At some point during the night he got partially ttuck under the bed and Carly had to pull him out. Then, at 6 he had a bit of an accident and we had to change the sheets and his clothes. We all got up. He watched some Max and Ruby. I got lunches for us so we could try to get on the road early for the hour+ drive to Haifa and the science center. But when he was done he got upset when I said he couldn’t just have Cheerios and he knocked a couple books off the shelf.
We picked those up and went and made Duplo buildings as he was grumpy and wasn’t letting me get ready. I asked what we were making: “A fancy store” “Are you making a base? So we can add lists of fanciness?” Our big structure had animals all over it and he put a bed on it: “To get there the kids have to… Skip over the bed, boop, into bed. It’s not a very safe bed.” He found a Lego without a leg and asked what people who didn’t have a leg did if they didn’t have a wheelchair. We ended up watching a video of prosthetic legs.
We were talking about Max and Ruby and how I’m not a big fan of it. I said that Max is impolite. August asked “Can I turn into not doing please and I love you?” He was still having a bit of a hard time and asked “Dada, could you give me a treat cuz I’m sad this morning?” I think it was mainly because he didn’t get enough sleep last night. But later it also came up that he might have been upset that I didn’t want him to watch more Max and Ruby and he really likes it.
We did a little more Duplos, then moved to Piano Maestro. He insisted he wanted to do piano, which pushed back our departure. Apropos to nothing, he said “Dada, I still love sheep…I love sheep. I just love sheep.” I THINK he was thinking about the other day when I sang my “Itsy Bitsy baa baa” song to him and told him that sheep used to be his favorite animal. But that’s been a couple days. We moved to Dust Buster, then I got some mac and cheese and broccoli for him, after he hadn’t really eaten anything. He ate two bowls.
I exercised and we went upstairs and I let him watch Max and Ruby. He was happy about that. We skipped his bath for today. While going to the bathroom he asked “In Korea did I pee like a grown up?” Standing up, he meant. I reminded him of the kid-sized urinals at the children’s museum and other places that he used a couple times.
We got going about 10:40. Through Netanya he said he spotted a mineral water sign “Right out my window!” He was right, as I spotted it on the way home. We listened to season two, episode 1 of Story Pirates on the way up. He had me star it. We then listened to music. He didn’t play his iPad at all. He fell asleep at 11:40 with 10 minutes left, according to Google. By the time I parked, on the same street but a bit closer this time, he had about a 15 minute nap. When I got him in the stroller he perked up and asked “Do you want to go to the science center?”
At the science center we had a wonderful surprise: I went to buy an annual pass and were informed the museum was free every Wednesday. As we walked in (him without an armband, as he won’t wear those) he said “Maybe we should just come on Wednesdays from now on!”
I asked if he wanted the play area or the “more science-y stuff”. He voted for the “more science-y stuff”. He suggested we go to the bathroom (he used the Hebrew word). We did that, then headed up. First to the sound area, which was busy at first, but not incredibly busy. But then it cleared out. This would happen, as people seemed to be in groups (but not just family groups). Occasionally busy, but other times we’d have rooms all to ourselves. Given that the museum is probably busiest on a rainy day like today (the play area was filled with moms and toddlers), it wasn’t too busy for a free day.
We first went to the sound room, then up the stairs in that room to the puzzle area up on the balcony. We went to the energy room for a few minutes. August was having me carry him everywhere again. We had the energy room to ourselves. He then agreed to go outside and have lunch. We sat on a bench and ate, then headed back inside and went up to the second floor, which we hadn’t visited at all when with Carly.
The first room was all about mirrors and perspective. He was making me carry him, and finally I made him get down. He then pulled open the curtain to the dark room, and started to tell me I’d need to pick him up again to go in, but then he spotted something, ran in, and that was it – not a single mention of picking him up after that. All sorts of activities involving colored light, strobe lights, etc. On one thing that showed how light mixes to make white he said “I think it’s the primary colors. If you ever forget the primary colors you can do that.” There was a plasma sphere, and then we really liked the shadow wall, where the flash leaves your shadow on the wall. There was an activity where you could redirect light with prism, which reminded us of a similar thing at the children’s museum in Seoul.
From there we went to the room on dental hygiene and he brushed the huge set of teeth with a huge toothbrush. I told the teeth they weren’t brushing properly so he’d have to take control and do it. Also in that room he spotted rainbows cast on a chair and he took a photo. The next room was historic microscopes and telescopes and other instruments. We looked in a microscope and at a couple other things. Then a class was coming in, so we made our way out. Next was air and air pressure. And a surveillance camera you could control. The best were these wheels you could turn to create air pressure, then you’d press a button and it would shoot a plastic bottle up a tube.
And then to the optical illusions room and the astronomy room, which we didn’t spend a ton of time in, before getting to the magician room, where there were different magic trick things. He lay on a bed of nails, then I did. There was a bottle of liquid that would drain/fill when you put a hat over it, and he liked learning how that worked. His favorite though was the beachball that would float in the air when you stepped on a switch to turn on the fan. While in there I got a phone call at 2 from Omar to check on our work.
He needed the bathroom, so we went to the one down the hall. Oh, downstairs we had also played with a cool video installation that simply showed a video of yourself. But delayed it about 5 seconds. That was fun. Anyway, on our way back from the bathroom he started singing my Juicy Juice song, but changed it up, in particular changing it to “Mechanical juice store”. No idea where that idea came from.
We went back and finished up the magic room (entirely empty now) and did the bed of nails. He really liked saying magic words to make the fluid appear and disappear.
We then went outside and across to the temporary exhibit space, only to find it empty. But we played a little with the water stuff outside, then wandered the top part. We looked at (but didn’t try) the unicycle you could ride out over the water. I get that it is ‘safe’ in that it is counterbalanced, but it is still rather a fall to the shallow-ish water below. And August got to ride in the helicopter thing and I pushed him around. It started to rain as we headed back to the museum and it was close to closing time.
We stopped in the bathroom, then bravely pushed past the people waiting by the exit door, afraid of the rain. I had my umbrella up and we hurried the couple blocks back to the car. We sat in the back seat of the car and have a snack. Talking about Carly he asked “Did she go to the bathroom a few times?” Don’t know why he asked that. As we got in the car he was singing a “Please go away” song. It was quite nice, and entirely made-up. Well, part of the tune was, I think, based on the Poli English class song about crossing the street. But August’s song was about how he was shutting down and wanted to be left alone. Then, he was doing a really cool cha
nt, repeating each line several times: “You’re kidding me…you broke me to pieces…go away…I really mean it…please please please.”
On the drive back we listened to Story Pirates episode #2. Then he requested the monster story from episode 8, then the bath story/song from episode 1 again. He likes the Story Pirates. Then for most of the rest of the way home we listened to a longer one of the science podcast episodes about dinosaurs. August had all sorts of questions about dinosaurs and I would pause and try to answer them. The show wasn’t about how they were extinct, but August asked me “Why aren’t there dinosaurs now?” I answered the best I could. A few minutes later he asked “What killed the dinosaurs again?”
The show was discussing why dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals got so big, and it talked about eggs. August was then a huge snake that covered everyone and made us extinct. He then asked what would happen if everything on earth died off. And he asked what would happen if an egg hatched too early. I explained how developing babies have to be in their egg/etc. to develop. August joked “Same as couches”. He then kept asking about different animals “What about…” and listed different animals. We talked about what happens when things are born premature.
A few times August has caught me sort of sugarcoating things, I think, or avoiding his real question, when I say something about how science makes something easier, or there’s medicine for something, etc. I think he did that when I said that if a baby is born prematurely there are machines, etc. that we can use to help the baby. He says something like “No dada, I mean in the past.” And I have to explain that the baby would die.
As we got to Even Yehuda we stopped at the strawberry stand and got two cartons. He waited in the car. We were home at 4:50. He asked me to let him unbuckle himself (just the seatbelt button) and told me “I figured it out when you couldn’t figure out the gas pump.”
Inside they nursed and Carly told him not to fall asleep. He asked “Why don’t you want me falling asleep?” He ate soup for dinner and said “Dada, I’m rejected to noodles.” Another funny word mixup, as he meant ‘addicted’. I think I forgot to mention a conversation yesterday or the day before he asked what would happen when he ran out of words to learn. I talked about how many words there are, and also that there are other language and things to learn. He then said something like “I’m gonna know SO many words when I’m 100!”
I was getting dinner and needed a rest when he asked me to play Piano Maestro. I told him I needed to rest and he said “What’d ya mean? But I want you to be a better piano player.” Which is supportive and nice, I think.
He and Carly did a lot of building with the Duplos, then Skyped with Vivian and Colin. Colin was really into skyping and seeing ‘Ata’ (as he still calls August). They did more Duplo building with Vivian watching.
Carly got him ready for bed, and when I asked what he’d dream about, with no prompting, he replied “microscopic motors”. Don’t know where the concept of such motors came from. I left them at 7:10.
Off to Haifa:
Our shadows:
Floating ball:
No pants:
Back home:
