He called me in once during the night, 3am or so. He had thrown off the cover and was really stuffy. I was a little afraid he was getting sick. In the morning he was up at 8:20 and actually out at the couch bed. When I came up he asked if it was time to wake up. I said it was up to him and he chose to go back to sleep. We went in his room and he fell back to sleep pretty quickly. I left after a few minutes, then came back at 9:10 to start waking him. Tried a couple times with his eyes opening, then him rolling over and going back to sleep. I had him up around 9:30 but he was very slow to get up.
At 9:45 I started reading the next Boxcar Children book, about a ranch. He asked about the phrase too proud, so a word of the day, and then really about it, saying “You can be proud, but not TOO proud.” He also connected it to bragging, and seemed to suggest that bragging would make you too proud. We went and did our teeth. August asked about shrugging, and was then practicing.
Downstairs he played a little Happy Glass, mainly for ads, then we switched to Minecraft, exploding things in a world he downloaded. He came up with a game for himself, placing the TNT in sort of geometric algorithms, where they could be diagonals of different slopes, but nothing could be completely straight. He was really into it and kept showing me and explained: “Cuz it goes with stuff I like, like math…it’s all about sequences, and I love sequences.”
He did his alone time right after, listening to the Stories Podcast story about the kid that wants to be powerful and takes turns as being things like the wind and a mountain. He gave a big “Haaa” laugh at the end. He had oatmeal, then finished the story, or the next one. Then said, “Time for my TNT secrets.” He did more exploding, then we went outside. We did a Myna and Sister game, then discussed Sister’s age. He wasn’t sure of her age, but by asking him about people he knows he declared she was older than Vivian but younger than Grace. When I suggested 13 he said she shouldn’t be a teenager, so we finally settled on 11.
He agreed with me on something, marking the second time today that he had said I was right about something, he played some piano, and we talked about how people know they own stocks, and how they used to be on paper. He talked about criminals stealing them or making fake ones, and we made connections to money and counterfeiting.
We started making the scone dough, and had most of the stuff mixed when Carly got home and he played chess with her. He then helped finish the scones: he had had fun with using his hands to squish in the butter, and now enjoyed playing with the dough on the counter, getting his hands covered. When done I let him lick his hands. He told Siri, “Hey Siri, I’m eating scone dough.” She responded with “You’re a true gourmand.” She will also say “Bon appétit” and we defined both. He had Siri define the latter for him, and she said it was a salutation before eating, and he asked, “What’s a salutation?” I explained, and he made the connection to sun salutation in yoga and we talked about why it is named that.
When the scones were ready we shared one, then he had one of his own and took some to Carly to try. She said it wasn’t carpety. On the piano he was playing something quite amazing, then told me it was in a pattern of time signatures that goes 8/8, 10/8, 7/8. Crazy that he’s working around with tempo and rhythm like that.
We ate a lunch of crackers and tuna and apple and chocolate milk outside in the chairs. I read a little Boxcar Children, but then he wanted us to go through the whole simulation in a simulation game. That went okay, but then the chair I was sitting in suddenly broke. Think I got it fixed though.
Back inside we looked for wart videos, and he watched the removal of a foot wart that looks similar to his. He handled it quite well. We then played with GarageBand and hooked up the keyboard. He found the exact sort of sound he wanted, saying “The gushing is really what I wanted to play.” He called me over a bit later and said, “Before I was asking how you use diminished chords. I figured it out.” And showed me what he had come up with.
I then had him do a video for Eve and Zoe, of him telling his jokes. It sort of worked, but he wouldn’t tell them to the camera. Think we will try again tomorrow. Maybe it will be easier for him with practice.
He asked, “Can we do writing math? I have a very generous deal for you.” He then decided it was actually a “neutral” deal, as it was good for each of us: one minute of Minecraft for one minute of math. So we did Ms. Safe math at the chalkboard, working on multi digit addition and subtraction with carrying. He can do problems up to 20 in his head, like 20-12. Carly came down and he told her about the neutral deal. He started his 15 minutes of Minecraft and Colin called.
He took some sort of break between his 15 minutes and when it was time to play with Colin and Vivian. I think he had Carly played chess. They then started playing Minecraft in his new city exploding world. Colin couldn’t get in and was getting frustrated. They handled that, with Vivian switching worlds to play with Colin. August was a little annoyed and didn’t want to switch, so I played with him a little before getting ready for a run.
They finished up that, had spaghetti for dinner, and were playing chess when I got back. When I came down he was scooping out watermelon at the counter and eating it. The fruit and veggie delivery had come just as I got back from my run. The rest of the evening was a lot of talking and playing with Colin. Colin wanted to sleep with August, so August went up to the bed to pretend to sleep. I went with, and Colin was telling us when to sleep and when to play. August and I played the Suspend Junior game. August showed Colin his robot from Spenser. We went downstairs when he wanted crackers with peanut butter. He was also doing a lot of talking with Cassie and explained what motivates him to do math when she asked him. He explained our deal, and also said he does it for fun.
When Cassie and Carly started talking food preferences, after August told her about the scones, I think, August sang a “My parents is doing grown up talk” song. Colin stayed on the line as they went up and August had his bath. They finally said good night. It was almost 10. I took over. He now ate his cold watermelon (he hadn’t liked it warm straight out of the watermelon so much) and ate Cheerios as he listened to “With Our Powers Combined”, then “Inch High Samurai”, which he’s heard a few times. He asked about why slaveowners treat slaves badly, and said it wasn’t right, although he mainly had a practical argument about how people respond to motivation. He said, “I’d be nice…that’s the way to motivate people…” He asked about when my finger had a piece off of it. It turned out he meant Carly’s, and I showed him photos of when she had the tip sewn back on.
We brushed our teeth and got headed to bed. We listened to Brian Eno’s The Drop and he was asleep around 11:40.
Explaining his TNT patterns:
Squishing butter into the scone dough:
Changing time signatures 8/8, 10/8, 7/8:
More time signatures:
Song of the day:
More synth:
Music instead of jokes:
Music and telling his jokes:
