He woke up at 6:50. I heard him, but was in the downstairs bathroom. I hurried out and found him at the halfway point of the stairs. He was upset that Carly had already left. I got him to refrain from hitting me, and carried him down to the couch to cuddle with me. But then he surprised me and slapped me. We went upstairs for a timeout and to work on it. We didn’t come down until 7:10 or so. He was sneezing a lot this morning, and sneezed four times on the way down the stairs.
I let him watch a little Magic School Bus as I got us ready. After 7:30 I tried to get him going, and he talked about not wanting to go to preschool. And he pointed out he hadn’t had breakfast. So I gave into being late and let him finish the episode and I got him breakfast. He cheered up after that. He talked about wanting to play at home with me, but he didn’t fight leaving and we were out the door at 8:08. I had to run back for his water bottle, but was luckily just a house up the street. We kind of sang our conversations on the way to school, and when he was dragging his feet to wear out his shoes (he’s decided he wants new shoes, and wants to try on the Minnie Mouse shoes after school) sang a nice “wearing out my shoes” song to the same tune. But he wouldn’t repeat it for a video.
As we got close to school, he told the rule was that I couldn’t poop on him. I said that was good to know, and we ran through other rules, like not dropping pianos on him. I said it was hard to know, since he was a robot and all, and he had me pretending to throw fireballs at him, but they would bounce off.
We parked the bike and headed in. He was in a good mood, and made a funny noise to the guard, who made a funny face and noise back. Down at the classroom, 8:30, they were still having a meeting. I stopped him before he could run in and yell, but when he went in he ran up to the circle and made a funny noise, similar to what he’d done with the guard. It was a little better than yelling, at least.
I went home and worked. Little volunteering for the Consortium website too. I rode back and picked him up. He ran out and told me he’d had a good day but there were two or three hitting incidents, but no crying. One was when a girl from another class kicked him and he kicked back. The other was when he and another boy were erasing the whiteboard and Millie didn’t want them to and grabbed August and he hit her. He was happy to say there was no crying though, and he has stopped using his mean words.
He had STEM class, and when I went in he excitedly showed me the big piece of art he had made using cardboard, glitter paint, and tape. Andrea said they had also used hammers and safety saws today, although August didn’t do any hammering. We told her about how he’s been using tools at home. August had also shown me little clay houses they had made, and talked about how the little things in Ms. Marion’s had been broken, so he broke one two (it didn’t really look important). I asked Andrea a few questions from the parents’ list about upcoming events. Nothing for Valentine’s and they’ll be doing activities with the older grades for Lunar New Year, but parents aren’t invited.
We went over to the playground and August showed me how the toys have been painted new colors. He had some snack, and randomly asked, “What is a hemisphere?” So a word of the day. August then took us over to the garden and he was trying all the plants. He liked the mustard greens the best, saying it had the most flavor. We also went over and tried the mint. Spent a minute on the teeter totter as well, then when he finished his Cheerios we went up to the library to checkout some Elephant and Piggie.
We met Carly at the entrance and went in, and he chose three of the books: I Really like Slop, I Broke My Trunk!!, and I Can Fly!. We all walked home. He stopped at the billboard along the way to rip off some old pieces of signs.
At home he wanted to try our drill in wood (he’d been talking about it at school, and what would it would and wouldn’t work on). He got a scrap of wood outside, and drilled two holes in it with my help.
We went in and he had mac and cheese and broccoli for dinner. He saw me having the veggies and noodles and he wanted some of that as well, so he had that for seconds. He and Carly read two of the new books, then I read the third to him. He wanted to do an imagining game on the couch, so I pretended to be a rock. He asked, “But you’re really dada, right?” This morning I had pretended to be the backup/robo dada for some reason, and he had asked the same thing. He went to the bathroom and he was quoting lines from Hilo, like “Ill lick your butt so hard…”
I started to clean up the magnet blocks, and Carly helped him put the ‘wheat’ in the oven to dry it. We had noticed it was starting to open up as it sat in the vase and dried. He then walked over to me, but stepped on staples on the floor. I saw him standing there. He had pulled out the staples from his foot, by his big toes, and looked sad. At first it didn’t look like it was going to bleed, but then it definitely did. I held him on my lap, while Carly got tissues, then a bandage for him. He was really upset, but then I got him to discuss the pain scale. He said it was currently a 3, but had been an 8 earlier. I was then trying to trick him into saying it dropped to 2. He then kept requesting that I try to trick him.
Carly went up to take a shower. We lay on the floor and he requested the pee visualization again. We did that, going all the way through the pee and water water cycles. He then said his foot was a 1, then a 0. He went to the bathroom and decided to take the bandage off.
We went upstairs and I remembered he’d wanted to try on the Minnie Mouse shoes. But then I found the light-up dog shoes we’d bought in Chelan for the fossil dig. He tried them on and said they were comfy and wants to wear them to school tomorrow.
I got him ready for bed. He had gotten a lollipop when he was hurt, then had a few more licks, and I put it away in its wrapper on the dressed. When I stepped out of the room he went and grabbed it again to get another lick. When I told him not too, he explained it was a natural consequence of me leaving the room, and compared it to how there are natural consequences at school, like when someone gets out of line they lose their spot in line.
We brushed his teeth, and he was asking about explosions, and cars blowing up. I said I didn’t exactly know what it sounded like, as all of my knowledge is from movies, and they are often exaggerated. Exaggerated was another word of the day.
Carly came in and I left them a bit before 9. A lot of laughing before he fell asleep.
Checking on the glue experiment:
Trying the greens:
Taking down old flyers:
Drilling holes in wood:
The dried ‘wheat’:
Metal that’s soldered:
