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He was nursing a lot at 3am. A restless night. Closer to morning he rolled against the headboard and threw his legs over my head. We both slept that way for awhile before he took over most of the bed and I moved to the edge of the pillow. Up around 6. We were upstairs and he said “Dada, go in there and turn the air conditioner on.” I went in the bedroom and turned it on. He giggled and announced “I turned it on 17!”

Downstairs he started watching Timmy Time. I was sitting next to him and he said “When I was sleeping back there, dada fish, I had a very bad nightmare.” I asked “Did real Zinnie have a bad nightmare too? Is that why you had a tough night of sleep?” He gave me a thumbs up. When Carly headed to work he said “I don’t love you.” Which is often his grumpy reaction to her leaving now.

We then spent awhile typing and copying and pasting on my iPad. He then started singing Ants Go Marching and walking around the house. He’s been adding verses himself the last few days. He started with one he’s done before “The ants go marching 90 by 90, the little one stops to break his knee, and they all go marching…” He expanded it, with verses like “The ants go marching 2 books by 2 books, the little one stops to smash a chair, and they all go marching into the underground, to get out of the rain…”

He wanted me to take a photo of him and he made funny faces. He then used the camera as a machine to scan Marshy and Green Monster. Took care of me as a syringe that turned into a flea comb and “coison” to kill fleas – based on the Animal Hospital app.

He played some Word Wagon on my iPad and was excited about silent E words, we then organized his apps and he had fun with that, and then finally he played with Comic Maker as I made a started making a lassi. He helped me put the ingredients together, and when we got to cinnamon he asked “Is this the last thing but not least?” (As in ‘last, but not least’)

He then used my phone to send messages to Carly. She actually responded, which we didn’t expect. We read Berenstain Bears Slumber Party and part of the Magic Treehouse #8 book, where they go to the moon. He was nervous about them running out of oxygen and we had to stop. We then had to act it out: “Can we be two blood cells not getting oxygen…can we be the two lungs not getting oxygen? Can we be bacteria? Dada germ? There’s ton of teeth here.”

We looked at some of the new Hebrew flashcards and used the translation app to figure some things out. We then shifted into being mice and hibernating. Next he watched Sarah and Duck while I exercised and took a shower.

Back downstairs he wanted a music app on my iPad and he found Bloom, a generative music app from Brian Eno that we haven’t used. We spent a long time on it, playing with the delay settings. He liked it on a long delay and waiting for the repeat. Really cool how he got into it. He the moved to the toy piano and was figuring out Yankee Doodle in the key of F sharp.

We then finished Magic Treehouse 8, but only after I looked at the end so I could assure him that the two characters were okay. This is the single most Carly-like thing about him, as she will do that for movies. Near the end of the book, when they realize the stars make a mouse shape and that Peanut, the mouse is special, August got excited. I asked “Why do you think Peanut is special?” He exclaimed “Morgan!” Morgan had been under a spell and was in the stories the whole time, transformed into a mouse. He got so excited when he figured it out.

I put a pizza in the oven and gave him his shower while pizza cooked. He stood on my feet again, something he’s done every day, while I gave him a shower. Makes it hard to wash him. Can’t tell if he’s bothered by the floor being too cold or too hot. He’s not very communicative about proper temperature.

After his shower we were “blasting” everywhere, me picking him up and him firing his rockets to move us around, trying to find Angeles’s socks. That mission accomplished, we went downstairs and he got really excited by a Bjork song, “Innocence” (Sinden Remix), and was dancing all over the downstairs. He sat and ate a piece of pizza for lunch.

He wanted to read the ninth Magic Treehouse book and said something like “I wonder what adventure…?” He was then excited by the beginning of it. We went upstairs and played some guitar, then read Peppa Pig Dentist Trip. Made a game of calling him the names of book and show characters (Peppa, Garfield, Oona, etc.) and he thought that was really funny and kept asking for more.

Finally, we got going and were out the door at 1:50. We drove down past Ikea and just across Highway 2 to the area west of the Poleg Interchange. There is a strip of parks at what’s called Zohar Square. Parked about a block away and walked in the stroller. Stopped at the playground area in the middle of the park and he got on a rocking thing. Then spent quite awhile blasting monsters and dragons and walking on the low wall around the playground. Eventually we got back in the stroller and continued walking.

There was a pedestrian path headed north, and we followed it, then up and across a big pedestrian bridge. Found a park area to the north and kept walking around as he didn’t want to stop and play. He wanted to keep walking but I told him we needed to get back to the car and go do grocery shopping and pick up Carly. He said he wanted to be late picking up mama.

We got back to the car at 3:10 and let him have an “extra mint”. He first said he would keep it a secret from Carly, but then said he could talk to her right now: “I can hear her cuz I have a power that when I say something it goes over to mama.”

We drove to Tim Taam. Should have been a quick trip, but took longer than expected. They’ve now torn apart more parts of the store. Then, I picked a bad line again: only one guy in front of me, but it took forever. Employee was on the phone a couple times, forms were being filled out. But at least I recognized a couple Hebrew words in conversation for the first time. August had put his head down on the cart again and told me he was tired. The guy behind us in line entertained him by poking his (the guy’s) stomach with his (the guy’s finger) and making a funny noise with his (the guy’s) lips.

Finally outside we returned the cart and got going. And hit traffic. I said something about how it would be nice to be able to rocket to the school because we could skip the traffic. He disagreed: “Dada, there’d still have to be traffic cuz there’s rockets in space.”

August had mentioned going to the bathroom before we got to the store, but once in the store he said he could wait until class. But then the slow line and traffic happened and he was saying he really needed to go in the car. I offered to pull over at a bus stop and he could go in the dirt, but he refused. When we got to the school I ran him in to the performing arts building and took him to the bathroom.

We got to class about 4:40, which normally would have been fine, but today it was starting at 4:30. We walked in with other people who were also late, but August didn’t like the slight extra busy-ness. Perhaps because we didn’t walk in with the teacher like usual, or because he was already tired, he decided he just wasn’t doing class today. Got him to look in for a minute, but that was it. He told us he was afraid of the teacher, even though this is the teacher he really likes.

We headed hom and got there at 5. He said he wanted to “Just lie on the couch.” When Carly pointed out that that meant not nursing he thought it was funny. They nursed. He was grumpy about having to stop and threatened to throw a pillow at Carly. She said he’d have to have a timeout. He thought about it and asked her “Can you throw this at yourself?”

Had some dinner, then Carly read him the letter from Josephine. He liked that. They then skype called me from the table while
I was on the other side of the room. We read half of the You Wouldn’t Want to Live without Bacteria book, then Magic Treehouse #9. He’s really getting into the predictions thing. When they got into the mini-sub he said “I think that will help them find the thing for the R word thing.” “R word” meant ‘riddle’ – he just couldn’t remember the word.

He was then pretending we were in a sub. He was pushing an ‘8’ button to steer us down: “I can’t see anything now.”

Did a lot of flops on the bed and he pretended to be the skipping CD player in the musical sculpture at the park. He was the laser and I was the disc. Brushed his teeth, and he was being a mouse. I suggested he dream about cheese and we agreed he’d dream about mice and cheese. He was asleep at 7:35.

Photos: 

By Zohar Square: 

Tiv Taam: 

The closest he got to class:

He woke up around 5:40. At 6 he told Carly “I have to call someone on your phone.” Downstairs he played some Dragonbox Big Numbers then they read part of Berenstain Bears Trouble with Pets. I let him play Toca Robot Lab on my iPad as Carly left. We Skyped with my parents. They asked about his Cars shirt and I told them that a few nights ago, when Carly put it on him, he said “But. I’m not Colin. I don’t like cars.”

We then watched the “What’s the Name of that Song?” Sesame Street video as we’ve been trying to remember all the words. That led to watching other Sesame Street songs. YouTube then switched to an Ants Go Marching video. He was surprised it stopped at 10 and had forgotten that we made up our 11 to 20 verses. It was raining outside this morning and we had a good downpour for a few minutes.

We finished reading Trouble with Pets, then he was a puppy panting on the floor. We next read Bad Habit. Then we acted out, several times, him being a puppy and tearing up the house while I went shopping. He also needed a shot. We read 3 chapters of Magic Treehouse #8: Midnight on the Moon book. Then pulled up a video of astronauts walking on the moon. We’d watched a video of astronauts falling down before, but he didn’t want that one – he didn’t want to see them fall down. We then watched several Arabic alphabet songs videos, finding a couple with the same song that we liked.

He then spotted the collection of songs from ABCKidsTV that he used to watch: https://youtu.be/_UR-l3QI2nE He watched that while I exercised and showered. We then finished the video. Went downstairs and heated up the leftover salmon sandwich from yesterday and made a grilled cheese sandwich and cut up strawberries for lunch. We watched and sang along to Sesame Street songs, and found some new ones: He quite liked ones from Adam Sandler and Norah Jones. Then gave him a shower.

Shmuel called while I was giving August his shower, then again as we were leaving. He asked if he had left his purple bag with papers in it here. An odd conversation as that was weeks ago, and he instantly rejected my suggestion he might have left it in the locked garage.

August and I drove to Ra’anana Park. We parked at the east end at 1 and paid for parking until 3:10. We took the stroller and walked to the west end of the park and around the pond. On the far side of the pond we came across the musical sculptures garden: different xylophones, harps, etc. in varying states of working order. But his favorite was a big yellow sphere with a handle out of the top. You walked (or ran) around in circles and it played Hebrew children’s songs. We played with that for a long time. He asked me to turn it and said “I’m gonna play my strumming instrument. It has all the notes in the world!”

We took a break to read Berenstain Bears Bad Habit, then to have fun taking some photos. We then read another chapter of Magic Treehouse #9. He’s kind of scared of this one, afraid that they’re going to get a leak in their spacesuits on the moon. We also had a snack. A smell wafted past and he said “Dada. I smell something good. It smells like oatmeal.”

He was worried about parking time, and would continue to be, asking repeatedly what would happen if we stayed too long or left early. As we left that spot at 2:35 I said we could call it the music spot at Ra’anana Park. He added “And this is my favorite place!” We continued the walk around the pond, then headed back to the east end. As we went he was having us fight all sorts of dragons, etc. He had freezing power.

We looked at the zoo for a few minutes. He wasn’t really into it though, saying he didn’t like deer. But of the emu he said “Huge, giant, enormous!” We stopped at the bathroom, then walked to the car, getting there a little after 3. But that took us by the playground and he decided he wanted to stay longer. So we put more time in the meter, until just after 4 and headed back. At first he changed his mind right away: “Let’s go home now.” But we ended up playing on the exercise equipment for quite awhile. He’d use one piece of equipment, say he was ready to go, but then see another machine he’d want to use.

He saw a spider web under one chair and asked “What will happen if I touch it?” I said “Maybe a spider will come and wrap you in a thread and save you to eat you later.” He replied “No! It won’t….Could you joke about that?” Me: “I just did.” Him: “Could you joke about it again?”

We then went over and played at the acorn spaceship. He said he was going to a “A tree planet with air.” He then found the fake hollow log and decided we were termites: “Dada termite! Eat the log!” “Can we go to our termite car?”

We left after 3:50. We drove over to Wiz Kids, which is an English book/game store nearby. August wasn’t very excited about it, so didn’t get a long look around. Ended up buying a couple sets of Hebrew flash cards and a couple of games – one storytelling game and one about nursery rhymes – out of their sale area.

Lots of traffic and we got home just before 5. As we got out of the car he spotted Carly walking down the street towards home.

They nursed and I got stuff out for dinner. I asked if Carly wanted tea and she said yes, and August said he wanted tea as well. I asked if he wanted apple cinnamon tea and he said yes. He was then surprised and very excited about the apple cinnamon tea I made for him and that it was just his. He drank the whole cup.

We read Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible No Good Very Bad Day, then looked at the fairy tale game. He threw his empty water bottle at me, so I took him up to the bed. We ended up doing flops on the bed and he wanted mama to come up to go ballistic. He was then a baby squirrel curling up in my arms so I thought he was getting tired. I went down to get books. He came down, carrying Marshy, and slipped and fell on the floor. I distracted him by taking care of Marshy, who had slid into the chair leg. August was then being a syringe, hopping as he didn’t have feet. He then wanted us to take care of Green Monster, operating for a broken humerus.

He played with the calculator on Carly’s computer – billions, etc. then wanted to Skype with someone. They called Glecy but he was upset that Carly wouldn’t let him play the little video emojis.

We took him back upstairs and he was plenty hyper for awhile. Brushed his teeth, then he and Carly had a came passing things in a circle under the cover and out from under the cover. He was doing a ton of laughing. As we put him to sleep I said “Have a good sleep.” He responded “Okay, I’ll dream about air conditioners.” I left them just before 7.

He walked downstairs at 8:50 as Carly was skyping with Glecy. Shocked us as he hasn’t done that for a long time.

Being a dog chewing everything: 

Perched on the stool from Nazareth: 

Ra’anana Park. Posing for a photo: 

We talked about how we used to use changing tables all the time. He remember not liking them for awhile: 

Exercising: 

Acorn rocket: 

Being termites: 

In Wiz Kids: 

He was up at 5:45. Watched Smurfs as Carly left. We then read several chapters of Magic Treehouse #7: Sunset of the Sabertooth. He was being Peanut, the Mouse, who is cold and cuddling behind my back and watching me read over my shoulder. We got into taking photos, then he wanted to go for a walk and take pano photos. We got our warm clothes on. He was being a fish again and said he pulled up his sweatshirt zipper with his fins. Outside he pulled some weeds near the door, then we got on our walk at 7:50.

We wandered around singing songs to Tal Garden. We played with the soccer ball in the ball chute thing, but that just lasted a couple minutes. He wanted to take a panoramic photo. He was protective of the ball, wanting to put it back in the bike so no one would take it. There wasn’t anyone else in sight. I convinced him to set it on a seat next to us. Took a few photos, doing them together, then he wanted to keep walking. He was doing rocket blasts with his hands, Hilo style, and when we got to the little park south of us (where the didgeridoo player was) he blasting all sorts of monsters that were going to come out of the bushes and attack me or throw up on me. Did one more pano photo and blasted more monsters, then headed home.

We finished reading Magic Treehouse #7 then got our books together to take back to the school – 7 in all. He then watched Timmy Time. We went upstairs to start some laundry. He said “Today’s washing day. Tomorrow’s dragon day. I fight dragons with my rockets.” Then he asked “Dada, can we actually play the guitar with GarageBand?” We ended up playing mandolin instead. He would choose chords on the phone that he wanted me to play.

I exercised and took a shower while he watched Timmy Time and Smurfs, then gave him a shower.

Back downstairs I cut strawberries and made teriyaki salmon sandwiches for lunch. He ate all the strawberries before I could join him at the table. Listened to Chemical Brothers and he loved it, adding the first two songs to his playlist. He then requested Toca Robot Lab so he played that for a bit.

As we got ready to go he played with the cardboard tube from the rug, simultaneously trying to destroy it and saying he wanted to keep it forever. He asked if we could ship it and when I asked why he said he wanted it forever.

I had planned on driving down to another park in Netanya, then going to the Ace store. But August really wanted a walk on his orange bike instead. So we did that, leaving at 1. We walked up to the dead end, adding to our cat count – think we were up to around 18. He said “I always use number magic to put numbers on the animals.” In fact, as we kept walking we were fighting more monsters and robots and he had all sorts of powers: “Let’s use our brick lasers” “Really heavy falling tree power” “Hurricane power”

We didn’t walk for long and decided to head to school early. On the way I let him hold the container of new crackers. When I went to get him out, I found him eating them like a sandwich, six crackers at a time.

We went to the library. Returned 3 Magic Treehouse books, Du Iz Tak, Ada’s Violin, and 2 Berenstain Bears books.  Ilana said there was a class coming in soon so August and I went and grabbed a bunch of Berenstain Bear books, a Star Wars book, two Magic Treehouse books, and a book called You Don’t Want to Live Without Electricity. We went back to our usual bean bags and read much of the electricity book, then three Berenstain Bears books: Learn about Strangers, Forget Their Manners, and Ghost of the Forest, which we read twice. August figured out right away that the third ghost was Mama Bear and thought it was really funny.

We went to the bathroom once, and while we were there he was saying big numbers. When I had trouble following them, he said he had “Comma power” and put in commas so I could understand the numbers.

When he was done in the library he carried the seven books we had to check out up to the desk. He realized that Liz was gone, but Amanda helped us out and checked out the books. She asked what we had done over Thanksgiving and I mentioned that we had gone to the beach. I said we had made sandcastles, and he added “And moats”.

We left the library at 3:10. Put on his sweatshirt and he wanted to pull up the zipper on his own, which he’s been doing recently. He’s been doing other things more independently too, like he can usually push the drinking fountain buttons on his own now.

We first went to the preschool playground. Spent most of the time cooking “toad spots” in a pan and tasting that. Looked up and saw the moon and we talked about the gibbous moon, which he joked was the “give us moon”, so we kept telling the moon to give us things. Then he was asking why we couldn’t walk on the big chunks of wood and we talked about stable versus unstable and demonstrated by having him crouch down and I tried to shove him off balance, which he found quite funny.

We went to big playground and he spun around a post saying “Go go go” until I got him to stop. We went up to his rocket and climbed in that. Think we went to Neptune. Back down on the playground he heard two girls tell a boy (a brother, I think) that their game was “Girls only”. August was concerned about that and kept watching them. He wasn’t sure if he could go on the play structure. He was then saying “Only big boys can play!” as we played around.

Done there, we went back to the library building, riding the elevator up after using his rockets to fly him across the lawn. We sat outside the library and he sent Carly messages on the phone. He was ready to go, so at a couple minutes to 4:30 we walked a slightly long way to Carly’s classroom. Ayal saw August practicing saying “Mama! Time to stop working! It’s 4:30!” He liked that as a bit earlier he’d said something to us about how Carly should go home. We burst through the door and August delivered his line really well.

We got home at 4:50. He was falling asleep as they nursed. Got him back awake by Skyping with Cherie, then we ate dinner. Tried to get him to read some of our new books, but he was tired and didn’t feel like reading. He lasted until 6:45, at which time I left them to sleep. I asked what he was going to dream about and he said “Helicopters!” He was asleep by 6:50.

Rockets: 

V: 

Cracker sandwich: 

Reading: 

Doing circles: 

In his rocket: 

He was up at 6:30. They came down at 6:50 and said that mama was getting him fish food (Cheerios). I asked if he woke up as a fish today and he said uh-huh. He did some typing on my iPad, then we were doing the copy-all and paste thing. The iPad was being slow at that so I got out Magic Treehouse #6 and we finished that. He asked”So dada fish, can I have some zucchini bread?” We read Du Iz Tak. He was singing each page before I read it. When we turned the page he would put his hand in front of my mouth, sing the pages, then let me read. We moved to GarageBand and the keyboard. He’s playing Yankee Doodle more, but mainly interested in different octaves and scales. He was being different chords: “I’m A minor!”

He got the long cardboard tube and used it like a telescope: “I’m a spy cow.” That’s from the Treehouse books. Then he was a musical scale: “I’m actually a scale. No one named us. there’s thousands of us…billions…nonnilloins…And I need you to name me.” We decided on the QZ scale. He then wanted guitar and we went upstairs and plugged in the guitar and talked about chords a lot.

He watched Smurfs and I exercised and took a shower. While he finished a Smurfs I watched a few minutes of the last Formula 1 race of the season. August then watched with me for a few minutes, wanting to see cars crash. But he was also really interested in the numbers (places, intervals, gears, speeds). Then for a long time he was race cars on the bed: crashing into each other, slipping in the rain, crashing into the walls, going up and down gears, etc.

We went downstairs for lunch. He activated Siri on my iPad and was talking to it: “How are you doing?” “We’re making lunch!” We had some strawberries and two pizzas I made: olive and cheese. We ate our pizza and August had been looking at Google Maps and wondered why ‘Home’ didn’t have our pictures of home. I explained we didn’t post our photos of home to Google Maps. He wanted to, and I told him about his Instagram account and he wanted to post a photo. So we did the photo he took of me playing mandolin and he chose the filter, etc.

I then hauled him up for a shower. He was okay once he was in the shower and insisted on spraying my feet at the end. I put his new underwear on him when we chose clothes and he liked them. We did more guitar. He set a timer on my watch for 23 hours and I said it wouldn’t go off until lunch tomorrow. He said he had a time travel sensor: “Some sort of sensor that I touch it with my feet it goes to tomorrow lunch time.”

We went downstairs and read Berenstain Bears Moving Day. We then ate the pumpkin pie that Carly had left us, leftover from the party. His first pumpkin pie. Liked it well enough. We were still fish, and August kept saying we were surrounded by oil and asking how we would get through it. Got snacks together, then blasted through it out the door.

We left at 1:30 and drove down into Netanya a bit. When we got out of the car he was getting sleepy and leaned against the car as I got the stroller and stuff out. We parked by Shaked Garden in the Agamim neighborhood, which seems to be an immigrant neighborhood. As we got walking I said “Something smells good”. He said “It’s curry!”

At the park we first stopped at a bench for a snack of grapes. He wanted a note so we played the piano on my phone for a minute, then I made him go play. The park was empty but he complained about people: “I don’t like people. Just mama. Not you though.” Got playing though: a jeep thing, a shaky bridge, going down a tube slide to slide into me, playing on the slide and singing “Yankee and Doodle”. “Sandifying” each other. We then left at 2:30 on a walk.

We walked to the south and into Winter Lake Park at its northeast corner. We walked to the south and played at the big playground at the southeast corner. Lots of climbing equipment and turning things. He saw signs on the equipment and wanted me to translate. It said “For ages 4 and up”. He didn’t like that, despite my assurances that he could still play on it. He said “I don’t like signs”. It reminded me of “Signs” by Five Man Electrical Band, so I played it on my phone. He liked it, dancing to it, and said “Can I listen to that song again?” While I was standing near the climbing structure a hooded crow flew right behind my head. August saw it.

We continued walking around the lake and found the big wooden playground on the west side of the park. Started to play there, but he needed a bathroom. So we walked to the southwest corner and used a bathroom by the skate park. He played on a little hill outside, running down it, but then started yelling “Go!” towards people off in the distance. I said it wasn’t funny, and suggested yelling random stuff, like “Spaghetti power!” He liked that phrase and as we rode the stroller back towards the playground he said “I have spaghetti power!” His power would let us go through trees, poles, etc. I’d drive towards them and we’d pretend to go through things. We played around like that. Found a soccer ball in the center and kicked it around, but August wasn’t interested in the ball, just his powers.

I emailed Carly about picking her up from work, then he sent her a message. On our walk back to the car we smelled the curry smell again and investigated, walking to the east past the grocery store and around the square next to it and across the street. No luck, so we headed back to the car. He sent her more emojis when we got back to the car.

We picked her up at 4:45. He had my phone and was sending her messages while we sat there waiting for her, then more messages as they rode next to each other on the way home. He took off his shoes at the door but then tripped coming in the door and scraped his feet a bit. It was still bothering him after nursing. He was grumpy and said he didn’t like anything: “I don’t like chocolate or presents.” Carly started opening the box from Dee, then realized it was a Christmas present so stopped. August said “I don’t like Christmas.” I held him on my lap and we read Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day twice, then The Berenstain Bears and the Green-Eyed Monster.

He opened Skype on Carly’s computer and saw that Cherie was online: “Let’s Skype with Oma!” He danced as it rang. She didn’t answer, so he left a message. Chuck called back and he skyped with him for awhile. We read Berenstain Bears Moving Day and much of the Peppa Pig collection after I had mentioned to Carly that it had two different stories about how they move to their new house. He then sang a new version of Yankee Doodle: “Princess Peppa goes to school riding on a pony, stuck a feather in her hat and became a wizard.”

He was a baby squirrel at bedtime. I told him to dream about acorns and he agreed. He then asked “Do squirrels nurse?” Excited when I said yes. I left him at 7:25 and he was asleep soon after.

Spy cow: 

Hi: 

Shaked Garden: 

Sandifying: 

Winter Lake Park. Where he didn’t like the signs: 

Our water dilemma: 

Photo he took: 

They got up at 6:36. He was upset and wanted to keep nursing. When I came down they were playing with Legos, making a base to protect their spaceship from aliens. August said “Only the nice ones can come in.” He was singing his mashup between When Johnny Comes Marching and The Ants Go Marching.

We read the rest of Max Axiom Magnetism and part of Plumdog. We shared some zucchini bread. August then looked at Google Maps, asking “Where should we go today?” He then wanted to watch Kipper. Started with Arnold’s Balloon Trip on YouTube.

I went and took a shower. Back downstairs they went outside for a bit. August came back in and we were hedgehogs. He started saving grubs and worms for later, as we learned that hedgehogs do (by paralyzing them). And “We’ll also make worm bread. That’s gonna sound good for us but not humans though.”

He and I went for a walk at 9:30. He was singing songs really low and said “I’m playing in a lower octave.” Then “The scale I’m singing in is called blues smash. It sounds like people smashing water.” We wandered around and eventually up to the dead end and back. We were counting cats and ended up with 8 cats and one lizard on our walk. We eventually ended up at Tal Garden and he wanted to use the ball thing where you throw the ball in the top and it comes out of one of three tubes. We headed home for a ball, but figured he’d want to stay home. We were home at 10:10. He said “Can we eat a grub? This is our secret refrigerator.”

I spent some time hanging new hooks up for the photographs above the dining table and some other pieces we’d taken down when the previous sticky stuff failed to work. They went outside, then upstairs to get ready to go to the mall. They had a secret, which August eventually told me: getting a chocolate smoothie. He helped me hang hooks by peeling off the old tape and then helping put the new strips on the hooks.

We left about noon. Made it over to the mall and started clothes shopping. August wanted to get the smoothie first. He made it through the first shop, where we just bought some underwear for him (which he hasn’t been wearing for a couple months), and sort of made it through the second (where Carly got one pair of pants for him to see how the size works). But he had a meltdown when we said we were going to the grocery store next. Carly took him out the back mall doors while I went and did the shopping. I tried calling Carly, then walked around the mall myself. She had forgotten her phone and gotten locked out. She grabbed one more item, then we paid and headed for a smoothie.

August was doing much better – the getting locked out and walking around had really distracted him – and they went for a smoothie. I went back to the second store to look for socks (no luck), then to מאיה, the health food store, where I found some fluoride-free toothpaste for August. I found them out on the bench, drinking the smoothie. I helped August finish it and Carly ran in to the pharmacy and to the cleaner to pick up a blanket we had dropped off. When Carly came back August said “Thank you mama for the smoothie.” We headed home at 1:20.

August wanted to walk the long path home, but Carly was carrying the blanket. August told her to take the short way, and we would see her at home. He kept wanting to know what key we were singing in, so when we got home at 1:45 I installed the Piano Companion app on my phone we we’d always have a piano handy to play a note.

Carly had made salsa, so we had some of that and other food. August primarily likes the cilantro out of the salsa so will ask me to pick that out for him and put it on his chips. Carly went outside, and he played on her computer with Excel and Maps. He was singing the Peanut Butter and Jelly song to himself and making up nonsense words. When Carly made him a sandwich earlier he had asked me to sing it, then we were singing it on our walk. I put up pictures and a few more hooks, organizing our entryway.

After 3 we got in the car and drove over to Udim, south of Ikea and went to the Udim Reserve. Put August in the big backpack. We walked up a short trail that ended at a cliff where they had cut through to make a channel to drain the swampland to the west. Walked back down that, then down a dirt road that was supposed to take us over to the National Trail. I said “Oh, There’s no bridge here.” He immediately responded “Then why are you still walking‽” We walked north on a parallel dirt road. August was being a bit demanding for snacks so we ignored him. He said “I’m going to use a different tone now.” We looped around to the car and left at 4:15.

We drove to Ikea and had a wonderful shopping trip as August was having a ton of fun. He found a couple of hopscotch courses on the floor and hopped on them and followed footprints and arrows on the floor. He hung from the handle of the cart while Carly pushed it. We got a rug to put in the kitchen and a few small things. We got a hotdog, fries, and falafel sandwich (and an orange juice) and sat and ate them there. He was then spotting ‘exit’ in Hebrew on the floor. All was well until we exited, then right as we went through the checkpoint he tripped and fell, I think looking back at the guy talking to us.

In the car he sent messages to Carly from my phone. At home they Skyped with Oma and Opa and he traded messages with Chuck. He then found the long cardboard tube from the rug and Carly went outside with him so he could play with it. They played tug of war with it, and after winning a couple times he let Carly be the strongest.

Back inside he found the tape measure and was measuring everything, pretty accurately now. He played GarageBand on his iPad to play electric guitar – which Carly wasn’t excited about, but then I told him that was a great idea and he agreed. We read to chapter 8 of Magic Treehouse 6, then Carly took him upstairs.

They were being fish up on his bed. He went to the bathroom and was speaking different languages. He was still a fish until I said that fish don’t nurse. As I said goodnight to him he said, unprompted, “I’m gonna dream about magnets.” I left them at 7:40 and he was asleep by 7:50.

In the backamapack: 

Udim Reserve: 

Ikea: 

He woke me up at “6:37”. He was watching some Timmy Time when I came down, then an episode of Smurfs. He nursed and pretended to be one year old “Nuh, Nuh, Nuh, Nuh”. Played with Siri on the iPad, then we played with Legos. We made the boats and took them up to float them. He emptied out the Lego container to fill that. We did, but it wasn’t much room for the boats to float in and he then suggested the green bathtub. I said “That’s what I suggested in the first place.” He then was repeating that sentence.

Back downstairs August got upset, wanting to nurse before the timer was up. Told Carly once “Mama! You’re not paying attention to me!” Carly too him upstairs to calm down.

Then another confrontation with the downstairs neighbor. He hammered on the window with a broomstick. I went out, video on, and calmly told him that’s not how we communicate and offered to give him my phone number. Thought we were making progress when he went and got his phone and took my number. But then when I apologized and said that Carly had taken August upstairs as soon as he’d been loud he swung the broom at my head. I ducked and he hit the fence several times, then said “Son of a bitch. Take him out. I’ll break your bones.” Sadly, I’d stopped recording when I gave him my number.

Went in and called Shmuel and emailed Ada. Then I went upstairs and took a shower, after which Carly gave him a shower. He was upset up on the bed and she was getting clothes on him. Carly squeezed the bad mood out of him and I pretended it got on me. He thought it was funny when I pretended to have a bad mood.

Back downstairs we read Alexander and the Horrible, Terrible, No-Good, Very Bad Day. He then play acted printing paper and buying a yo-yo. When I said I wasn’t very good with a yo-yo he said “You need to go to a yo-yo class.”

We got going at 11:25. Read Alexander and ate strawberries in the car. Parked and walked down to Argaman’s Beach. August was singing “Whats the name of that song”. Got to the beach at 12. Walked a bit south and played in the sand by some rocks. Brought the bucket at toys this time. They made sandcastles and August would put a shell on top and crush it. August needed to use the bathroom and I took him. He was running along the beach, singing about “negative infinity” to the tune of “What’s the Name of that Song?” The bathrooms were closed, so I had him pee in the sand up on the hill behind a little retaining wall. We got back to Carly at 12:35. He immediately told her “I peed on sand.” I got the stick out of the backpack and did some writing in Hebrew. August saw the stick and said “Sticky!” I drew a big Q and he stood in the middle of it. Then August used it to drew mem sofits, as Carly pointed out, probably his current favorite Hebrew letter (previously it had been tzadi sofit).

We left about 1 and walked up to the car, then across the street. There is a playground there and we played on it for awhile. Carly tried to go into the hotel to use the bathroom, but no luck. August was quite interested in the cubes that showed the weight of different materials. A boy demonstrated the bike that makes a funnel in a tube of water for him, then Carly and I did it.

We then drove up into Netanya and parked just north of downtown. Along the way I told him why I liked the windows closed in the car. He asked me to repeat the story.

We parked just north of the downtown core area, near the waterfront. Started walking and found Rhythm and Friends juice bar and cafe. Ordered a large iced coffee, a green mojito smoothie (August liked the sound of the mint in it – also had pineapple, almond milk, dates, and something else), and a cheese sandwich. August was dancing and pretending to play along to a Supertramp song so we added it to his playlist.

We went for a walk through the Independence Square area, then around some streets to the north, pausing at a little closed museum to look at the historic photos outside. Then across to the park area at the top of the cliffs. Admired the view and checked out some pokey aloe plants, then realized August and I were standing in an area dense with ants. He played in some sand and wanted me to pretend to step on his hand so his hand (a crab) could pinch me.

We headed home. On the way we read Alexander and Berenstain Bears Moving Day and ate some grapes. Home at 3:55.

He went to the bathroom then he and I took the box from the shelves to recycling. He had fun trying to stand on it first. Got our 10,000 steps at the park, then used the exercise equipment. He was asking how the different machines exercised him. Finally, played with the water fountains. He also said “Sorry, wheelbarrow. We ran out of wheelbarrow food.” We hadn’t been talking about wheelbarrows, so don’t know where that came from. He was watching the water pool on the concrete, so maybe he thought it was the shape of a wheelbarrow.

Back at home he played the Elmo Loves 123s game, then we had some dinner. Carly sliced up some apple or pear and August liked it. He offered me a piece and said “You have to try this.” We all then Skyped with Cassie and family, then with Cherie and Chuck. While Carly was using her computer to have an actual call with Cassie and Vivian, August was using my iPad to record a video for her.

After all that excitement, August and I read Ada’s Violin: The Story of the Recycled Orchestra of Paraguay. A really cool story and book. We brushed his teeth, then he ran a donut machine up on the bed: “I ran out of dough.” He was asleep about 8.

In a Q: 

Cuddling: 

Exercising. He is actually swinging his legs off the ground: 

He was up a lot in the night. At one point, after nursing, he asked Carly “Why aren’t you nursing me?” then fell asleep on his own. At another point I heard him have a big laugh in his sleep. At 5 I thought it was 7:25 and was happy to go back to sleep. He got up and I sent him downstairs and heard him say “Mama! I waked up at 6:40!”

I got up and made French toast. He was watching something and I asked “Do you want French toast?” He had a hilarious response as he distractly tried to tell me that he was running out of Cheerios: “Yeah…Umm, my Cheerios are…Could you cook it?” When he was done with his French Toast he started sticking his fingers in the syrup on his plate. Cute at first, but then he did his whole hand.

He remembered his pizza pillows from last night and asked”What happened to the pizza I was slicing last night?” Then “Let’s go back to putting pizza on the plates.” So we did that a bit. He then spent quite awhile sending Happy Thanksgiving messages to family members on Skype. Carly suggested they go outside and he tried to run out in socks but stopped when he saw it was wet outside. They decided to clean out the interesting bowl and throw everything away. He said “Bye bye interesting stuff in the interesting bowl.”

I took a shower, then we brought down the shelves to see how another set would look downstairs and considered a spot for the new wall hanging. Carly and I then were taking photos of each other holding it so we could see and he got into the action: “Can I take a photo of you as a wall hanging?” He took other photos, and we did some slo-mo video as well of him shaking his hair.

We got going and headed to Ikea. As we went down the stairs inside August said “Ikea’s huge…giant…. enormous.” Made quick work of our shopping, just grabbing plastic bags as we passed and heading straight for the book shelves, getting them in black. Then chose the worst line and had a long wait to checkout. Carly went and got us a falafel sandwich and a hotdog and fries and we ate those for lunch.

From there we went to Tiv Taam. The highlight for August was using Carly’s pen to cross things off the list. And he drew a map on his hands.

We got home at 1:40. He climbed on the Ikea box. Tried to ask him something and he said “Yeah but I’m on the box.” He also gave Carly a funny look when he climbed on it and we called them his cat eyes. He replied “Actually, I’m Zinnie. But I still lay on boxes.”

He ate a bunch of strawberries – the first strawberries of the season that we’ve seen in the store. I made zucchini bread and Carly put together the shelves. Both went well, aside from one minor break on the shelves, and August got upset when Carly wouldn’t let him hammer on his own. Apparently I let him hammer on his own. That really frustrated him. He hopped back and forth between us, helping with bread, then the shelves.

He eventually got upset about nursing and Carly took him upstairs for a timeout. I then took him to the cages at 3:45 to do recycling. We then went for a walk, and as we walked south towards the trail we saw a guy playing digeredoo in the little park. He liked that. We got home at 4:30. We had listened to “Alice’s Restaurant” while I made bread and August said “This is a Thanksgiving song!” Also listened to Dan Bern’s “Thanksgiving Day Parade” and when we got back I found a Storybots Thanksgiving song that he listened to several times. They then read part of Magic Treehouse #7.

We were the first to arrive at the party at 5:30. Good for August. He wandered around a bit and we got him some food early, just before 6. He was pretty fascinated by the video of a fireplace they had playing on the TV (Derek and Jill used to do the same thing at their place, but it didn’t attract his attention much back then). When August said he was ready to go home I instead got the iPad out. I had the Peanuts Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Halloween episodes on it. He watched part of Thanksgiving inside, then got a bit overwhelmed. I went outside with him and we watched together, sitting on the bench swing. Carly and I switched and I went inside. They came in a little later. I kept him around a bit longer, getting him more foods to try. He ate some more, then he and Carly decided to head home at 7:10.

Back at home he took a basic shower, but said he didn’t want to get the bed wet because “that’s boring”. He was asleep at 7:50.

I was home around 9. A lot of the conversation centered around Washington State, as Mike’s daughter is trying to get on the rowing team there, and they own a house up south of Bellingham.  Also, Holly’s daughter is looking at small places that would fit her and people were suggesting Evergreen.

Taking a photo of mama as a wall hanging: 

Drawing a map on his hand: 

Watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving: 

Our view of Carly: 

More food: 

On our way: 

Up the stairs to Jaffa Gate: 

Into the market streets: 

Graffiti: 

Incense: 

Lunch: 

Western Wall: 

Between: 

Gates: 

Selfie in the rain: 

T-shirt: 

Candied fruits: 

City wall: 

Big math numbers: 

Our first family trip to Jerusalem!

He was nursing around 5:20 and almost got up but fell back to sleep until 6:50. At one point he said “Why aren’t you nursing me?” after they had been nursing, but then fell asleep on his own.

They read some of Thieves of Ostia, which Carly is reading for school. Then he was quite upset when he couldn’t nurse again right away. We were getting ready to go and I went and took a shower. He was then watching Peg + Cat, including  “The Beethoven Problem”, which I watched with him. Carly made him some of ‘my’ oatmeal for breakfast (the instant kind). He was keeping it a “secret” from me and kept saying things like “Keep watching and you’ll see! Keep watching and you’ll find out!”

He was then singing the ZYX song phonetically, all the way through, following up doing it with the Hebrew alphabet song as well. This is something that is pretty much his own invention, although a couple of the alphabet songs we know, like A Ah Apples and the A Makes Ah songs have a phonetic component to them.

A bit rainy out as I started to take things out to the car. There was a little plane flying really low, and doing circles around the area so I told him about it. He came out and watched the plane with me and walked to the car with me. He was then humming Eine Kleine Nachtmusik fast and slow.

We left around 9, Carly driving. We stopped at the bank, parking in our usual spot around the corner. The ATM worked! Back at the car August wanted to show Carly the sculptures at the house and was upset when we drove away.

We played some GroGarden along the way and read some of Magic Treehouse #6. He found he had control of the window and asked “Why do I have control?” Carly: “I guess because I trust you.” Him: “Well, okay. We’ll see about that.” He also sang his sofit song. As we got to the parking garage west of the old city there was a big traffic jam getting into it. We finally made it in and parked around 11:30. We stopped at a bathroom in the mall area and as he came out he sang a “I shake my hands at home” song.

We walked west through the mall area, then into the old city at the Jaffa Gate, past the Tower of David, and straight to exploring the market streets. August was pretty much in control. He liked the steps and the little ramp things, and when we came to a fork he often chose the direction that seemed busiest. We meandered north of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and then to the east, then back south and east, eventually stopping at the Al Burma restaurant for lunch. Very cool underground interior. We got hummus, Turkish salad, and a shawarma plate. The hummus was green with likely pistachios so Carly skipped that.

We continued west and found the Western Wall. We watched there for several minutes. August was interested enough. He and I wandered around a bit. Before we left we stopped for the bathroom. I took him in, and he was fascinated by all the toilet stalls, which were numbered. He let me close the door to his stall while I went to the bathroom, and I heard him start to sing a “I’m going to the bathroom in toilet 19” song.

We walked south out of the Western Wall area at the Dung Gate, where a Jewish man put his hand on my head and said a prayer for us. We then walked along the city walls to the south and through the area around King David’s tomb, before walking back up along the walls on the west side. We read a couple signs about the history of the wall, but then it started to rain heavier. I was carrying him from the steps to the south, and continued carrying him as we made our way back to the Jaffa Gate.

We looked at rugs at a shop we had seen at the beginning, but couldn’t decide on anything. While we considered what to do next, August walked in circles in front of a shop, singing London Bridge. It was 2:30.

We decided to try to find the Church of the Holy Sepulchre by taking a street. We walked up the Greek Patriarchate Street, but it went down stairs and back into the underground market streets we had been in before. We found a rug and jewelry shop and found a rug we liked. Will looking at the options the salesman asked August which he liked and he replied “I really like all of them.” We bought a rug for 450 shekels. He also had a lot of Roman glass silver jewelry and I looked at that for a bit. We walked a little to the south and August spotted some candied fruit that he wanted for his treat. We got some papaya, kiwi, mango, and a couple other random ones. Then made one more attempt to find the church taking a little side street on our way back, but then realized it too headed down underground eventually, right back to the candy place.

We headed out, leaving 4ish. August was looking at Waze and telling Carly which direction to turn next, and in how many meters. We sang “We all sing with the same voice” and asked, of one line in the song, “Why they have two dadas?” He then sang “I’ve got three dadas, I’ve got a billion dadas…I’ve got seven Mama’s…I’ve got infinity sisters…” We then played with the calculator on his iPad and kept multiplying bigger and bigger numbers. When it got to over 300 digits it would give an error message that said “Infinity Duck”, which August found very funny. We then read a bunch of books: Oh Daddy, Loch Mess Monster, Click Clack Cows that Type, Peppa Goes to the Pool, Would You Feed It to the Monkey?, and Gaston. He watched a few Kipper stories and Timmy Time and we stopped at a gas station for a bathroom stop and were home after 6:50 as it rained.

We came inside. I think Carly and him had talked about Thanksgiving because he said “I’m thankful for you.”

Watched one more Timmy Time, then we read Edgar and the Puffin Rock moon book. He then played with the pillows and rugs as if they were pizzas and plates. He said “There’s a lot of pizza cutting going on here.” “I call them square pizzas” He was cutting the pizzas into all sorts of interesting shapes: “Sometimes I do rectangular shapes.” He then had a pizza shop and had me buying pizza. At some point he said “Dada, now you’re a crayon…yarok…it’s a color in Hebrew.” He remembers green.

Went up to the bed and brushed his teeth. He was then playing zombies: “I punch them to Neptune then when I’m on Neptune I punch them to the sun and they burn up.” He was then being a catepillar and turning into a butterfly. I told him to dream about catepillars and butterflies. He said “Caterpillars and butterflies is really cool.” I left them at 8:30 and he was soon asleep.

He fell off the end of the bed sometime in the middle of the night. Didn’t seem to bother him too much. But towards the morning he was nursing a lot. Carly got him back to sleep, but at 5:55 he woke me up shouting “Go!” in his sleep. He got up and went downstairs. When I went down a few minutes later he was watching Peg + Cat. Carly headed to school. We read Berenstain Bears Moving Day, then played Toca Blocks and Toca Plants. The latter is a pretty good puzzle sort of game as you figure out how to make all the new plants. We then Skyped with my parents as we won’t be able to talk on Thanksgiving. He was typing all the alphabets we know backwards, sort of, on the iPad keyboard. That is, he was typing ZYXWVU… but doing it in Hebrew, Arabic, and Korean to see what it would look like. He type a lot of words to them, but in the end kind of got upset when he wanted to type a word with the ‘z’ in the middle. My mom suggested ‘gazelle’ and we were typing that, but he had gotten it in his mind that he wanted it in cursive (I’d been talking about how Arabic letters change based on their locations in words, kind of like English letters in cursive) and when he realized he couldn’t type in cursive he got kind of sad.

After we were done Skyping he finished Peg + Cat and I exercised. We then went upstairs. He played with the calculator on my phone and I introduced him to the advanced calculator layout, with all sorts of new keys for him to learn. I took a shower. We then read a Peppa Pig book (the collection with seven stories) and Little Critters Fall Festival, then gave him a shower. Not too bad.

Got headed out at 11:20 to head to the bank. Again. Ada had come through with our temporary Israeli licenses yesterday, so we are back to driving the car. I tried to put August’s shoes on him, but he only tolerated them for a minute before deciding he wanted to go back to his green crocs. As we got in the car I said something to him and he replied “No it doesn’t, you silly old beast.” I laughed and asked what that was from. It’s from James and the Giant Peach. He was then being an animal but told me “You don’t know if I’m a mouse or a Plumdog. It’s a secret.”

He had been wanting to play GroGarden again at the bank, but when we got there he first played with the calculator on his iPad, then came in and played with the one on the desk for the rest of the time. The guy said he didn’t know why the account hadn’t been unfrozen, but he submitted the request again and got an email back saying it would happen during the night. As we got ready to leave, August realized he’d forgotten to play GroGarden. I let him play for a minute and told him he could play later at home.

We headed back to the car. He riffed on the Peg + Cat song, singing “The problem is solved, the other problems is not solved, everything’s on fire.”

At home he played GroGarden. He talked about Peg + Cat, as if he was Peg, and said “Cats not solving the problem with me, because he is sick, and in the bed.” Which as far as I know never actually happens in the show.

I made us tuna sandwiches and sweet potato fries for lunch. We ate that, then read Plants Vs Zombies Timepocalypse, then had a zombie laser fight with the pillows as the lasers. He had brought the paper mache ball from Vivian downstairs yesterday. He said he didn’t need it anymore and started to destroy it. The damage was already done, so I let him take the rest apart over the garbage can. NO ONE TELL VIVIAN THIS!!!

We then got out on a walk. I’d planned to drive to a park over by Ikea, but he requested a walk on his orange bike. I wasn’t sure how well the weather was going to hold up, so I didn’t press my plan. On our walk we discussed what the song “Sentimental Wars” was about and we talked about being sentimental about things from Korea. August then totally got jumped on by a little dog that was licking him. I actually had to push the dog off of him and shoo it away to its negligent owner. August didn’t like it, but didn’t scream or get upset. We then found the tunnel under the highway and walked through it. It has a really good echo and we spent a lot of time at one end playing with the echo. We walked through to the other side, past a big puddle, some horse manure, and a lot of graffiti to find it just ends in a dirt road now. On the way back through the tunnel he was looking down at his feet, slumping over the handlebars and said “something strange happened. I turned into a peddle.” And at some point he just shouted out “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik!” We got to the end of the trail, at the main intersection with the road that goes up past the school. We talked about going up to the school, but he decided against it, which turned out to be good as Carly stayed a bit late to finish up some grading.

Looking back over the fields he saw a cylinder-shaped building that he hoped was a waste treatment plant. We turned around at 3:10, went back and walked the dirt road at the north end of the strawberry fields (they area all covered by plastic domes now), almost getting back to the main road again, then headed home. He played in the dust and dirt along the way. He was turning us in circles and said “If we keep doing this I will change.” A reference to the Toca Plants and Elements games. I saw a big white bird (kind of owl shape) fly over and said “Come back bird!” He narrated “But the bird didn’t answer.”

We got home at 4. Played some GarageBand, then Earth Primer. We read/played through that, doing more of the section on water that we hadn’t done before. We read half of Max Axiom Magnetism. He asked for more Cheerios but was upset when I offered dinner instead. Carly was home at 5:30. He was falling asleep as they nursed. Woke him up with some Beethoven and Carly gave him a chocolate chip, then he played Earth and Animal Hospital on the iPad. We read the two Berenstain Bears books.

He went upstairs and after going to the bathroom washed his own hands, then brushed his teeth all on his own. We then did flops on the bed – fun in themselves and also fun because it makes Carly nervous. I told him to dream about flops. He then loudly stated “I don’t like showers!”

He didn’t fall asleep though, and came down at “7:28”. We read Biscuit Visits the Doctor, Would You Feed It to the Monkey, Splat the Cat, 1-2-3 Peas, and Hap-pea All Year.

He went back up to Carly. I heard some crying and I think he fell asleep sometime between 8:30 and 8:45. Carly fell asleep too though, and she woke up for a bit around 9:30.

A lot of dancing that has to go on here: 

Standing on the bricks: 

Pillow zombie lasers 1: 

Pillow zombie lasers 2: 

Bye bye paper mache: 

Echo in the tunnel: 

After his shower: 

Deciding he wants the shoes off: 

Our long walk: