I started waking him up at 7:30. He did not want to wake up. I eventually carried him downstairs and he lay on the couch for a few minutes. Ate his vitamins but didn’t say anything. He watched one Ollie and Moon. On the couch he asked me “What’s negatives and positives?” I asked what kind of negative and positive and he said “In your brain…emotions.” Before we left he had a complaint about school, about how he doesn’t get to do as much as the other kids: “They make stuff out of clay that gets fired faster than mine.” I explained this was because they did a lot of it before he started going, and then he missed glazing his teacup when we left early one day. I told him he could ask one of the teachers about when he’d get to glaze something.
We left at 8:15. At one point we heard a dog barking repeatedly, “every second”, so August meowed every second. And then talked about how it was less annoying than barking, right? This was a conversation we had once, where I said meowing sounded better to me because it isn’t as loud and it sounds nicer.
At school we asked about the glazing and found out one of the other kids had glazed his teacup for him. He was happy about that. He wasn’t entirely thrilled with me leaving, but for the first time this week I left without him having to be held or yelling. He was standing close to Anna in the clay area.
I picked him up at 1. He gave me a “scribble paper” he had drawn and a nice flower. We decided to leave the flower in his cubby and pick it up after the tea party. As we walked out he said to it: “See you after tea party!” As we were out front of the classroom Myriam walked by and he loudly said “Hey, Ms. Myriam!” He so seldom goes out of his way to say hi to people, so still notable.
We walked up to outside the library and sat at what’s becoming our regular outdoor bench. He did a science experiment, ate a bunch of his fruit, and lay on the bench across from me for a little rest. I asked if he was a baby squirrel, then a couple minutes later when I asked about going into the library he said “Yes, dada squirrel.” He told me that today he had played with Reia with the light blocks. He said there were no challenges on the playground today. Anna had told him to do something else. He had done some yesterday though. After another question he said “Ehh. Let’s go inside. I’m a sleepy baby squirrel.”
In the library he played on the stuffed animals. He asked “What’s ‘serious’?” Then asked for examples and added “I like examples. Why?” We played the squirrel game for awhile, with me just sitting next to his pillows and refilling his nut supply when he asked me to while trying to read a little of my book.
Then took him back to the tea party. He got to sit next to Ms. Michelle. I don’t know who that is though. We got August his short straw, which I’d brought for him today, and I went and sat in the staff room. He first came in after the tea party about 20 minutes later. Got him to go back out to play, but then Omri and Ori then came in. Marion then had them sitting down for a meeting, and it was clear August was going to keep getting distracted by me, so we headed out. He said to Marion “Happy three days off!” And they had a conversation about how it was only two days. But later I realized that his ‘free’ and ‘three’ sound similar and he seemed to say that she had misunderstood him, as he does call them ‘free days from preschool’.
As we walked out he said “By plants! Bye preschool!” We paused to look at the baby falcons (we’ve noticed they look like they might be flying, or close to flying, as they keep flapping their wings) and he said “Hey chickity chicks!”
We went to the entrance to the library and had a snack again. Shary introduced me to Leslie, who used to work in a preschool and is another parent volunteer. Didn’t learn anything more than that. August was talking about Uijeongbu and we pretended to ride the u-line. In the library we did a little reading of the Magic Treehouse book.
After the bell at 3 we walked over to Carly’s classroom. He was singing the bell to students. He told Carly “I’m ringing the bell for all the students but not the teachers…I was ringing the bell for your student.”
The plan was to go swimming with Carly. I had brought her suit, but mine wasn’t in the bag. Got him changed, then we all walked over to the pool. On the way we found Omri and her mom and siblings sitting at a picnic table by the cafeteria and eating pizza. They asked us to join them. August ate two pieces of pizza and he and Omri had a lot of fun.
Then on to the pool. Omri came with us while her mom got changed. Started out well enough. Bar was also there, and so was Ms. Myriam. August didn’t believe it was her at first, until she was close. But then he kept getting splashed. Then the worst one: A kid jumped into the pool on the steps, right towards August. That made a big splash of water go all over him. The wettest he has been. We had to get him out of the pool and took several minutes to calm him down. He was furious.
We packed up and he calmed down, but then as we left he lamented “Why were we at the pool for just like a second?” We all walked home, but he was having problems with mean words and hurting plants along the way. At our park I had to switch with Carly and let her push him. He then had a meltdown with Carly upstairs at home. A few minutes later he came down and apologized.
He spotted his vitamins and said “Let’s take extra and see what happens to me! An experiment!” We told him we would not do medical experiments on him. We then taught Carly the teasing game, or at least how it was supposed to be played. We ate dinner, then he went outside with Carly and was happy wasting water and was then raking, sort of, with the broom with a stick though the handle.
I took him up for his bath and he spent a long time in there. He was then in the bedroom with Carly, and was practicing tying knots with a red and a white piece of yarn that came from somewhere. He came downstairs and she took a shower. We read The Chicken Problem and Lulu Witch. He ate several peanut butter and crackers, then finished the apple and grapes from his lunch. I went to get him more food, and saw a lizard chasing a white moth outside our windows. He told me “You’re distracted.” But then we saw the lizard actually catch and eat the moth.
Headed back upstairs, and he finally fell asleep close to 10.