He came down at 6:15. Not a long night of sleep. He was with Carly for awhile, then she headed to work and he watched Aardvark and the Ant, then a video on how ice cream treats are made. My parents were up before we left for school. He used my phone and was taking a long time lapse and he did a funny dance. I asked it was, and it is the dance that the bear does in the Loopimal music app. So now he’s learning dances from animated beers. My Mom mentioned that they were using Paul’s suitcase. August asked, “Where is Paul, by the way?…But if Paul’s suitcase is here, Paul should be here!”
We got walking at 8:45. He was worried about the schedule again. I appeased him by saying I’d wait outside for a few minutes to make sure he was okay. He went to the meeting and I walked home a few minutes later.
My parents did some laundry and got settled in and I set up my new phone and did one final, final, final review of the latest version of the Sabeel book. We then walked over to the mall after noon and bought a few things at Tiv Taam. Came back (tried to figure out the fruit in the little orchard near us, but no luck – breadfruit is the closest we can figure) and had some lunch, then drove to school before 3.
August didn’t greet them excitedly at first. But he then wanted to tell Andrea they were here. He went into the makerspace to tell her, but he got distracted by something they were doing in there. They looked around, and August came out and had fun tying his water bottle to the strings hanging from the ceiling to hold art. He sat out on the bench and ate a little, then we started on a tour.
August was into it at first: he pointed out the plants and a few other things. We looked at the herb garden by the playground, then he had us picking up branches on the preschool playground and putting them with the rest in the big swing, then looked at the bigger beds. He showed them the one plant the kids are allowed to eat right now. Looks like celery, and he ate some of the greens. The teacher running Gaia club invited us into the greenhouse and we looked around in there. August had some of the kale. The guy knows a photographer in eastern Washington that takes photos of wheat fields.
We ended continued on to the elementary playground. There, August played hide and seek with Mom, although he only wanted to do the seeking. He was getting grumpy about doing more of a tour and walking around the school. Finally coaxed him over to the echo area, where he had me do a time lapse again and a video of him making funny noises. We went upstairs and he used the bathroom. We went into the library, and he was grumpy towards Amanda. Back in the book section he chose a book called School’s Out, by Johanna Hurwitz and had me read the beginning of it. ‘Rambunctious’ was our word of the day. He then ran off to have it checked out by Amanda. He threw it in the return box at first. She checked it out, and we returned Hilda and the Stone Forest.
We walked over to by the pool and field, and Carly found us. We headed back to the car and to home. At home, Mom and Dad gave us some gifts. August got a cool wooden Pinnochio figurine. He only just recently learned about Pinnochio after seeing someone dressed as Pinnochio on Saturday. Later, I explained the basics of the story to him. Carly and I got a wonderful little bowl, and we got a magnet with a fish on it. August unwrapped that one, but he wasn’t impressed. But he liked the last gift: a couple of boxes of candy.
We ate the chicken and salad and veggies for dinner, then August and I spent a good amount of time doing art on his iPad. We found a few new ways to collaborate on art. He didn’t want to see what I was doing when I did my part, so he made himself a fort using the blanket on the red chair.
Carly took him up for a bath. He wasn’t fond of getting his hair washed, but at least it went better than yesterday. Back downstairs we expanded his fort and we did some more art. He was palying with a rubber band, then he was chanting the nonsense words from Toca Band.
I took him upstairs at 7:50. He wanted the lamp, but I suggested the flashlight that he likes and we used that instead. I asked him more about preschool and he said that the high schoolers, and a new teacher he doesn’t know, read them stories around lunch and rest time as part of the reading week. I asked what Lydia did today and he said, “Nothing. She just sitted and sitted and sitted until the end of the day.” We played a game where he was a deerfox walking into an art class after I had said they were imaginary, so then the class drew rel deerfoxes. He curled up next to me, and was asleep pretty quickly at 8:15.
Tying up the water bottle 1:
Tying up the water bottle 2:
Giving them a tour of the school:
Hide and seek:
Echo area time lapse:
Echo area sound:
Not excited by a present:
Rubber band slo-mo:
Toca Band noises:
On the PKA bench with Gramma
Eating from the garden
Kale
Spinning
Pinnochio
Showing her the art
In his fort
Asleep cuddled next to me
With a high school reading buddy. Photo taken by Marina.