Friday, October 5: Carly returns and a meeting with his teachers

Tried waking him at 7:10, then let him sleep. At 7:30 I tried again and he sat up, then lay back down at the end of the bed. I was going to give him ten more minutes, but at 7:35 he got up and headed downstairs to the couch. He started watching a Magic School Bus episode in which a bird makes a mess in their classroom and then they investigate to figure out what kind of bird it is. He didn’t finish before we had to get going.

We took the car as we had hummus to deliver, were running late, and needed the car to take Carly and her stuff home in the afternoon anyway. On the way to the car August saw the red brake on the front wheel of another car and said he needed to take a photo of it. But then of course we found out there was no food pickup as all of the Gaia Jr. Club were on their Week Without Walls trips. We got to the preschool a little after 7:10. They were getting ready for a nature walk, which August was not happy about and got upset about. His main complaints were that it was too long and too hot. He must have had one nature walk that was uncomfortable for him, as he had liked them in the beginning. Anyway, Eve came over to try to hold his hand, but he only wanted to hold mine. Hector came over as well. I ended up walking him up to the field with the class. He continued to protest but was calming down—until he found out they were going to the field before going to the butterfly garden. He really didn’t like this idea and told Andrea “You need to cancel this now!” He complained they had just done this yesterday. Apparently they had brought soccer balls up and kicked them around. When we got to the field I handed his hand to Andrea and she was telling him he could sit with her. He wasn’t happy, but he wasn’t really upset either and I took off and walked home after putting the hummus in the staff fridge.

At 11 I walked back to school for an 11:30 meeting with Andrea and Marion, which went quite well—certainty better than the last one. I showed up with cappuccinos, which went over well. Marion started by showing me a bird skull they had found on their nature walk. A mystery like the Magic School Bus episode. And Andrea showed me a person that he had made out of cardboard and glue and googlie eyes. It was totally his idea and was a major step in doing stuff on his own at school. Andrea said he also animated it with JibJab or something and would send it to me.

They now want to focus on getting him to play with the other kids more. They talked about how Eve and Hector in particular have reached out to him—literally—but he’s avoided holding hands with them. One time Eve fell down and was hurt, and they went and sat her across from August while she was recovering. He turned his seat around so he didn’t see her. But generally he is doing well. Always coming to group time on his own, raising his hand and waiting turns and providing good ideas. He’s been going to the bathroom occasionally, and washing his hands when they ask him to.

Marion also said that they asked all the kids today what their favorite foods are and he said, “All the candies in the world!” She then talked about how the ‘treats’ are always the first thing he goes for in his lunch and suggested we involve him more in putting together his own lunches. I thought it was a bit of an unfair stretch to link his love of candy with the going for the healthy breads/protein bars in his lunch, but it was a good idea anyway.

The other thing they suggested was talking to him each day about one kid in his class that he’d like to play something with—it could be a specific project at school, or something he brings from home. Set a reminded to myself to do that each morning on our walk to school. Oh, and Andrea said he really likes the Lunch Robot notes in his lunch.

I then told them about Dr. Aviv and that went over well as Dr. Aviv assessed Marion’s own daughter, so she knows her very well. She commented on how it is odd to work with someone in a different role, now being on the teacher side with Dr. Aviv.

I fled the preschool at 12 when it sounded like the class was getting ready to come back down from music class. I went and typed and studied in the library. And I went to the business office and got a copy of our bills from this last year.

When I went to pick him up he was playing with the shape blocks on the floor by himself. I watched him for a minute before he realized I was there. When he saw me he told me “I’m finding shapes that fit in with other shapes.” He then asked if I’d help him. We added to it a bit and he told me “It’s the germ sucker. It makes people not sick. The squares suck up the germs.”

We were still in there when Carly called and joined us. He showed her the germ sucker then we cleaned up. He went out on the bench with Carly and started eating. At one point he told us “I hate noises! My ears are designed to hear quiet noises. To me the noise that kid is making is 92 million times louder than a rocket engine!”

He took a lot of photos around the preschool and up the stairs and through the gates as we left. Carly went to get the hummus from the fridge and a few things from her classroom and met us at the gate. August saw her keychain dangling from her hand as she talked to someone and took a photo of that, and also of the flowers on the woman’s shirt. In the car he had me take a photo of the dashboard—a photo he’s talked about taking a few times.

At home he watched Julius Jr. and then ate crackers and hummus with Carly as I threw together a pasta dish with cream sauce and mushrooms, olives, and sun-dried tomatoes. He didn’t eat much of it. He went to the bathroom and lost his after-bathroom treat when he put a big wad of toilet paper in the toilet after Carly told him not to. He had some chocolate milk a bit later though.

They went outside and I went out to help when they were trying to get more sticks from the storage area. They were putting in sticks to hold up the growing plants. I went upstairs for something, and a few minutes later August came in wanting to play with me. He told me he was going to cut pieces of paper for me and I would draw on them. When I needed more he would cut more pieces. So we did that, with me drawing little pictures of trees, a robot, Green Monster, etc. He told me “I like how hard you’re working on that.” And sometimes we would disagree on what I had drawn. He told me “It’s okay to disagree.” It sounded like things that he would hear at preschool, but he claimed they weren’t. He was also taking my finished pictures and cutting blank paper off like the teachers do so that other kids can use that paper. He then drew some pictures as well. He then took a photo of our art and a lot of other photos around the living room.

Carly and I were on the couch talking, and he came and sat between us, then had fun recording our conversations. He then recorded songs in the voice recorder, and sang “I’m really fun to play with” and “I love you – This is the greatest song in the world.” He used the bathroom and got a treat this time. We played one round of the plant growing game up on the couch, then I took him up for his bath. Carly rested on the couch—she’s pretty sore after all the hiking on her trip.

He and played an elaborate version of the robot boy in class story, where did the helping out with the plants, then we celebrated his birthday. He said that he’s from another world and to him mushrooms are cake, but he let the other kids have a regular cake. He got presents, and one of them was a mysterious button that allowed him to teleport back to his world. He left one for the class though so they could come and visit him on his world. I commented on how it sounded like the start of a series. He asked what ‘homesick’ means. I think it was from both Llama Llama (he watched an episode in which they have a sleepover and talk about being homesick) and the discussions Carly and I had about her trip and kids getting homesick. So ‘homesick’ was the word of the day.

In the bedroom Carly took over and read him the first half of Hilde Cracks the Case: Hero Dog. I then took over and read the second half. We then played day 2 of his game: the kids visited him on his planet. He said that everything pink, purple, lavender, peach, and silver and that those are his favorite colors in real life. Carly came back in and I left them at 8:50. He was asleep a bit after that. The first time in a week that I didn’t put him to sleep.

Working on his shapes blocks: