It was sort of half a holiday for Carly. No school, so she was home until noon. But she and Mandy went to Jerusalem in the afternoon to meet with an organization that does outreach to Palestinian lands.
He had kind or a restless night. Carly thought he was going to get up at 1. He managed to go back to sleep and got up at 6:10. Carly has today off, so he went down to her and I stayed in bed a bit longer. They played “Map”, looking around on Google Earth. He surprised her by reading ‘Jordan’ on his own and being happy to see it. We discussed Jordan while over at the Dead Sea, but I didn’t know he could read it. He was also commenting on whether places had trees or not “There’s not much trees here.”
He ate the last of the apple bread (except th last couple bites), then I distracted him from Carly while she made some food with GroForest, where you can now fly a hot air balloon and do some composting.
We then went outside where the two of them were painting shapes cut out of milk cartons for a design on our bedroom wall. I measured the second shelf and started to saw it, before deciding to wait awhile as it was still a little before 9. When I started August asked “Have you been doing that all night?” Odd question.
Back inside Carly was getting oatmeal for him. He said “You’re the oatmeal say ‘Oh no! Let’s hide!” Then he made up an oatmeal dance as he lay on the floor and chanted “Ooo-ba, ooo-ba”.
Carly went upstairs to work and he and I read more of The Magic Tree House and looked at dinosaurs in our big Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Life book. We did some math with blueberries and writing on paper, then played with Duplos. He then wanted to watch the KidsHealth.org videos about the body and watched a few while I took a shower. I came back down and they were nursing. August then declared that they were eagles and they played being eagles for quite awhile, having nests on the couch and in the red chairs and flying around to get fish. Although one time they got stuck in the stomach of a huge fish: “Let’s get in our fish bathtub and eat dinner…where we store our fish.”
I went out and worked on the sawing, then I prepared schnitzels and sweet potato fries for us for lunch. Carly got out a new set of paints that make circles that you paint with. August made a long snaking line in green and said “It’s a slithery snake…a machine snake…a road.” Playing on the floor, August found a small piece of popcorn that he said was a tooth. Carly told him him about the tooth fairy, and as she did I practiced my eye rolling. But then Carly told him the truth, and how we pretend to be a tooth fairy. Carly had to head outside to Mandy, and August and I played Tooth Fairy. He would pretend to sleep and I’d give him a surprise under his pillow. He would then request a new thing “Now, could you give me a toy train?”
We then played Toca Nature, actually figuring out how to get all the different plants to grow and which animals wanted which, and exercised. With Duplos I then made a series of rockets, and August was counting how many people could fit in each and adding them up and saying they were his friends: “I had seven friends but one of them went to a coffee shop.”
He watched the airplane episode of Ask the StoryBots. He really likes the airplane episode, and after it was over he was repeating “Thrust, drag, weight, and lift” as if he was trying to remember the four forces.
He ate the last of the sweet potato fries, then listening to music he really liked the remix of Mark Lanegan’s “Death Head Tattoo” and added it to his playlist. A version of Nine Inch Nail’s “Closer” then came on and he said he really liked it. I didn’t add it to his playlist though and distracted him by switching to Bjork. He then heard “Earth Intruders (XXXChange Remix)” and said “I love this”.
We went on a Zinnie walk at 3. First we did a clockwise circuit of our block, which we decided to call the playground block. He ate some Larabar along the way and we realized I’d forgotten his water bottle. He said it was okay though as we were going around the block and would end up at home. Very thoughtful reaction from him.
Got his bottle, then he decided to walk around the other block, which we decided to call the Holly block, since she lives up that street. We kept walking up the block though, all the way to the dead end. Someone had a bunch of dishes set out, and I grabbed a couple of good glass bowls as I need a second mixing bowl for baking. August had eaten apple with peel last night when he was having dinner, so I tried to give him apple with peel on it today. He took the cup and looked at all the slices and said “Umm…Why is there PEEL on it?” He was having none of it. So I had to bite off the peel for each slice. Ate that as we walked back.
He spotted a truck with Hebrew writing on it and wanted to know what all the letters were. So I was telling him. Then he was looking at the numbers on the phone number. He was trying to read it as a long number, from left to right. After I explained it was a phone number and went from left to right he still had fun pretending to read it the other way.
We then got to the small synagogue up that way. Spotted some junk furniture out back and went and looked at it. He got off the bike to walk in the sand and play. He wouldn’t go down the little slide though. Too sunny. But he pulled weeds along the wall of the synagogue. I sat and read, and he then walked the edge of the square in the bricks several times.
We went home because he said he needed to use the bathroom – it would be another hour before he finally went though. On the way home he was saying he was a white blood cell, but then giving a scary laugh. A surprisingly scary laugh. Maybe I can get him in a horror movie. I asked why he was laughing like that and we decided he was a virus pretending to be a white blood cell and attacking me.
We were home at 4:20. We played more Toca Nature. He said “I’m filling it up with snow like Greenland.” Carly got home a little later. We talked about her trip to Sabeel (they got to eat lunch with them and met with the director – might do some sort of tour with them around Thanksgiving) and were talking about work stuff. August was playing his game, but apparently paying attention and asked what we were talking about. He asked “Are you talking about the guy that kicks them out of school if they don’t have homework?” Got to be careful around him.
We went outside for a good amount of time, doing all of our watering. Carly and August picked the first ripe tomato off the plant from Ikea. I asked August if he was going to eat it, and he started to wind up to throw it away before Carly stopped him and said she would eat it. They did more shape painting outside, then back inside Carly Skyped with her parents. August and I used used Google Earth, so he could actually see the round earth, as opposed to just Google Maps. He ate some pumpkin seeds and Carly made banana drink. He drank that and watched the second movement of Beethoven’s Ninth before switching to the fourth.
Carly gave him a bath, then he was a candy machine on the bed. First it was a gum machine: “Cutting you into the right size and shape”. I’m sure that phrase came from the how gum is made video. Then he made jawbreakers: “hardening process…sweetening process”. He was ready for sleep and fell asleep just after 8.
Robot pajamas:
Counting friends in the rockets:
Ripe tomato:
Painting outside:
