He woke up at 6:45. I was on the lower bed, and he said , “I thought Mama was sleeping with me.” I climbed up on the bed and he fell back to sleep for another half hour. He was lightly talking in his sleep during this time, which he also did yesterday when he went back to sleep. I got up at 7:15 and was still in the room when he woke up again. He said he had to close the door behind him and I could go back to sleep. I came down a few minutes after him, and he was using cut-up post-it notes to make art. He asked me to make another sloth for him, and Carly made a crane for him instead. She then did a magic trick of making him origami flowers—making the ones from Korea appear out of the berry flower hanging in the kitchen. They’ve been there since it arrived from Korea. He wasn’t impressed.
He and I read The Book that Eats People, then on the iPad read Goodnight, Already!, Rain, and a little Nimona before he got hungry for breakfast. I made french toast, and he helped by spraying the pan with Pam between rounds of french toast. Carly managed to take a little nap on the couch. He and I ate. He ate two slices, putting strawberries on them himself, and proudly leaving the last bite of the second piece. He started to go bother Carly, so I suggested he play on his iPad. The Montessori Preschool game, I think.
After awhile he went and was trying to wake her up. She was getting up, but he was bothering her so I took him upstairs for a minute. We came back down, and the sun came out, and they went outside for a couple minutes. They came back in and Carly got her french toast. He was on the floor with the paints and said, “Mama, we used to always make paintings together, now we never do paintings.” Carly said that was a major guilt trip. He kept it up as she ate her french toast. They then did paint together, and had the idea of painting bookmarks for the librarians.
He then made a dish in a pot: water, salt, baking soda, hot paprika, garlic powder, brown sugar, oil, and cinnamon. We had fun looking at it along the way, and he used the electric mixer on it and then saw how things swirled around in it. Then he added pasta and wanted to boil it on the stove. We did, and when it was done he wanted the pasta strained out of it. We showed it to Carly, who was appropriately disgusted. They basically smelled like cinnamon noodles, and I ate one, much to August’s delight.
August the found a cosmetics thing, then wanted makeup for himself. He referenced an episode of Max and Ruby. I would later realize, and he verified, that this is where the rosy cheeks idea came from when he drew the mama robot. Anyway, she let him use a lip gloss she had bought on accident. He put lip gloss on Carly. She wouldn’t let me take a photo. Then he had fun putting it on himself. He made a scary face for a photo and looks liked a zombie August. He then wanted to put it on me. When I hesitated he said, “I think you’re just nervous. Ruby did it!” So I let him, a couple times. He had me lay down on the floor while he put it on my cheeks and ears. He told me, “You have to respect me cus I’m dressing up you.” Not sure if that is a Max and Ruby reference, but it sounds like it comes from somewhere.
He went upstairs to Carly for a few minutes. They came down and he made a ‘present’ using a big plastic bag that he filled with random stuff and then twisted shut. I shopped for underwear for him on Amazon. He talks about not liking the boy-specific ones with trucks, etc. on them. So looking for more gender-neutral stuff in colors he might like. A startling lack of unisex kids underwear on Amazon, but found one company to try this summer in the states. I had also bought him a watch earlier in the day. Would have gotten it for Christmas, but he reminded me of wanting a watch just a few days before. It is a Garmin Vivofit Jr. 2. With little robots on it: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B075G59RS7/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_DQCkCb40N1K9M Now he can track his activity and steps and tell the time.
I went up for a shower. Carly then let me go work. Their plan was to go to the mall when it stopped raining and buy August his own lip gloss. I went up to do some work, and made initial good progress on an entry about Nabi Saleh.
It rained longer than the forecast had said it would, and we didn’t leave until 3:30. August just had a light sweatshirt on, and Carly asked if he was cold and wanted another sweatshirt. He replied, “I like being cold. And I AM cold.” As we left, Carly pointed out one of the bird feeders they had made out of a Cheerios box. There was a second, made out of an egg carton, that I would see later.
August first had to look at the junk pile across the street. Nothing of use. Then we saw a big stream of muddy water running in the runoff channel. And more branches down on a tree that was broken in the windstorm last year.
At the mall Carly realized that the pharmacy was still closed, although it appeared they were close to reopening with the new branding. We went down to the Tiv Taam. Along the way August wanted to get free samples in the health food store and I told him we could do that afterwards. He went with Carly in the store and she let him pick out a lip gloss. He got a lighter pink. I went in the Delta and looked for underwear for him, but they were basically out of his size anyway. We then went back to the health food store and had free samples. He asked to get something and I agreed. He was excited, and later thanked me for letting him choose something. He chose these little bar things filled with sticky date stuff. He almost switched to ice cream, but I pointed out he’d have to wait for that. So we got those and a tub of peanut butter.
We started walking home and stopped on the first pedestrian bridge, over the stream, and watched the water. We got sticks and leaves and dropped them in. Sticks you immediately lost, but you could see the green leaves.
We were home by 4:30. He played with the ball of green string, then we read a couple chapters of Ramona the Pest. I taught him the word ‘gloaming’ when we were talking about going back out for another walk. He didn’t want to go, so Carly just worked out in the yard while we read.
He got the putty from Andrea and family and we played with that. He wanted to fire it in the catapult, but the arm had come loose and needs to be glued again. Carly was upstairs, and her parents called. He wanted to use the electric piano keyboard and we hooked it up to his iPad. But then he just wanted to make mistakes while I played in Piano Maestro. He then wanted to play with the guitar, but I told him we needed to wait until Carly was done talking. He didn’t respond well to that.
I was talking about getting some dinner and he told me, “Don’t get too excited about making food…cuz you’re going to make art for me first.” We made two collaborative pieces on big pieces of paper. I started by drawing houses and he added to them, making more rooms and windows and other things. They turned out quite nice.
I was then putting dinner together (mac and cheese and broccoli and seitan) when Carly came down. He played with the putty with her, until she decided it was too messy and it got put away.
They then Skyped with Vivian for long time. Colin was dressed in a costume and they went upstairs and August changed into his okygen costume. Carly wanted to take a shower so I came up when I finished a small work thing. He was jealous of something Vivian had.
We took the laptop downstairs and August tied a green string around it while Vivian was showing us something. There was a funny exchange where Vivian told August a ‘secret’—she is eleven days older than Thatcher and August couldn’t tell Thather. August then told her that he could make himself any age, and that she couldn’t tell her mama.
When Carly was done we did goodbye and I started to take August up for his bath. Carly took over and did that. I then came up to put him to sleep. We read The Boy with a Problem(one of the free books from the library) and We Are All Wonders. He had a small scrape on one of his fingers that was bothering him and he asked me to put a bandaid on it.
He fell asleep by 9:20, I think, but I fell asleep as well. I got back up at 10 and went for another nighttime walk, listening to The Mere Wife this time.
Playing with a thread:
His cinnamon noodles:
New lip gloss:
Muddy water:
Dropping a leaf in:
Collaborative art 1:
Collaborative art 2:
A fib:
Trading secrets:
