he came and poked me awake. I tried to get him to lie back down, and he thought about it for a second, but then wanted to know where mama was. So I spilled the info and he went and found her. They did a lot of typing and skyping and nursing. When I got up he had just started watching some Puffin Rock. Carly made him oatmeal, and he ate that and did some hide and seek as George and Peppa, and we found him. He then laid on the floor and made letters with his fingers. He was then ‘erasing’ the punctuation on Go, dog. Go! and decided he wanted to write punctuation on paper. So we went and did that and also did some math. As he sat on my lap he made up a song “Baba in the bathtub…achoo in the morning.” They Skyped with Vivian and Cassie while I took a shower. He went down with me to do recycling but saw a puppy as we got off the elevator and wanted to play as a puppy. Got him outside only to find it wasn’t full recycling. Could only recycle our glass. Tried to read the notices by the elevator, but didn’t see anything about recycling.

Back up in the apartment he made up a places chant “…Myanmar, Centralia, Mongolia…” We got ready to go and left about 9:50. He fell asleep on the bus at 10:10. He woke up at 10:50 as we got off the subway at the War Memorial.

We went in the children’s museum at the War Memorial from 11:10 to 11:50 while Carly went to the War Memorial to scout it for an upcoming trip with her students. In the children’s museum we went to this upstairs place where I had to crawl because the ceiling was low. August liked to see me crawling like a horse. There was a castle wall with foam bricks you could put in it. He sat in the box for the bricks, then spent a few minutes on the wall. From there we took another 15 minutes or so to go though the rest. There was a digital puzzle he worked on, a little tracing thing, some shapes to play with. It was kind of about the effects of war, but had the overall message of the larger memorial – Japan is bad, Dokdo belongs to Korea, here’s the guy that unified Korea, etc.

At the end was a big play room. As we walked in it, the two women in the room jumped at him and got in his way to tell us he wasn’t big enough for the big play structure. Really quite aggressive and annoying. And August didn’t like the news. He didn’t want to play on the little kids one (which just had a climbing wall and foam shapes – no slide, etc.) I held him for a few minutes, but he just kept talking about going on that one. Eventually we headed out.

Back outside, he kind of walked around the open area and sat down. He wanted to do iPad and kept asking “Can dada do art?” We sat in the middle and did art for awhile. He then agreed to go on the play structure. He climbed up on it and we went down the slide – first me to show that it wasn’t too fast, then he came down on his own. He had some crackers, and when he was done I took them to the backpack. Had my back turned for about 3 seconds and turned around to find him holding two gummy bears. Couldn’t figure out where they came from, until a girl came by holding a gummy bear package. Wasn’t entirely clear whether she had given them to him, or they had fallen out. August tried to give them back, but she wouldn’t take them, so I let him eat them. He was happy about that.

Carly showed up and we sat on the benches for awhile and he played around Carly. We then headed to the subway and headed eight stops west to Mangwon. We walked towards our second museum, and found a Vietnamese sandwich shop along the way. We got sandwiches and Vietnamese coffees and sat on stools and ate lunch. His first time, I think, sitting on a tall stool on his own, outside of the ones in Centralia.

From there we headed to the War and Women’s Human Rights Museum. On the way we stopped to look in the windows of a store, and August was walking. Well, sort of. He was pretending to be a puffin, then a snake. And was slithering on the ground. I turned him into a robot with a spell, and he said, in his robot voice, “I am IOQ-excuses-2014…” Carly or I had used the word ‘excuses’ awhile before that, and he picked it up.

Wasn’t sure if I was going to take him in, but he seemed intrigued by it, and it was only 3000 won and he was free. Glad we went in, as the museum was really well done, and August did a great job. Mainly, he was attracted to the audio guide things. He listened to the voice and talked back, as if it was a phone call. When we got upstairs he and I sat on the floor for a long time so I could listen to the audio guide and pretended to dial numbers and make phone calls. Downstairs, he and I went outside and down the stairs to a small space while Carly went and arranged for her field trip. As we went to go back in, there were two women sitting outside. August went up to them and was saying “Now get off.” in a funny/demanding voice. Told him to say hi instead, and he did. They asked where we were from, and August was telling them we lived in different places (made up places). He finished by saying something like “I told them three things.” So funny. Carly took him in to the bathroom and changed him, then I had him put coins in one of the donation jars.

We headed home. He did a lot of art on the train home. At Seokgye, transferring to the bus, he was starting to fuss a bit, and Carly made up a little chant with him. She said “Waiting is so hard.” And he would reply with “I don’t want to wait.” One time he let out a big burp instead and thought that was funny. He rode home on the bus sitting on Carly’s lap. He was getting a bit impatient but she did a good job of distracting him and getting him home.

At the building, Carly went to get bread and he and I headed to the kimbap place where the pizza place used to be. We got 3 kinds of kimbap: dongatsu, cheese, and aloha cheese. He had the idea of getting Juicy Juice, and he settled on an apple and I got mixed fruit. I had a bit and Carly had the rest.

We went up and they nursed. Carly then tried the kimbap and had an allergic reaction and got sick. It was the cream cheese stuff in the aloha cheese – there were chunks of nut in it, probably cashew. August then had some kimbap, and the cream cheese stuff was the first part he wanted. And he decided he really liked the cashews. Later, he asked “Where the cashews go?” I replied, “In mama, Z. In mama.”

We read Peppa’s Ballet Lesson a dI changed him and got him in the bath. He was fine until he realized I was washing him and then he wanted mama. I finished it; got his diaper on, then Carly took over and put his pajamas on in bed. He calmed as she did that and I asked him if he was going to sleep. He said yes and let me give him a goodnight kiss. He was asleep at 7:10.

 

Photos: 

Asleep in the subway:

Play area: 

Outside: 

Gummy bear: 

Vietnamese sandwich place: 

Slithering: 

War and women museum: 

Writing ‘kite’: 

Juicy Juice: 

At some point in the night when he woke up to nurse he was talking about “just a little poop.”

He was up at 7:13. He walked out and curled up on the reading area. I went back to typing on my iPad, hoping he would fall back to sleep. He came out to the living room about 8 minutes later and said “Go to bed a little bit”. So we went in on the bed and laid down. He said “Hi dada” and something else, then “Let’s play with Duplos.” He got off the bed and whispered “Dada come.”

We read Snoozers. He then wanted to do art on the iPad. He really wanted my iPad, but settled for his. He did some drawing while I typed. Then, of course, he decided he wanted to type on mine. He had seen me type the date before, and wanted to do that. So he ended up typing dates. He got the slashes and general format down. He was typing things like “11/77/99” and saying “That’s mama’s day.” Or “That’s Derek’s day.” He then just started doing art.

He was doing art when I went in to take a shower. He stopped his art and spent most of the time singing and reading the zoo map and other things. We then wrote several words from the zoo map in Korean on the paper. He wanted to know what ‘snot’ is in Korean, so we looked it up and learned that it is ‘콧물’ – nose water. Back out in the living room we read the Alphabet book we hadn’t read last night. He kept mentioning going to Uijeongbu.

I had music from 2016 playing. He kept saying he changed the words singers sang on songs. And at the start of a New Order song he said of the bass sound “I changed it to Buzzerbass!” He said “808 Bass” for another song. Those are bass sounds from Figure.

We changed him and he started playing in the basket. It tipped over and he kept hiding, pretending to be George and Peppa. That game extended over much of the house, and he was pretending to be George as I put him in the backpack.

We headed out and took the trains north to Uijeongbu. On our way there there was a woman who was calling him a ‘doll’ in Korean. We both recognized it, as we had learned the words in one of the books yesterday at the Cafe Dream. A stuffed bear is a ‘bear doll’ in Korean. I noticed that the stick in the backpack was gone, having probably fallen out in the last couple of days. I said we had lost Sticky 3 (we had just named it a couple weeks ago). He said “I liked sticky 3.” The first stick in the backpack he lost at Dongdaemun last year. The second one was probably left at a park a couple months ago.

We got some kimbap and a sandwich and headed up to the roof of the department store. There were three other kids up there, and the boy was really interested in August. August first wanted to play, and was climbing on the rubbery hills, pretending to be George. They kids came and talked to him and ran off. August ran after them a bit and said “I chased them” He was climbing all over the hills and I missed a “snort snort” as I took a video. He read the 새둥지 – birds nest – sign. The other kids left and we ate went to eat lunch. But we decided it was now too windy and went inside and sat on a bench and eat.

He wanted to go back outside after that, but stopped before going out. So we went downstairs to the toy store. First, he found the keyboard. He stood at that, and played with it for 10 minutes or so, playing along to the backing tracks and dancing back and forth. Then, he found the magnets on magnetic boards. There were only 4 sad Hangeul magnets (the rest were Magformers). He really wanted to find more: “let me find the Hangeul magnets.” He spotted the play area, and wanted to go. I said we could do it after his nap, and he started to lose it: “I’ll go in the play area.” He said repeatedly.

Changed him and took off and he fell asleep right away, at 12:24. Had headed west to our usual coffee shop, but stopped a few blocks short and found a new one. At the coffee shop he woke up at 1:06 and started requesting we go outside. I told him to go back to sleep. And he did. He woke up at 1:36, waving his arm as it had fallen asleep. He quieted down and sat there for five minutes before asking to leave again. He wanted out of the backpack, so we walked around the block to 의서어린이공완 – a children’s park we’d played at once before. Along the way there was a restaurant with one of those chalk-type boards out front. August wanted to erase letters with his finger.

At the park he walked on the bench, chanting “all the way to this 7, boop” and turning the ‘boop’ part into more of a melodic line. He noticed part of the bench was coming apart, and wanted to know why. So I was teaching him ‘rot’ and ‘rotten’ and explaining why it rotted. He then picked up little pieces of rotten wood and was “sorting” them into the cracks. He was hungry so ate a banana, then was back to walking around and chanting numbers. He then started climbing the hill thing as George and Peppa. He saw some bigger boys and chased them when they came off the slide. Did that a few times. He spotted blue paint on the ground as George (“George found paint on the ground”). At first he needed my help getting up the hill, but soon he could do it on his own. The hill was different colors, but fading, so he was curious about the colors: “I thinked about colors mixing into grey…see what I know.” I said one color was a ‘pinkish grey’. Him: “a pinkely grey…I changed it.” “Peppa likes that smell.” From the guy sawing something in the nearby alley.

He sang a long song, with a tune he made up. Then he said “You made up a very big tune.” He saw a girl climbing the spider-looking thing and wanted to do it. So I helped him up. He then got down and was singing into the voice thing. He sang the 123 version of the ABC song, and the girl sang along singing “A B C…” He went back to the hill thing and was climbing it again – this time as George. Peppa could already climb it, but George needed my help. But then George could do it on his own and was very happy about that. We saw a fuzzy fly bye and he said “Bye fuzzy!” – a reference to our youth center playground experience. Suddenly, he was down on the ground and pretending to be a seagull, flapping its wings. More correctly, “George is pretending to be a seagull.” After that he said “You’re August again.”

He then was playing by the alley and said “What’s the yellow?” It was sparks from where the guy was working across the street. I picked him up and August watched him through the doorway for a couple minutes. He used the grinder once so August got a good view of the sparks. I was explaining what sparks were and teaching him how to spell it. When August was done I had him say thank you before we walked back to the park. He sat on the ground and made letters out of his fingers. He did a pretty good lowercase d and b and uppercase D and several other letters.

He sang and played around a bit more, then saw me reading on my phone and said he wanted to type on his iPad. I thought about it and said okay, and he got excited and ran off, saying “Let’s go to another bench! Let’s go! Let’s go!” Good timing, as then it started to rain. We sat on a covered bench and read and typed and did some art. But then he was upset, wanting my iPad, then we just worked together on his.

We changed his diaper, then ate a Larabar as we got ready to go. He said he wanted to go to home in Uijeongbu. I told him which trains we would take, and he said “Er sound” for the Uijeongbu line. He had mentioned this on the way up. As we walked to the train, he imagined letters everywhere, saying “l is walking over there, R is walking over there…Q is walking that way, S is walking that way…” and pointing.

On the train he did the ‘errrr’ sound when he heard it. Much of the way home he worked on a big piece of art on the iPad, zooming in on one part and drawing, then another. When walking he heard a car honk and said “that was a ng sound.”

At home he chose to put a
diaper on after I changed him. I talked to him about practicing to be a big kid, but he said he wanted to do that later. We read some Go Dog Go, with him reading lots of the words, and Carly got home. August saw she had bags: “you go to the store. What you get?” They nursed. He then played on the couch with me, casting spells and turning him into different animals: storks, etc. He was saying ‘Choi-chwon-i-cal’ again. To himself: “Is it from Puffin Rock? No. is it from imagination? No.” I started to say “You are…” and he finished with “confusing”.

He went and played with his magnets, and exclaimed “You wrote 귤!” He had. That’s the word for mandarin orange.

I changed him and was singing Cada Semilla. He asked what ‘something else’ means, so we were going through examples. He would then say “another  sample”. I then changed to ‘someONE else’ and explained that. He was then listing people, saying “Torrey or Megan or Gramma or Rosie or Logan…” When we were done I told him he could do more art on the iPad but that later I wanted to do other things, and listed something. He said “No, I want to do iPad. I want something else.” We both then got excited that he had used the phrase in context.

He and Carly nursed again and ended up watching our videos on my phone for quite awhile. They then did coloring together. He came it and found me typing on my iPad and wanted to type, so I let him do that for a bit. Carly went and took a shower, and we went and made our fort on the bed and read some Smurfs. When she was done and came out we hid as quietly as he could until she found us. He went out and found his iPad and did some Hangeul magnets. Carly started his bath and he wanted to go it in the hall. So she put some shorts on him and they went out for a few minutes. Came back, took his bath, then went in on the bed and was asleep at 8:30.

 

Park art: 

Up by 6:40. He was fine with Carly leaving. We watched Peppa Pig, then did a bunch of art on the iPad. We ate banana bread and then he switched to Timmy Time while I took a shower. We wrote on the paper. I introduced him to writing full sentences, like ‘I want crackers’ and ‘Mama goes to work.” And used words like ‘subject’, ‘verb’, and ‘object’. He then wanted to write ‘Australian Pavilion’ in Korean. This was a reminder that we had grabbed the Korean map at the zoo on Monday so we could learn some of the words in Korean. So we got out both copies of the map and wrote things like ‘Australian Pavilion’ in Korean. He then found one of his sticker books in the drawer and we did a lot of stickers – he likes putting them in the proper place now. We then went in on the bed and made a fort. We read Planting a Rainbow, Mr. Gumpy’s Outing, and Mañana Iguana. He then did some painting. We were brushing our teeth and he got some toothpaste on his hand. He said “What you get toothpaste on your finger about?” I replied “I don’t know. Why did you?” His answer: “Because it’s funny.” And he started a game where he was pretending to slip and fall down, and of course he wanted me to join in. And he was singing  “I’d like to have a barbecue with you and you and you.” That’s a line from one of the Jolly Song letter sound videos on YouTube.

We got to class on time today. No forward roll, but he was very good with the teacher today. And for that matter there were two teachers, as there is now an assistant. At one point the teacher tried to hug him, and August gave him a high five instead and said “Just high five.” But at the end of class, the main teacher put his hands out for a hug. August first gave him a high five, but then considered it, and walked into the teacher’s arms so he could hug him. Class was about cars. There were cars they rolled around on the floor and on a track, steering wheels they used to push around cars, and of course little car scooters they sat on and pushed around with their feet. August liked all of them, but was probably most impressed by the horn on the steering wheel. It was hard to make squeak though, so he spent a lot of time working on that. Oh, and near the beginning of class August was on his hands and feet, and said “you’re a rainbow”. There was also a cubby with extra floor mats in it, and August climbed up into it and curled up a few times.

On our walk home he was singing letters and said “The letters are wearing costumes” He was then listing what costume each letter was wearing: ”C is V…dada…pancakes…6…Hangeul…” We stopped in the park in our now usual spot so he could trace Hangeul and play around for a few minutes.

When we got home he wanted to play with the door buttons. He hit the pound sign key and it shut it off and wouldn’t work at all. This happened once, long ago, and just means it turns off for a few minutes. We went and checked the mail and got in a couple minutes later. But as soon as we were inside, he wanted to go for a walk. So we got ready to go. He wanted to go right away, so when I asked if he wanted soy milk he said “No!…Just a little.” He then managed to spill some soy milk right as I set some banana chips on the tray in front of him. Once we were cleaned up, we walked over to the youth center. He got out for a snack lunch – Larabar, etc. He said “Ready, steady, go!” When I asked what that was from he said “from Peppa Pig.” He was poking me and making a noise: “Pon, pon, pon…that’s the sound of poking.” There was a group of older kids playing, and a bunch of boys were over at the picnic table. August heard them knocking on the table and went to investigate. He then climbed up at the table and started knocking on it, like them. They left to go back inside, and August played on and around the table for several minutes. I asked if he wanted to do something, and he said “I’m a little too busy for that.”

He pooped, so I decided we’d go home to change him first, then try again for a nap. But on the walk home he wanted to get out. I let him out, but he started walking back the way we’d come from, looking at the ground. I asked what he was doing, and he said “I’m just looking to see if there’s anything interesting.” A street cleaner truck went by, going the other direction, and we watched that.

We went home and changed him. He was clearly tired. He wanted to do iPad, and when I wouldn’t let him do that, he sat on the floor and said “I’ll just do marbles then.” Referring to making marbles out of play dough. Got him in the stroller and we went for a walk. He fought a nap, but clearly needed it. I picked him up at one point as he was upset, then had to force him back in the stroller. Took about 50 minutes total, but finally he fell asleep and we went to the Sarang Bread coffee shop. He fell asleep from 3:11 to 4:24 when I woke him up as we left. He woke up from a coughing fit at 3:26, sat up for a minute, and fell back to sleep. On the way home he fell back to sleep a couple times, until I got him out of the stroller. He quietly said “can we eat?…yeah, yeah.” We made and ate a salmon sandwich. We then went and played in the fort. We read Night Becomes Day, In the Forest, and In the Small, Small Pond.

Carly came home as we were in the fort – that had actually been the plan since earlier in the day when we were in the fort and August wanted mama to come home. They nursed, then did lots and lots of art on the iPad. He was using the smart tool to draw ovals, calling them eggs: “I know a kind of seagull. It’s a clown seagull. It’s a clown made out of smoke. It’s a clown smoke seagull.”

Carly gave him a bath. He called ‘Ryan’ so I came and looked in. He laughed. That was a game, with him laughing every time I came back. After his bath he came out and he said “Why dada say…?” I don’t know what I said that got that going, but then I would say a random word and he would laugh and say “Why dada say…”’ again. After a couple minutes of that he suddenly got quiet and serious and said “All done saying things…Let’s play Duplos.” And he he took my finger and led me to the parlor. We wrote on the whiteboard thing, but but first I made a big production of panicking about not being able to find the pen for it. He was then wanting things to go kaboom, so we laughed a lot saying kaboom and kablooie and boom. He and Carly then did Duplos, and I remembered I’d mentioned cutting his hair. So we let him watch Peppa Pig and we cut his hair. Actually, Carly did it this time – her first August hair cut. Took quite awhile, and he did quite well. At one point though he said“I’m too busy to sit down” as he lay on the back of the couch instead.

Headed to bed. Read Pete the Cat. Left them at 9:45. Then at 10:23 he came in to the parlor. He wrote on the board thing for awhile. “Why you not sleepy?” He asked of himself several times. We read The Little Kipper Collection and Mother Goose (Elsie Marley is still Tia Cassie, and the spoon is Mama). He went out and got the Matthew Van Fleet Alphabet book, but he wanted to read it in bed. I said he could either read that in the reading area with me, or go in and sleep with mama. After a couple minutes of deliberation, he decided on bed. He went in right at 11 and was asleep pretty quickly.

He did a lot of slithering like a snake today, and we got the Halloween card from my parents.

Fort: 

Class: 

Park: 

Street cleaner: 

Asleep: 

Home. Fort:

Haircut: 

Up late reading: 

He was up at 6:30 and very smiley this morning, and fine when Carly left. He was pretending to be a baby duck and climbing behind me on the couch, then we read 줄 타는 코끼리 (the elephant book). We went in and wrote Korean on the paper. Wrote words from the book and from one of the little word books from one of his classes. He then wanted the cookie jar song, so we moved to word songs on YouTube. He started watching a collection of songs that had “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” in it. He whispered “What is it?” And scooted back and crouched on his toes. I asked if he liked it and he whispered “Yeah”. It was like he was mesmerized.

I took a shower. After I was done he called to me, and wanted to pee on the toilet. The first time he has done this with his diaper still on. We read the Korean baby animals counting book. He could read and understand the whole thing. That is two Korean books we now have down.

We Skyped with my parents for an hour. August was really giggly and funny. He was joking about making them look at the ceiling, then sent them lots of “nonsense” typing. He remembered what ellipses are, but decided that they should be called something slightly different. He picked up some new phrases from Puffin Rock that he really liked and wanted me to explain: “Leave the rest to me” and “we’ll miss it” and “Puffin patrol”. He also said  Oona said something like “ker-whanickle” or “tyrannical” but we couldn’t find it in the episode he had been watching.

He played Figure on his own, then I was playing and played something that reminded him of “Three Little Kittens”. So we figured out how to play and sing it. He then moved to Paper and did some art. He was singing “Three Little Kittens” to himself before moving to other tunes.

Getting ready to go, he was walking around the living room/kitchen and noticed the temperature of the floor because of the floor heater. He walked back and forth saying cold and warm.

We walked and took the 100 bus to Dream Forest. We first walked up and saw the deer for a few minutes. One of them made deer squeaking noises next to us, and August was curious about that. We went to the playground and sat on the edge and ate lunch (leftovers from yesterday) and he pretended to be Oona climbing on me. He then walked and crawled on the rock wall. Sang the Lulu song from class. He heard a noise from the construction site and said “I like that noise…the low noise.” He did his “All the way to this stream, boop” chant, and added the line “All the way to this I, boop”. He also tried crawling on it and said “I’m a flamingo working on it (the pine needles)…so dada can be happy.” He stumbled, after which he got down and started walking away, saying “I want to go to the coffee shop. I’ll just type a document.” I asked if anything was wrong, and he said “yes”. I held him a few minutes, then we walked to go inside to the bench area. But then he saw the play structure made out of dodecahedrons and wanted to play in it. We spent several minutes climbing up into it, and counting the levels. He liked the sunnier spots as they were warmer. We made it to the top, and we went down the slide. It was fast and we shot off the end. I said “I think I scraped my butt.” He said “Let me check…no…there’s no blood. ”

We walked inside to go to the bench area. We have revived the whole “I got my dada/I got my Zinnie” thing when I pick him up, but of course it is now a joke all the time and he changes it up. As we went in the building to the stairs he wanted me to pick him up and he said “I got my Duplo.” So I put him back down since he hadn’t called me ‘dada’. I joked that I wouldn’t pick him up because until he called me ‘dada’, and he said “I won’t pick you up anymore.”

We got up to the bench and played on there for awhile. I asked if he wanted more food and he said “I’m fine for now.” He is also using “I suppose…” and “I prefer…” sentences a lot. He spotted the information desk across the room and read out 꿈의숲아트센터 in Korean. It means ‘Dream Forest Arts Center’. He hopped around on the floor, saying “hip hop, hip hope” and then climbed on the wire furniture, pretending to get his foot stuck, then pretending the ghost also got his foot stuck.

He argued against a nap a bit, but we got him changed and in the backpack and walked some of the trails and he fell asleep. Went back to Cafe Dream and he slept from 1:40 to 2:43. After he woke up I got him out and he stood around while I packed up. A woman came over and gave him two mandarin oranges – 귤. August and I understood her using the word as we had learned it at Mama Juice the previous day. We went in the kids’ area and ate one, and read a couple of the Korean books. He then spent quite awhile doing art on the iPad. We got ready to leave at 4. I picked him up and was swinging him from side to side, singing the Basho song, and he started talking about the word ‘side’: “Side…it’s close to sign…and it’s also close to scientist.”

We headed outside to find it drizzling. We popped under a cover to put up his cover and had some crackers as it rained heavier for a few minutes. We then walked to the bus stop and caught the bus home, transferring at Induk and taking the 9 to Brownstone. Carly was home about 10 minutes later.

They nursed and then they did art together on the iPad. He was showing her more make believe shapes: “Which is a tricky one…which is not a tricky one.” He and I then and went and played in the fort. He said something about eating spaghetti in there and I said she’d go ballistic if we spilled spaghetti on her bed. He didn’t know the word, but got the gist of it and thought it was funny: “Mama go ballistic…mama go crazy.” He went out and watched part of a National Geographic video that Carly needed to watch for school. Then he and I played on the piano. I played The Ants Go Marching and he kept singing made up verses to it.

He wasn’t eating dinner, refusing to eat the spaghetti. Earlier he had eaten a couple of bites after he had spilled some on the floor, and we made a big deal of calling them ‘floor noodles’ and Carly was jokingly telling him ‘No’ to eating them. He laughed a lot, but didn’t eat much. He just wanted banana bread instead. I made a deal where he would eat one bite of bread, then one bite of spaghetti. But when it was time to eat a bite of spaghetti he told me to eat it instead. He then got upset when I wouldn’t let him eat more banana bread. He went in the bathroom after Carly was done with her shower, then they went straight to nursing in the parlor. I started his bath, and got him in the bath. He played with letters a bit, but the second I started to touch wash his hair he started to lose it. Carly came in to take over, but they ended up going to bed and he fell asleep pretty quickly, at about 8:30.

Fascinated by Twinkle Twinkle:  

Dodecahedron structure: 

Not quite: 

Bench area: 

Reading and 귤: 

Art: 

Pausing for the rain: 

Home: 

In the fort: 

Funny words: