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Think he was up around 6. He and I read the rest of The Purple Smurf and started The Flying Smurf. He wanted some of Carly’s quesadilla, then followed her to the door, but was fine when she left. I made him a broccoli and cheese quesadilla. He then wanted to go outside. He had his shoes on his hands and said “I want to go.” We got clothes on him, then had a good discussion about electricity.

We went outside, or rather downstairs, on his bike, at 7:40. It was a regular light rain. Mainly rode up and down the hallways, and outside for a minute or so at a time. He spotted the fly papers hanging outside restaurants and was curious about those. He pedaled the bike around on his own from time to time, and we just sort of sat and people watched as well. We went up to the second floor and rode around up there as well. Since we weren’t doing anything in particular I also was adding places we’ve gone to Google Maps. He also decided to eat the rain and was sticking his tongue out. We headed home at 8:40.

We read more Smurfs – finished Purple Smurf, The Flying Smurf, and read bits of others. He then played in the water and I made the cell phone and internet calls. Successful on the first, although they just told me I had to go into the store to cancel (after I hung up I realized they didn’t need my phone number or anything – that is, the person on Monday could have told me the same thing instead of telling me I needed to call back on Wednesday). No luck on the second, after being on hold for ten minutes.

We then watched Smurfs: Baby Smurf twice, and the Jokey Smurf episode. I exercised and took a shower in there. We had a salmon sandoo and soup. He ate a good amount of the potato soup on his own, but didn’t like the dripping. Any time he dripped he wanted me to come and wipe it up.

He wanted to watch an orchestra, and we tried a couple new ones out before settling on Mahler’s Symphony No. 6, which we watched or awhile.

We then headed out to the Kwangwoon University area KB Bank branch. Word was there is a coin ATM there where you can exchange your change for bills. Figured that would be fun for August to do and a good rainy day activity. We took the Nowon 9 bus and got there at 12:40. Only to find that they recently changed their hours to only allow you to use the machine from 9 to noon.

We turned right around and hopped a bus home. As we got close to home, in the warm, humid bus August fell asleep just after 1:10. I got off and went up to our local KB Bank branch. The lobby attendant asked what I needed and I asked about a coin ATM. He simply took my box of coins, went behind the counter, and started doing it for me. I woke August up (about 5 minutes on the nap) and he perked up (although first he asked where we were) and liked watching the coin machine from a distance. Not as much fun as doing it ourselves, but it got the job done.

We then went down to Lucky Mart and got crackers and bananas and milk before heading home at 1:40. Earlier, on the bus, he had been asking what was above us. At some point he was then speculating, asking “What if there was a bathroom on the roof?” of the bus.

We then turned around pretty quickly and left for Nowon, as August wanted to leave right away. He chose the backpack and taking the bus over the bike and walking. We got off after the Nowon 15 makes its left. We then walked around a bit in an area we haven’t really walked. We found a coffee shop called Penguin Drinks Coffee, which really made the whole trip worth it, even if we didn’t actually go in.

We then walked back to the main street and went to the Daiso, where I found a few more of the small carabiners to use as zipper pulls and August played with the cleaning supplies, shaking them and asking what they were for.

The plan was then to go to the coffee shop/cinema and get a drink and treat and play and hangout until we went to meet Carly at the pension office around 4. But we got there and tried to walk in, only to find a scene of construction. Turns out it hadn’t closed, but was doing two days of quick construction for something. This was the first day.

Then I remembered that Carly wanted to get a couple of boxes of tea as presents for people taking care of our car. So August and I went down to the Osulloc counter in the basement of the department store. No luck though, as the woman was hovering, there was no black tea, and August wanted to go to every little shop and look at all the food and desserts to eat. We did have a nice sample of an iced tea though.

We then went to find the pension office, only to find out that I couldn’t find it. The instructions I had said it was visible across the street from exit 2 of Nowon station. The only problem was that the only building ‘across the street’ from exit 2 that was close to being tall enough was only 7 stories tall – and the office was on the 8th floor. As I was trying to figure it out, August spotted a hotdog (corndog) stand and wanted one. So we got a mozzarella one, and let them roll it in sugar. It was very good.

Carly had an actual address. It was actually a block south. So we headed down there, and sat in the waiting area of the pension office until Carly showed up with Atsuko, Melinda, and Megan. I had run over the play with August several times, but not being able to nurse was too much for him. Carly ended up taking him down to the bathroom for awhile. He was better after that. He was shy with Melinda a bit, then had his fingers in his ears as he walked around the office. Actually, he was the best after Atsuko came back with cupcakes for him and me – she had ‘missed’ our birthdays, so this was a makeup gift. August ate one and was very happy. Sugar covered hotdog, followed by a cupcake…

I did make him sad once though. Megan and I were talking about the things we had left to do, and I mentioned next going to the bank on Monday. August was listening, then asked ‘Then we go home?’ I said, well, then we go to visit Gramma and Grampa and Thatcher… “No! I don’t want to go!” Then I realized that he thought I was talking about right now…he thought we were going to the bank next, then getting on a plane. I quickly corrected the miscommunication and assured him we were heading home next.

The pension office went smoothly. The guy spoke English and we had everything in order. Carly went to the bathroom and we headed home. At the bus stop we realized we hadn’t had August go to the bathroom. When he said he needed to go. I asked if he could wait ten minutes, and he said no, he needed to go right now. Well, good to know he can tell. Luckily, there was a big building right there, and they all have restrooms in them. Went in, went to the bathroom, and were back out in time for our bus.

We were home at 5:25. He was getting a bit frustrated about Duplos, though wasn’t clear if it was real frustration, or ‘play frustration’. He was talking to Carly about her flowers when she trimmed them. She said they would eventually die. He asked “It doesn’t make any noise when it dies?” Which is an interesting question, as I don’t think he’s heard anything make noise when it dies, or really seen much of anything die, except for when we talk about trees or plants that are dead, or dead ants or a dead bird we saw the other day.

He was stacking things on the water bottle but they were falling off, and he kept saying, frustrated “Don’t do that!” I was asking “Play frustration?”  Again, not clear. At one point he also threw the Teuni spaceship. I picked it up, and he said  “No, don’t take it away. It’s my toy.”

Carly gave him a bath and they watched some Cookie Monster show or video I hadn’t seen. I asked him afterwards if he liked it and he said “I didn’t really like it. It was just pretty boring.” He played in the sink for awhile, then headed to bed. Asleep about 7:15.

 

Photos:

Waking up at the bank: 

Daiso: 

Sugary corn dog: 

He was up sometime around 6. When I got up they were reading Berenstain Bears Go to School. A bit later he was eating enchilada and threw it up. And then more, and then more. I cleaned it up while Carly took care of him. Seems to be that he got a big bite or spinach stuck in his throat or something as he was fine the rest of the day.

I took a shower and Carly started making hummus. I took August out at 9:20. We went to the park past the pink building. He surprised me by wanting to play there. He spotted an open swing and wanted to go on it. So he got on the green swing. Then we realized that the girl on the other swing had a bird in a plastic cage under her swing. While on the swing he noted that it was squeaky:  “I want to measure how squeaky it is. Sounds like a mouse. Hard to tell. Maybe it’s a wood swing, I think.”

The girl got down and headed over to the exercise equipment. August followed, playing on the exercise equipment and watching her swing the bird on the exercise equipment as well. He got close to it as she put leaves in the cage. Soon after that she ran off over to her grandmother. We headed the other way. August got up on the slanted wooden bench sort of exercise equipment and slid down it several times, holding my fingers. And he had me lift him up to the chin up bars. He found a big grate and saw a bunch of garbage under it. He asked why, and I said it was probably because there were no garbage cans and all the kids threw their garbage down there. He wanted to do it as well, but settled for dropping rocks.

We left about 10 and headed home. We all left about 10:30. He saw a light on in the other room and said “That light’s on so it’s making pollution?” He had apparently discussed this with Carly. As we left he spotted the broken light fixture cover that I had broken a bit a long time ago. He asked why I had broken it and I said something about dropping it. He added “Also gravity? Gravity pulled it down? Maybe a crane could catch it. Or a vacuum cleaner.”

On the walk to the station he was making up instruments and said “I’m playing a dump truck mixer” as he hummed Ode to Joy. He sat with Carly on the train. Think they did Art Maker. A woman gave him a piece of candy and we put it in his pocket to eat at the park.

Sat outside the museum and he had the chewy vitamin D candy then chased and popped bubbles a girl was blowing (along with several other kids).

We went into the children’s museum and saw the woman from downstairs working the entry and said hi. He headed down to the basement and played with the robot and a couple things before heading to the blue blocks. Only one kid there when we enter d, then more showed up. A girl spoke English and kept asking “Can I play with you?” They then played together as more kids showed up and joined in.

It got really crowded, but generally things went really well. The girl who had been really nice at first kind of turned on him though when she had girls her own age to play with. August saw them being cats and he wanted to be a cat too and tried to curl up in the fort they had made. She told him to go lie on the floor, and August did. He also got frustrated at one point when basically all the blocks had been claimed due to the various building projects going on. We took a little break, but then some kids left and there were plenty of blocks. There was one more time that August tried to lie down like the girls, lying on one of the curved pieces. She was telling him to move and pushing the piece away with her foot. I didn’t make him move, as she was being quite bratty. He wasn’t going anywhere. Her dad saw and wasn’t having it either and made them leave at that point.

He needed to go to the bathroom, but had to spend some time playing with the x-ray and jumping on the round things before we headed out.

We were hungry for lunch, so we got in the backpack and headed out of the park and across the street. Carly went to Subway and August and I went to KFC. We got a sandwich and chicken salad and a drink. August filled the cup for me. We then walked down to Subway and met Carly. We all then walked back to Children’s Grand Park in the drizzle. We went up by the rectangle pond and sat at a table under a tree and ate lunch.

After that we went up to the coffee shop and Carly got a drink. On our way out he saw the piano, so we went and played a bit. At one point he was done, or wanted me to stop playing and I said I wanted to play more piano. He told me “You can play for one minute.” As we were then leaving he said “We’re ready to go to the playground. The really fun one.”

We walked over and showed Carly the new playground they’re slowly working on. We got to the four swing playground at 2. I went and got a cappuccino at the little place next to there. I came back to find him playing in the sand, filling a cardboard coffee holder. There was a girl with a plastic drink container that he was seriously coveting. We then headed over by the walking path where a boy and a girl were getting water from the faucets and pouring it in the sand. August played with them, using our cup from the backpack to play with. They also ran around a bit crazy. But eventually the desiring of the toys other kids had was too much when he spotted someone playing with a simple paper cup and had to have it.

Time to leave. But he spotted the water pouring down to keep drinks cold and we stopped to watch that. We stopped at the bathrooms by the entrance of the park, then he started playing on the little prince statue and the associated snake in an elephant structure. That started about 2:45 and lasted about an hour. There were two kids in particular that he was watching and copying (and taking turns with), walking up on and sliding down the elephant’s trunk. He did a little slide and said “That wasn’t cool.” He caught himself falling off the edge: “But babies can’t do that. Babies would fall right on the ground?”

They left, and he had it to himself for awhile. When someone else came I mentioned he’d have to share: “No. I don’t want to share. I want to go to Israel…I want to go to a small town.” And he’d been calling it an elephant, but at some point he changed his mind: “I don’t like really like the slide. It’s actually a snake and I don’t like snakes.” He had, on his own, remembered the story (I had briefly reminded him we’d read about it when he was on the Little Prince sculpture) and that it was an elephant inside a snake, and not just an elephant.

We headed out about 3:30. As we walked in the station I was lifting him up to the ceiling. When I got tired, he put things in my head (like he used to put ideas in there): “I put exercise in there.” He saw a clock and thought it wasn’t working: “It’s not clocking?”

We stopped at the bakery and got some pastries. Looked at a little hand fan (battery powered) then headed home. Art Maker on the train. We were home after 4. He was pretty sleepy in the backpack.

I gave him an early bath. We watched the William Tell Overture and Ride of the Valkyries. Carly finished the hummus. He ate Watermelon and broccoli for dinner and added a Waxahatchee song to his playlist. He then was joking

“I want to add watermelon to your playlist…forks to your playlist.”

We then sat on the couch and read “The Weather Smurfing Machine” and most of “The Purple Smurf”. He had to go to the bathroom, then went in to bed about 6:50. We got him ready, and he was asleep by 7:20.

Photos: 

At some point in the morning he did a bunch of sneezing, then fall back to sleep before getting up about 6:10. On Carly’s computer he spotted the word “Community” and asked what it meant, so we tried to explain that. He had some banana bread for breakfast, then we read some Smurfs, reading all of the Baby Smurf volume. I had Cheerios for breakfast and he wanted some of his own and was upset when I didn’t immediately agree to give him his own bowl. I was done with mine though and he was okay using my bowl.

We then played with Duplos, and he was playing on his own, humming the Pink Panther song. We took care of alligator and built an exhibit for the dinosaur. We also packed some more Duplos, adding them to the block that they worked on yesterday. He got pillows and surfed on me, then requested I make up songs: one about a kid playing in a bathroom, and another about going to the doctor.

He was hungry so we had some watermelon. I took a shower and he just played on his own. Requested more watermelon when I got out. We then ate the rest of our treat from Tous les Jour a couple days ago. He then got my sheet off the bed and played with it. He said “I want to fight over it.” so we pulled on it. He got it wrapped around himself, and while he was walking he said “This is my apron.” We were listening to the remix album of the Erasure song “I Love You to the Sky” – a band and song he already likes. He wanted to add each of them to his playlist, and ended up just sitting on the couch and listening to them for several minutes. He then played in the sink, so I took the opportunity to make phone calls to KT about cancelling our phone and internet. Only to find they are upgrading all their systems and can’t do anything until Wednesday.

He had been talking about going out to ride his bike, so we were going to do that then come back home and have lunch, then head to the National Museum in the afternoon since Carly had middle school graduation and wouldn’t be home until 7. But when we were ready to go he changed his mind and said he wanted to go straight to the National Museum. So we made a sandwich and grabbed a little more food and switched to the big backpack and left by 11:40.

He patted the mama statue but I didn’t, and he wanted me to go back and touch the statue to see how hot it was. It was really hot. On the train I handed him Sesame Street Art Maker. He kept turning up the volume when I turned it down “I don’t like quiet things; I like loud things.”

We got to the National Museum and went and had lunch by lake at 12:40. There was a girl who went by, being a duck. He said “Zinnie should be a goose.” We then went in and got a children’s museum ticket for 1:30. We had about a half hour, so went into the main museum and looked around a bit. He saw the ten story pagoda and wanted to take a photo, so we did that. Then up the escalators, eventually to the third floor. I took him through the Silk Road and Asia rooms for a bit, but he wasn’t a fan of the darkness. We then heard music, so tracked it down to the lobby, where a woman was finishing soundchecking her accordion. There was a sign saying the concert would be at 3.

We went into to children’s museum at 1:30. He ran into the primitive house and fell in a hole (cooking pi, I think). He brushed himself off, then went and was grinding wheat for a few minutes. Then headed towards the back, where he threw around the big pillow-like dice, and hit a bigger kid with it. The boy (12 or so) didn’t seem to mind. He then went and was climbing on the hills, and took his shoes off to do it. From there we went towards the bathrooms and he saw the spear game, where you throw a spear to try to hit a bird. He wanted to run in and play but didn’t want to wait. We watched for awhile, then we went and used the bathroom.

Then he wanted to go into the toddler room. He played in there for quite awhile, going down the little slide and playing with the toddler cube things. He kept saying  “I wanted to be a toddler.” He then ran across to the book/lounge room and climbed up on the step things and hung out with a family. In the hall there are tables with little wooden blocks that you can change the shape of. They don’t stick together, but he expected them to: “I expect this one to stick.” It was starting to clear out, and he got a turn at the spear thing. I started to tell him how to play, but he grabbed two spears and started running in front of the screen: “I just want my shadow.”

We left at 2:50 and sat and had a snack of banana bread and crackers. We then went and watched a few minutes of the accordion player, but he was ready to play outside.

When we were coming in he was wanting to go to the Arabia special exhibit, but I missed my chance. He wanted to play outside now, and we ended up running out of time to come back. We walked over to Yongsan Park and wandered around a bit. He didn’t want the playground at first, and he didn’t want to play in the stream either, saying there wasn’t enough water. We saw a woman watering the big yellowing field with a single hose (rather Sisyphus like) and he wanted to follow the hose. It went across the field, then stretched across the stream to faucets on the other side, near the playground. We walked around and he was playing with the faucets by 3:30. Played with those for awhile, then he headed over to the playground and the sand.

There were two girls playing with the sand under the play structure and they sort of scared him a bit and chased him, then were pretending to offer him sand that was chocolate. He knew it was chocolate, but when one girl kept putting it by his mouth he said “I don’t want to eat sand.” He then saw a mom and little girl playing with buckets filled with water, and went and played with them. The mom gave him a cup and let him play with the water. Played with them, then went over to the little mushroom house and sat with some girls in there. Yes, there were only girls at the playground today.

The two girls in there came out and they all went over and played with the other girl with the water. He then went and climbed on one of the big bears, and sang a  “I’m climbing on the bear” song. Then back to the window area playing with a girl and a bracelet he found. He put the bracelet on his arm, and pushed it up to his upper arm and left it there the rest of the time we were there. The girl was only reluctantly playing with him – she was making a mountain or cake and didn’t want August to touch it. Eventually he was pretending to put candles on it: “candle, candle, candle…I was pretending it was a cake.”

Eventually, I got him to head out as we needed to go get dinner. I was hungry. In the bathroom I asked if he wanted to keep the bracelet or leave it here. He said “Give it back”. He ran out, over to the girl who had been making the cake, and gave it to her.

We stopped at the faucets to fill his water bottle, then he started playing again. I said “I want to go get dinner.” He replied “Yeah, but one minute.” He had also been asking about dinner, and asked if we were going to Brownstone. Then I realized he was confused: “But I not have dinner because it’s not home.” He’s not used to eating out for dinner.

We were headed back towards the museum and he saw a big area of exercise equipment: “What those handles things are for?” “Down please. I want to find out.” We ended up spending twenty minutes or so there. At one point: “I want a made up song: Cookie Monster finds the cookie.” And while on exercise equipment: “I’m twisting. I’m not working well. I squeaked. The gear squeaked…Zinnie Clockwork isn’t working well. The gears are lose.” The most fun though was the rolling equipment, and he walked on the rolling treadmill.

We finally got out of there, and got to the little snack restaurant by the CU near the entrance at 5:40 – just in time, as after they took our order they told people they were closing. We go
t shrimp fried rice and ate it outside. We then went to CU and I got a coffee drink and we got two cookies: strawberry and apple. We went over and sat on a bench and ate them.

We went and got on the line 4 train this time. We read Tallulah’s Tap Shoes and Berenstain Bears No Girls Allowed. We got off the train, then stopped to look at the billboard with babies on it and walk up and down the musical stairs once. When we got to the bus stop it said it was 14 minutes until the next one. So we started walking. After 12 minutes or so August said “I don’t want to take a bus. Let’s walk home.” I had been about to suggest the same thing, as it was clear we were going to be pretty close to home by the time the bus came by anyway. Indeed, we were about to cross the stream to Chrysanthemum Park when it finally went by.

He got quiet a couple times, but didn’t go to sleep. Right before we got home I asked “What do you want to tell mama about?” He replied “Nothing…All I want to do is nursing.” It was the first time he had mentioned nursing. We were home at 7:40. He quickly spotted the flowers that Carly had brought home from graduation: “What the flowers is from?”

We washed his feet, then they went in to go to sleep. But he couldn’t quite go to sleep yet. They came out and read a couple books on his iPad then went back in and he was asleep at 8:30.

Photos. Children’s history museum. Throwing the dice: 

Shoe hands: 

Jumping in the toddler area: 

Wearing the bracelet: 

Exercise: 

A dinner out: 

Silly on the train: 

He was up 6:15ish. Carly was making toast and eggs, and hew as doing butter and toast chants as she made it and buttered it. He was eating toast while sitting on the table and making yummy noises. I asked what he thought of the toast and he responded “Well, I can’t say anything.” Carly sneezed and he told her “Maybe you should take some medicine.” They then went in and read one of the Little House for a good amount of time before nursing. That turned into a silly time, as he was making the reading area slide out. At some point he said “I want to smurf Green Eggs and Ham.” But we read Smurfs, reading most of Gargamel and the Smurfs. He then spent time putting Duplos away with Carly, starting to pack them into a big cube to take up as little room as possible.

I took a shower, and when I came out Carly was vacuuming. He had closed himself in the parlor and kept opening the door and asking “Are you done yet?” He was wanting some alone time, and when I came up to him he said “Go away. Please.” and pushed me back to the bathroom.

We were then cleaning more stuff out. He and Carly in particular made progress cleaning out the art supplies and consolidating containers. Out of nowhere he said “I want to stop eating food and be a big kid…I don’t want to grow…I want to be a kid.” Then, as we was sitting on the floor, playing around: “That toe is very dirty. We should wash you. I want to take a bath…tomorrow.” He then played with the white stick and one of the purple things from that Teuni spinning thing and said “I’m not sure how this works and I’m going to find out.” He went to the bathroom. Not sure what he was talking about, but he said “I’m going to put the broken pieces in the toilet and suck them up with my penis.”

At 11:30 we went and got Dippin’ Dots at Home Plus. He’s been mentioning doing this with mama for weeks, so hopefully I’ll hear a bit less of it during the week. August chose rainbow flavor. We went over to the park and sat on a bench and ate them. He wasn’t disappointed. When he was done he went and played with a couple of kids by some rocks for a minute, then ran off to the sculpture area and ran around there. He came back and tried going under a rope that was keeping people out of some plants. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t step on them, and when we stopped him he was saying “Leave me alone.”

We got going over to Home Plus. Down on the first basement August stopped to look at the little vending machines. Carly went on to start shopping. August watched a boy actually get two bouncy balls out of one. I thought he was going to want to do it himself now, but that was apparently enough for him. We went down and found Carly by the fruits. He had some watermelon samples, then we finished up and headed home for lunch.

Carly cut up a bunch of the watermelon and gave him a bowl. He went and grabbed a big fork and used that to eat it. He asked Carly if it was her fork, and she said that both her and me use it, and now him. He seemed to like that. I made potato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich and we shared that. August and I read Baby Smurf. Carly was making her enchiladas and realized she’d forgotten yogurt (aka ‘sour cream’ here). I went to Lucky Mart to get that and tortillas.

When I came home he was playing with the Listerine for a long time, shaking it for the bubbles. He then just sort of sat on the floor with it and the two pillows from the couch and talked about it. I then went and vacuumed under the bed, finding the missing Bob book. He helped Carly with some of her cooking.

We talked about moving the beds, as we likely need to move the queen bed back into the master bedroom before we leave. Carly asked how he felt about rolling off the bed. He replied “I don’t like rolling off the bed because if I roll off the bed I fall. I want to balance.” I took the hangers off the wall, including the ones that were put on with some rather permanent adhesive. They took off the new paint we had had painted. So I got out the leftover paint and painted the spots on the light paint. August was very intrigued with the whole process, from opening the cans to painting the wall. After that, he was following around the apartment and it turned into a game of follow the leader for awhile. When he was getting tired with it though he said “in starting to get smurfed up with following Dada.”

We all headed out to Hangeulbi Park at 4:20. We first saw a dad and two kids flying a small drone. He talked about it flying up to space and I explained it didn’t have enough power to go that high. He was then saying “Didn’t have enough power to go to space?” We walked, or tried to, back to the playground, but he wanted to go play in the bathroom, turning the sink on and watching water go down the drain for a minute.

Carly had sat down and he went and climbed on her, and did a flip in her lap. Did that several times, and he was asking “The gravity is pulling Zinnie right now?” We made it back to the playground and they went on the swings. We also played on the play structure, with him climbing up the round platforms with no problems now. He was doing the sliding down on my head thing, but started stomping/kicking me. He kept doing it, and eventually we had to stop. He went around to the different kinds of exercise equipment and tried them all out for awhile and spent a little more time on the swings. But he wanted Carly’s, and kept walking in front of/behind her and got hit once.

We headed home and had enchilada for dinner. He liked his without sauce. Carly was cleaning through the bathroom stuff and he played with a hairdryer for a bit. He then helped me make banana bread. I gave him a bath. We watched the Baby Smurf episode of Smurfs. Odd, because the story was very different from the comic book, as it involves Gargamel turning himself into a baby to infiltrate the village. But it takes some of the lines and jokes from the comic book. I know there was an actual Baby Smurf in the TV show at some point, but this wasn’t it.

Anyway, he really liked the potions that Gargamel and Papa Smurf made, and when he was out from his bath he was with Carly and changed her into Gargamel and into Azrael.

Took him to bed and he was asleep about 7:15.

Photos. Toast on the table: 

Watermelon: 

Bubbles: 

Helping: 

At the park. Flip: 

Exercise: 

He seemed to have a lot of bad dreams last night. Sometime around midnight, I heard him say “Tissue…please.” Carly got up, half asleep herself, to get one, but by the time she came back to the room he was asleep again. They then got up at 6:15. He has started unrolling the toilet paper again, much to our chagrin. Dealt with that this morning. We were getting stuff ready for recycling, and of something he said “I want to recycle that later. I want to recycle that afternoon.” 

Carly took him outside a little before 8. They went to Chrysanthemum, ate their snacks, played with garbage he found in the sand, and got a sandwich at Tous Les Jour. They were home at 9:30 as I was taking out recycling. He was then being rather negative about things, although much of it seems to be that he’s acting like Grouchy Smurf: “I don’t want you to say that. I don’t really like that word. I don’t really like Korean. I don’t like kids…I like mama, dada, Zinnie.”

Meg Pendleton, the previous art teacher, flew in from Moscow for the weekend for graduation. We were meeting her at 10. Before we left, I said what we were doing, and he said “That’s the art teacher?” I then mentioned that she had given him The Boy Who Bit Picasso and he really wanted to read it. Unfortunately, it is in a box for Israel.

We met her at 10 by the pagoda. We tried to go to the coffee shop in the art museum but it wasn’t open yet. So we walked past See and Me and went to the Coffee House place (where Meg and I once went, and where August took a nap a month or two ago). August got an apple juice, and the rest of us got teas or coffees. Meg got a bagel and cream cheese and said she would share it with him. She said Sharing is caring” and he said “I don’t like ‘caring’”. He did really well though, looking around the coffee shop, talking to us, drinking his apple juice, and sitting on Carly’s lap and cuddling.

We all then walked back to the art museum, and into the play area. I offered Carly and Meg a mint and the woman came over and told us we couldn’t eat in there. We weren’t actually in the play area yet, just the shoe area. August had fun playing with other kids. They were throwing balls at each other, which went well for the most part, except when he would throw balls at people who weren’t throwing back, or would be too close to their heads.

Eventually, Meg took off. August was a bit disappointed, and asked why Meg had to go. The three of us then wandered around, looking at all the art museum. We made sure to show Carly the U Ram Choe bird sculpture downstairs. And Carly liked the crazy Star Wars shrine, and we looked at those figures/dolls. Unfortunately, just before we left he spit on the ground by where the bike was. He was then spitting on the ground outside, which is okay.

Anyway, he spent several minutes climbing on the yellow sculpture with a couple of other kids. Decent sharing, although he was stepping on a boy’s feet when he got too close. He then followed a boy on rollerblades as he skated around the wooden benches. He was then riding his bike around, so Carly headed home without us.

When we headed home a couple minutes later, he saw a Korean boy about his size and age walking in front of us, wearing a hat. August said “Is that Zinnie?” I made him repeat it a couple times to make sure I had it correct. He was either being funny (it did kind of look like him) or was having an existential crisis.

We were home a bit after noon. We ate a salmon sandwich and potato soup for lunch. Carly taught him how to play Simon says, and then he was telling Carly what to do. While nursing he was pinching and grabbing Carly, so I got him to apologize. Then spent a good time playing in the sink. He then helped take apart his other set of green shelves.

Carly was getting ready to go to the APIS high school graduation. August was upset about this, and he was upset that we couldn’t dry off a toilet paper roll he had been playing with in the sink. Upset about that, he then slipped on something on the floor and fell a bit. Carly comforted him a little, but was already running late, so had to leave.

He took a few minutes to calm down and was still upset when I suggested we head outside. That helped a bit, and when I mentioned I was turning off the lights he went and turned off the bathroom light. We left at 2:14.

We decided to go to Sarang Park. We walked by Cafe Sarang Bbang but it is still closed with the same signs saying they were closed until June. We got to Sarang Park 2:40. Played just a little with the water and in the sand, then he needed a bathroom at 2:50. He didn’t want to use a urinal or squat, so we walked south to Madeul Stadium and used the bathroom there.

There was a soccer match, and we heard some drumming. So we went in and watched the match and the drumming. Just a single drum, but August was pretty excited about it and stood on the seat of his bike to watch at one point. He then had fun drinking from his water bottle and spitting in the drain, and playing with a lid and straw someone had dropped. And occasionally looked at soccer (or ‘football’ as we call it).

Out water bottles were almost empty, so when he was done we walked up to the faucets. He played for a few minutes there. A man came with a little black dog. August was several feet away, but the dog barked at him rather aggressively. August jumped and flapped his arms and exclaimed “Don’t lick me!!!” Really, really traumatized by that one licking experience, since he doesn’t even seem concerned about getting bitten.

He then rode his bike around the plaza there and then we headed home. We stopped to make sure the ant road is still there. We went to Tous les Jour to get bread, and got a red bean and cream cheese bread thing to share. We decided to go to the park, and we went down the two stairs at the edge of Brownstone in the bike. I said “How cool is that?” He replied “A little cool…but a little boring.”

We sat across from the mama statue again to eat it. I asked “Do you like it?” He replied “Yeah…not as much as candy, but I still like it.” He then went and climbed on the mama statue, then we spent a lot of time lifting him up to the three exercise bars and letting him hang and drop. They are actually quite high, so I would have my arms around him and catch him. More climbing on the mama statue, and he hugged it, then went up and climbed on a big rock. There were a couple of girls up on the hill and he followed them around a bit. At one point the older girl ran down the hill and he followed, then kept following her halfway to the playground before he turned back around.

Finally, there was a dad with two kids at a nearby bench. They had a bubble gun and a regular bubble wand thing. August popped the bubbles and watched. But when they would offer them to him to use he would say “I’m just watching.”

He had wanted Carly to meet us in the park at one point, but she was later than I expected. We headed home at 4:50. We then fixed the fan by taking off the cover and tightening it. He said “We’re workers?” We also washed off all the dust while we were at it. We then had fun talking and making noise into the fan. We then changed the sheets and were doing that when Carly got home just before 5:55.

August told her “I don’t want you to go to work again.” She made them egg and beans and rice for dinner. He brought out the pillows and said “I want to surf on mama because I have pillows.” They did that, then Carly gave him a bath and I did dishes.

He then wanted to read Smurfs so we read part of King Smurf story then Baby Smurf. He was ready for sleep and we took him in and he was asleep by 7:50.

He was up just before 6:20. Did fine when Carly left, although I had to grab him at the door. He requested Marble Machine, which he hasn’t watched for a long time, and watched that a few times. We were talking about what to do, and he requested the science center. I asked if he wanted the little one near us, or the big one, and he chose the big one. So I jumped in the shower as he watched it again. When I got out I could hear that he’d moved on to another video by the same guy, and he came it to inform me that he had finished the vide. We got ready to go, but he wanted me to play with Clockwork Smurf, so I had Clockwork help make the sandwich. He found the bag of Duplos that Carly had used at work and brought home. He had a lot of questions about that, and put a couple away where they belong before getting distracted.

He’d had Cheerios and banana for breakfast, and I was eating the other half of the banana and offered him a bite. He sort of grunted and turned away. He thought his own reaction was funny, apparently, as he then said “Give me a bite of banana.” When I offered again he grunted and turned away again. In the bedroom, he looked at the Josh Ritter poster and said “I don’t like that guy.” I explained who it was, and sang a couple of the songs that August knows from Josh Ritter. August asked if the songs were “made up”. I explained that all songs are written by someone, etc. He said “Zinnie’s a musician?”

We left at 8:50. As we walked through the park, he was blocking the sun with his hand, and we talked about how trees provide shade. On the way down we read four books:  Loch Mess Monster, Tallulah’s Solo, Little Red Hen, and Tallulah’s Tap Shoes. We transferred, and during the walk a guy started talking to us, in English. He walked with us half the way, waited for the train with us, and rode the train with us, talking and asking questions, practicing his English. August said “I don’t really like that guy.” But he handled it okay, and did tell him he was 3 when the guy asked how old he is.

We got to the science center at 10:10. We went and played in the playground, using the buckets and backhoe things to scoop sand, then sat and ate our sandwich. He really liked the s-c-i-e-n-c-e song that kept playing on the speakers. Think it is like the museum’s theme song, like Children’s Grand Park’s. Maybe I’ll be able to find it. Played in a drinking fountain, then went and got a ticket and went in.

Robots were dancing when we went in, but he only watched for a bit. He would stop and watch them a few times through the day, but not for long. So I was surprised when he told Carly his favorite part was “robots dancing”.

We first went to the new wing, to the right on the first floor. It was closed last time we were there. It is about the future, science fiction, and jobs of the future. After the really cool opening (weird light halls, with one with mirrors that makes it look like you’re surrounded by stars), we wandered through there, looking at a lot of stuff. His favorites were looking in the 3D goggles that showed you an image from the back of a model train that was going around a track, and a video on lab safety. We talked a bout about some of the jobs listed in ‘Job world’, then about some pieces of art at the end of it. Oh, and we watched a robot perform surgery.

He looked at the see though escalators (working here) and wanted to go upstairs. In the center there is a temporary exhibit on sight and how we see things. He particularly liked the rotating rotoreliefs, and really liked the idea that it looked like you were going into a vacuum cleaner. Then there was the LED Magic Board game. A big wall screen with a controller that sensed your hands and you could interact with it to play games. Played that for several minutes with other kids. Then  into the ‘Advanced science’ hall (upstairs to the left). Through the area on power production. First wind, then he really liked the demonstration on tidal power production. I explained it a couple times, but don’t know how much he got as he had his fingers in his ears. Then the solar power demonstration. Quieter, and he was really interested (we’ve seen solar panels a lot, so have discussed them before). He seemed to be understanding it, and kept asking “Its making power?”

Past that is the area about space (sadly lacking in the new one close to us). August saw a group of kids in yellow shirts looking at a video about the robots on Mars (which he recognized from the Solar System app) and went and got right in with the group. He then followed the group, walking in line, as they made their way to the airplane area, through the model of a passenger plane. We parted ways, and we looked at more stuff about planes: he liked the wind tunnel (more plugged ears), airplane controls, and hang glider (it is an actual demonstration where you lie down and swing around, looking at a big screen of you flying. He ALMOST got on, then heard the buzzing noises it makes when you are too steep, etc. and that scared him off).

We were talking about going down to the play area, but he kept getting distracted, saying multiple times: “I want to go to the play area…Wait, what that is?” He mainly got held up by the fiber optic cable making machine (constantly making these fine fibers that go on and on) and a square light area that makes it look like you’re standing over a bottomless hole. Back out in the center of the second floor he saw the candy store and we went over and looked at candy for a bit, then headed down to the play area at 12:25.

Kind of puttered around there for 50 minutes: the broken water stuff, the musical keyboard you step on, the weights on levers, then we spent the last 20 or so playing with the foam blocks. I was really hungry, and just needed a break, but when he got distracted by the magnets thing I did pause long enough to show him the opposites attract thing.

We went out to CU at 1:15. Too late, as it had been cleaned out by all the school groups. I got a coffee drink and he got an apple juice. We went and sat outside and ate more of the food we had brought.

We went back inside and straight up to the LED Magic Board at 1:35. He went to watching robots from the balcony with other kids. He then ran back to the ‘advance science wing’, watching the ‘fiber spinning’ for a bit more. Then back to the science area, where we went in the Space Shuttle exhibit, which we had skipped before. He played with the concentration test (moving a metal ring over a shape). They need to update their displays, as they all talk about the Space Shuttle as if it were still in operation. We walked through the rest of the raised pathway part, and saw all the different kids of engines and discussed those: rocket, jet, propeller.

Then back to the vision exhibit – feeing things in boxes part, back to the rotoreliefs, a lot of looking at the plastic fruit randomly in a bowl (I’m sure there was a point). We watched some kids in a special area (there was a line, probably age limit, etc.) trying out VR goggles. We watched them walk around funny. August got upset when he kept scooting under the divider and I pulled him out. Took him out of there, but then he wanted to look at the candy more and was opening the bins. More frustration. But we were able to calm down and he went back and looked at the candy a bit.

Then through the last hallway we’d never been in (I don’t think, unless maybe briefly the first time), the one on the history of Korean science. I expected it to be kind of dull, but was actually pretty impressive. There’s a video game thing where you can use a joystick to walk around inside a turtle ship, then one where you can row a boat.

We were running out of time, and I said we had about 30 minutes left. He was having tons of fun and didn’t want to leave. He said “I want infinity minutes!”

We headed back downstairs. As we got to the escalators, we saw some high school girls playing around at the
top of the escalators (walking back up, etc.). Then saw them get met by science center staff at the bottom and walked over someplace where they were presumably getting in trouble.

Got to the human body area in the ‘Basic science’ hall at 2:40. We started at the end, at the baby development display. We listened to each other at the auditory illusion thing (which supposedly slightly delays what you are hearing, so it doesn’t match the other person’s lips, but it didn’t seem odd to me – we still had fun though).

But then the best thing were the sound tubes. They are different lengths, and are supposed to show you how sound travels slower than light, as when you listen through the tube that is 100 meters long it is delayed from the 1 meter long tube. August did indeed like listening to them, but then he started using them as vacuum cleaners. That lasted for several minutes until he needed to use the bathroom, just after 3. Did that and afterwards he wanted to go back and play with the hoses. Did that a bit longer, then as we walked out we were startled by this: https://youtu.be/FSmRSpxCWAM Didn’t actually get a good look at it, as it was to our right. We stood around a few more minutes, hoping they would fire it again. The suspense was too much for August though so we got going.

A couple weeks ago I’d mentioned that sunglasses only protect your eyes. Seemingly a pretty simple thing, but maybe not, since it makes everything look shady. Anyway, so he’s brought this up and asked about it several times, and I explain how it doesn’t shade your neck, nose, etc. Today as we left the science center he was then pulling up his collar to protect his neck and mouth.

On the way home we read Tap Shoes, Loch Mess Monster, and Berenstain Bears Go to School. We had to deal with a lot of people trying to talk to and touch August though, and it was too much for a worn out boy. Actually, the final straw was my fault: He was sitting on my lap and all 5 of the other seats cleared out at once. I thought there was no way they would all fill back up, and I let him sit next to me. But then a big group of older people got on right away and I tried to get him back on my lap.

So we got off at one station and waited for the next train. A woman tried to shove lollipops in his face as I was getting him calmed back down. We got on the next train, but just barely. He had a seat, and the guy next to him reached over and started touching his scraped knee. August made what were some clearly international sounds of distress at that and jumped off the seat. I got him back on the seat, reluctantly, and the guy tried doing it again. I made it clear he needed to back off. August wasn’t going to handle much more.

Got off at Changdong and immediately caught the 1144 bus at 4:45. The newest bus we’ve ever been on, with that new bus smell. He liked watching the driver. Got to the Brownstone stop right at 5, so we crossed and walked south by the pink building. August asked why there was a faucet on the side of the building. One of us said probably for cleaning, then before I could suggest that it was also for watering plants he said it: “Or maybe watering plants…maybe they attach a hose to (go to) the plants.”

We met Carly on the corner right away. I saw a woman with a cool shirt: it showed a cat with a horn, and said ‘Kittycorn’. Carly had brought home a poster from work, in a poster tube, with the end taped shut. She mentioned how she’d been careful to make it so the poster wouldn’t stick and rip, and he said “Well if it rips I’ll suck the rip up.”

At home he told Carly his favorite part was the dancing robots, which surprised me as he hadn’t watched them a whole lot. While nursing he was moving around like he was a year old. Which Carly mentioned, which then turned it into a game. He ate tortilla from my burrito, then Carly made him a quesadilla with broccoli and cheese. He was a little perturbed when the sides would kind of slide apart: “Don’t move!” “Were you ordering the quesadilla not to move?” “Yeah.”

I gave him a bath. We watched Beethoven’s Fourth. Carly cleaned the kitchen. We then read all of Smurfs #14 Baby Smurf. In bed I think I said something about him being Grouchy Smurf, then Baby Smurf. He said “I’m Big Kid Smurf.” He was asleep about 7:30.

He was up just before me, at 6:10. After nursing they read All in One Piece and Kipper’s A to Z. August and I were catching up on the 1Second videos while she left. Then had Cheerios and bananas for breakfast. We played with the Smurfs, then I suggested we read some Smurf comics. He wanted one about Farmer Smurf, but I found one about Baby Smurf and we read that instead. We finished that first story, then he started talking about machines: “I’m going to build a machine with coffee.” “I builded a mixing machine. I put a lot of scoops on it.” There was more talk of machines – made lollipops, etc. I had the idea of getting out the small fan and that kept him occupied for awhile. Did some exercise, then we read the rest of that volume (14) of Smurf stories. We had crackers, crab, and cream cheese for snack. I showered, and he just played around with things on his own. He was then talking Smurf: “Smurf all the crackers…” Sound outside: “Smurf that sound.”

I made a peanut butter and honey sandwich for later, and he wanted some now, so he hate some peanut butter and honey on spoon. We Skyped with gramma and grampa. Had fun with that, but we were getting a lot of feedback. At the end he was frustrated when an emoji he sent didn’t show up big like the used to do. He wanted to cover it up with a sticker on the iPad.

We were listening to Cream and he liked a song. He helped pull out the garbage bag so we could take it down, and we left at 11:40. As we walked, he took me apart, like Brainy does to Clockwork Smurf: “Sorry, I just want to see the bones…of the robot.”

We stopped and got some kimbap (again at his request, but then he didn’t eat any of it). We discussed how he has gone three nights in a row with a dry diaper and that he could try underwear soon. He said “Umm, no. I’m still learning.” We ate a quick lunch as was really hungry, but he just wanted to get in to the children’s museum to play. We were to the blue blocks at 12:40. Oddly, someone had left a plastic tiger toy on top of a very symmetrical fort that had been built out of the blocks. We started playing. He tripped and fell once and said “I’m okay.” A boy came and August was a little protective of the blocks he was playing with. The woman he has played with before came over and he was very happy about that, and they played until he needed to use the bathroom. As usual, on our way out though he wanted to play with all the things. Did some good waving to her as we left.

Went to the second floor for the bathroom, then went into the space area. He spent a long time on a ball game thing, where 4 people work together using ropes to maneuver a plastic circle to catch a ball, then to put it in in a hole. At first it was just a tug of war with a bunch of other kids. But then they left, and August really liked turning the wheel to make the next ball come out, and we worked together to catch the balls and put them in the holes. Other kids then came, and they played it properly, with August releasing the balls, and them catching them and putting them in the holes.

He hopped on the skateboard-ish spaceship game, then got in line with a group and walked up the ramp with them. But when they headed for the construction area August kept going and went to the water area, getting there about 2. A lot more playing with the hand dryers, and working on the hand over hand thing with the bucket. He then ran over to the fashion show area, still in his apron, and I took a photo before taking the apron off him. We played with the swirly thing, watching the bubbles form then disperse, then he ran back to the clothes area for the fashion show. He chose, on his own, the girl hanbok to wear. He did the catwalk with that and I took photos, then he walked in it over to the microphone area, then the swirly thing. Wore it for a few minutes before deciding to take it off.

We left at 2:30 and went back down to the blue blocks. There was no one there, but he said “I don’t want other people here…No, I can’t share.” Played a bit, then needed the bathroom. We went up to the bathroom again, then from the balcony we saw the woman (or she saw us first, rather) from the basement now working the front door and waved at each other. We went to the cafeteria for a snack at 2:50. I had brought the custard cake snack from the bag of treats from Jenny and he ate it. I was just letting him eat all of it, but he offered me a bite: “Dada, have it!…You like it? I like it.”

Back over on the third floor he played with the wind stuff: the scarfs up the pipe (which a worker had all tied together in a row) and the pipe where you can set the pipe on top of it and it will hover. I was pushing the button on this one, and he was both fascinated by it and terrified. Not sure if it was just the noise, or he was worried the ball was going to fall.

We then went downstairs and to the hand puppets 3:15. He started with the baby one again. He said “The baby’s name is Squeap.” He wanted a story from the mama puppet about a baby getting eaten by a dragon, so I made one about a boy named Thorton who finds a golden egg. A dragon, seeing the gold, tries to steal the egg, but accidentally swallows the boy as well. Didn’t really get farther than that. August sang a “I’m a floppy baby” song. Then, he started to follow and play with other kids and adults: first with the tree thing, then in the drum room, then at the zoetrope. However, at the zoetrope he was putting the used papers in the zoetropes and spinning them, but he didn’t want a little boy to take a paper out of the zoetrope.

From there it was to the colorful shadows, birthday cake lights, light rods, and light blocks. With the light rods and light mixing things though there were a couple of twin boys. They, probably used to battling each other for toys, etc. kept pushing and hitting August. The mom, right there, on her phone, wasn’t to bothered by one of them swinging a heavy light rod at August’s head, although she redirected the boys a couple times. But at the end there was a little girl. They first played together with the light rods, then he followed her in to the shadow animals and played together there. He twice had the snail slime her head, and she had the squirrel or giraffe kiss him. Then she was copying him as he put them against the wall or kind of banged them on the table.

We left a little after 4. Went to the bathroom by the entrance to the park, then ate apple on the train. As we walked home he saw a picture of food and said he wanted to eat octopus. He knows I don’t like it though: “I want to eat octopus. I’ll eat octopus but not dada.”

We met Carly at the corner, and were home by 5:10. She read us a couple of scenarios for their project at school. Of the first one he said “I like it.” The second wasn’t as good and he wanted her to go back to the first one. Carly made him some broccoli nachos for dinner, then she ran to the bank to transfer some money. He then ate rice and beans and broccoli on chips. We read the first two stories in volume 14 of The Smurfs (Baby Smurf and A Little Party). Carly gave him a short bath, like the shortest bath ever considering she also washed his hair, as they watched part of one of the outside orchestra piece video. They then were doing the pillow surfing on the bed, and August ran out wanting the surfing song, so I found “Wipe Out” on the iPad and played it. He was plugging his ears though, and it wasn’t clear if he didn’t like the song, or was just being silly. He ended with some random craziness on the bed: “I want the pillows… to do the craziness!” He was asleep a bit after 7:30.

All day he was singing snippets of a “I don’t know how to poop and pee…” song.

Photos: 

Backwards on the video game: 

In line: 

Fashion show: 

Hand puppets: 

Little girl: 

Shadows:

I heard the door open at 6:58. The next thing I heard was the toilet lid being opened. He had gotten up and gone straight to the bathroom. We played with the Smurfs a bit, then read Little Red Riding Hood (which we got a couple nights ago when he wanted to read Little Red Riding Hood – an odd request, as he doesn’t really know the story), Tallulah’s Tap Shoes, and A Violin for Elva. He ate the last of the banana bread for breakfast, then shared some Cheerios with me. He heard Rossini’s William Tell Overture on the iPad and wanted to add it to his playlist. We then played with the Smurfs for a long time, having Papa Smurf make spells, them visit the aquarium,  go on picnics, and made up stories about Azrael. He had a vacuum cleaner save them at one point: “The name of the vacuum cleaner is robot vacuum cleaner. The robot vacuum cleaner saves them.” He made shapes out of my vitamins – he remembered doing that from quite some time ago. 

He wanted to go outside, and requested water faucets. I suggested the ones up by Madeul Stadium and he liked that idea, so we headed out for a morning trip at 8:50. As we left, he said “We don’t have to take a bus or train?…A horse will ride us here.”

We got to the faucets, and he played for a little while, but not long. We left at 9:25. I drove him past the playground but he wasn’t interested. At the Spiderweb playground he hopped off and ran to the store window, and we spent a few minutes buying and selling things and making change. Then back on the bike and we went farther. He saw exercise equipment near the corner of the apartment complex and wanted to play there. Did some spinning things, then did the thing where your feet swing on his own. And he did some hanging from the bar on that one. Then he wanted to leave: “I want to get away from garbage.” I had also just detected a garbage smell, but wasn’t sure where it was from.

On the way home, by Cafe Tolerance, we spotted a huge line of ants. We investigated that for a few minutes and talked about how ants live. As we got back to the building, he got upset by the plans: he didn’t want to go to Tous Les Jour for bread, and he didn’t want to go home so I could take a shower. He wanted to go to Cafe Tolerance, and he wanted to go now. Took awhile to get going, but we made it to Tous les Jour. But there he wanted to look at cakes, and keep looking at cakes, then jelly beans, etc.

Since he kept talking about candy and treats I thought he might be hungry, although he wasn’t saying so. We got home at 10:30 and watched a video of the William Tell Overture. And then I got him some apple and he ate three pieces. I left him to watch the overture again and took a shower, and as I was finishing I heard him yelling for another piece of apple. He was quite upset I wasn’t getting him an apple right away (being dripping wet and all) but then he heard the start of the end of the overture (the galloping part) and ran out and watched that. I got him the last apple slice, then we watched the first two movements of Beethoven’s Ninth.

We were going to leave to go to Cafe Tolerance, but he decided he wanted one more Smurf story, so we did that. Then I put the stroller away in the closet and he saw the gas pipes and asked about them. So we ended up spending a lot of time talking about how the gas pipes and stove and exhaust and everything work. We covered it several times, and I kept turning on the burners for him.

Finally, we left by 12:10. We got to Cafe Tolerance. He got an apple juice and I got the cinnamon toffee latte. The woman (the one who remembers August each time) made sure it was okay with me that it didn’t have coffee. I then made the mistake of mentioning to August that he could try my drink. He really liked it, and ended up drinking about half of it. He kept saying “I want to share” but then when he started drinking his apple juice it was gone before I could get a sip. I tried to get out the iPads, but he didn’t really want to play or anything so, so we ended up leaving just past 12:50.

We headed to Home Plus to do our shopping. Going down the walkways he spotted a puppy in the window of the pet shop and wanted to stop and look. First time he has done that. We then did our shopping. He insisted on peddling and steering himself around the grocery store. I was keeping a hand on the bike at first, but he got quite good at it. Up by the checkout lines he found a display of bubble wands and little plastic hand crank fans. He loved the fans, and kept playing and playing with them. At one point he ran away from me and over by the wine section because he was afraid I was going to take one away from him. He then argued “Maybe we should buy it for mama.” They were only 2 dollars, so I let him get one and he chose the blue one.

We then went over to the park and sat on a bench in the shade by the (still off) floor fountain. It was now 2. He played with the fan, blowing air on my hair, the bushes, etc. A guy came over and gave us a piece of candy and brochure from the Bible university just up north. He was happy to hear we had gone to the flea market on Saturday.

At 2:20 August had the idea of going to the art museum. We went in and looked at the stage area that was being set up (alas for a concert at 7), then looked at the art, first on the first floor, then up on the second. Came back down and played in the play area. He ran right over to the one other kid in the play area and started playing with her. We played with balls a bit, then there was a second girl that was more into playing with him, and was actually chasing him around. When she left he was pretty much done. We went out, and he got a paper cup and drank from the water machine on his own until he spilled some on his shirt. We were then all startled by a very loud couple of seconds of music that was accidentally played from the speakers. August got upset a bit, and another girl really started crying.

We headed home a bit before 3. Played more Smurfs, and he mentioned Clockwork Smurf again. I had the idea of looking first at a picture, then finding a video of Clockwork. We watched part of the episode together, then he watched parts of the episode a few times on his own. He really found the beginning hilarious, and then wouldn’t really watch the parts where the story changes to the trapped prince and the scary woman trying to be queen.

We talked about heading to the four swing playground and meeting mama there. But first I realized I should cut the veggies for nachos later. Then, I couldn’t find a lid. By that point August got distracted and was doing other things, and wanted “one minute” of water. So by the time we went down we just had time to go meet her by the pink building.

We came home and I made nachos. I gave August an olive with beans on it and called it a beanive. He said “I like beanives.” For some reason Carly did a Marshy impression (I think August had said he was Marshy). August responded with “Oh, mama.” We ate, and he did a pretty good job of eating nachos. He tried to avoid the green onions, but on one bite had one. I suggested he just cover it up with yogurt, so he did and ate it.

Carly took him to the bathroom at one point and washed his hands. He wants us to get a hand dryer now: “I want a hand dryer. Hand dryer please!” We played around more with being Clockwork (he really likes pretending to break the parts inside Clockwork and then going out of control, like what happens in the episode), then Carly gave him a bath while I did dishes.

After his bath I was putting some stuff away and banged on his drum a bit. He said “Nice music.” He then made a Tallulah’s Tap Shoes reference, changing a line from referring to tap not being dance: “It’s not music, just making noise.” He was asleep about 7:20.

Photos. Playing store: 

Exercise: 

Puppy: 

Fan on my hair: 

Looking at art: 

Getting a drink: 

He was up, allergic I think, a little before 5. Carly made him eggs. He found the wooden car puzzle in the pile of stuff to be shipped to Israel and wantedthe backhoe one. He was upset when we found out Carly had sent it to Colin. First he decided he wanted to send it to Vivian instead, but when he calmed down he decided he wanted to send the car one to them as well. He played in the sink, but tried to follow Carly out the door when she left. Thought he would get upset when I stopped him, but he was fine. He simply asked “Mama’s at work now?” I explained that she was still in the hall, but on her way to work.

August then wanted to get the Smurfs out, and we played with them for a long time: he wanted to have them choose to have a picnic in the water, and of course everything sunk or floated away. They played hide and seek. And they went to the aquarium but Hefty broke aquariums with the rock he was carrying. We looked up a list of all the Smurfs to see what other Smurfs there are. And he sucked up all their rocks, flowers, food with a vacuum cleaner. We made soup for them, and he ended up singing a “tomato soup” song.

Then our doorbell rang. It was a woman asking us to move the bike from the hall. A good warning that they were going to clean the halls. Before we ended up with a lake out there, I put a Pink Panther cartoon on his iPad and jumped in the shower. We got ready to go as fast as possible, and left at 8:40.

We walked over to the mama statue and gave it a pat. He knew I had packed a grape slurpy thing (the last one in the cupboard) and wanted to eat it, so we sat on a bench across the path from the statue and ate that. He was watching the women walking laps, and said “I want to wear masks.”

We then got in the backpack and headed to the station. On the train a woman gave him a snack in a box before I could intervene. He wanted to eat it in the cafeteria at the children’s museum. He mainly played with the ear on Human Body. As we got off he said “I’m comfortable with that woman.”

At Children’s Grand Park station he continued to spot all the different models of CCTV cameras through the station – something he’s been into the last couple of days. They are different sizes and shapes, so I’ve talked about how some are older than others, so he’ll point and say “That’s an older one?” or “That’s a newer one?” One of the escalators was broken again. As we went in the park he said “I like that group. I like all those people.” We stopped in the pond area and looked for turtles and I spotted one. Then some workers climbed in and started to cut some of the grass in the pond and we watched them a bit.

We sat in the pagoda by the pond and tried the snack. It was a jello-like snack bar. He first said “Yeah, it’s pretty good.” But then only ate a couple bites of it.

It was before 10, so he was a bit impatient, waiting for the museum to open. He saw some people go in the doors and he wanted to wait in the lobby, but I wanted to wait at the pagoda. As soon as it was 10 we went in the children’s museum. We went downstairs to play with the blue blocks. But first he jump on the circle things, played with the magnets, etc. It was kind of funny, as there was a worker who was treating us like it was our first time there, telling us how everything worked. The best was when he tried to explain, and then pointed to the sign explaining, the random magnets – which are literally supposed to be a free play/creativity activity. August then wanted to go play with the blue blocks. They didn’t have the sound and video working and were fiddling with the DVD player and the guy told us that. I was fine and we started to play, but then he said we couldn’t play there as they were trying to fix it. A little odd. We went and did the robot, the Braille, the airport scanner, music box, etc. August still wouldn’t ride in a wheelchair.

The guy then let us play in the blue blocks. We played there awhile. I made a walking path for August, but he only did it once. August heard the hint of another kid coming down and was being possessive: “I don’t want other kids in here. It’s only for Zinnie…Only for Zinnie, but not other kids.”

At 10:40 we headed up to the bathroom. He chose to use a urinal. From there he wandered to the space area. Jumped on the tilting ship hinges with some other kids, did the running game, considered going up in the big play structure, and played in the space ship. In there, August got hit for the first time during the day, by a boy who hit August’s hand when August put his hand on a lever. The other boy wasn’t using it, and I realized as the teacher got the boy away that he was a special needs student. August didn’t seem bothered by it. Oh, and August chose on his own to get his picture taken at the photo zone next to the alien.

Then we went up to the water area. Played there as usual until August discovered the hand dryers. He would get his hands wet, run to the hand dryers to dry them off, then go get them wet again, etc.

For the last 20 minutes or so he went over to the culture play area. He stood in a masquerade figure so I could take his photo, we played around with the TV camera and microphones, and he tried to get in other kids’ photos on the fashion runway, then stood on it and put his hands up so I could take a photo.

We left at noon to go get lunch. I’d mentioned going to a restaurant to get Korean food, and put him in the backpack. I had also asked if he needed to go to the bathroom and he said he thought he was okay. I realized I’d confused him about where we were going as he said “I thought it was at Hagye.” when I started to walk away from the subway, further into the park. That would make sense, as it is around Hagye that we always talk about going out for lunch and getting Korean food.

But instead we were going to the combination burger/Korean food place (Cobaco) over by the animal show building. This was where, with my parents, he had grabbed a straw and where, a few months later, I had had him sitting in a seat on his own. This time, he was eating soup on his own and using chopsticks. A bit has changed. Oh, and on the way over we stopped to admire the weeds overtaking the old aviary.

At one point during lunch he reached up to grab a straw. I told him of grabbing a straw here and how he used to chew on them. So he tried chewing on it, but didn’t seem impressed.

We next went and saw the seals and sea lion. Spent a good amount of time watching and discussing them.

From there we went to the bathroom (where I had changed him when with my parents – one of the first places). He sat up on the changing pad for funsies. He observed of the soap on a stick “That one’s up. I like up things.” (Referring to the ones over in the coffee shop building that are installed sideways and rest down on the counter instead of rotating left and right.)

We took the path up behind the bathrooms. Actually got up the odd bumpy path just fine, but then he fell in kind of a hole on the regular path and scraped his right knee a bit. He walked around, and sort of played with a big stick a bit, but it was all too much. He decided to go home.

Went down in front of the seals and got in the backpack and put the cover up and sunglasses on. It was clear though by the time we approached the coffee shop area that he was about asleep. So I walked around to the back entrance and up and he was asleep. He slept from 1:57 to 2:47. I started trying to wake him up at 2:35, but that wasn’t happening. Once he did wake up, he wasn’t getting out of the backpack. He spent several minutes hiding hands and making funny noises, then jokingly scooting away from me. The first thing he said was something about coffee, I thought, and a minute later he said “I want my coffee.” Funny boy. He also got Smokey out and was playing with him for a couple minutes.

We left at 3. We walked over to the new playground area. A small fence had blown over, and no
one was working, so we walked in a bit and looked around. There’s a cool water play area, with water going down the hill from one wooden tub to another, that looks promising. And a small sand area. Still looks like there is a lot of work to be done.

Then to the Korean walking path area. Played with the faucets a bit and the toy boat in the backpack, but then he was done at 3:20: “I’m done. I want to go home now. Turn off the water.”

We went to the bathroom, then he really wanted to look at the candy and toys. I finally got him out of the shop. We started to walk out of the park, but only made it as far as the set of faucets. There, he found a hose used by the construction workers. We attached the end that had come off the faucet, and the other end wasn’t far away. We were turning it on, watching water come out the other end, until eventually we had a river that ran down the slope until it found its way into a drain.

Took about 15 minutes there, and though we were leaving a little before 4. But August spotted kids climbing on statues, and I told him he could go join them. The first group was of kids the same age or younger. August climbed on and sat at one end. At one point a girl climbed on behind him and was hanging on his shoulder. He didn’t much like that. Then, as he sat on it, two of the little boys started to hit August in the arms and legs for no apparent reason. Again this didn’t seem to phase him.

That group left, but another remained. One of the girls kept coming up and handing me or August rocks. So we were all making stacks of rocks on them statues together. At one point a bunch of the kids ran up the hill and he ran after them, and when they put their arms up for some reason he did it to. We played on the statues until 4:20, then spent some time looking at the robot-looking statue of Jan Janie Weltevree that is my favorite statue in the park (earlier, August had asked me if some other statue – an animal or something – was my favorite piece of art, and I told him no it wasn’t). We identified some of the things that it is made of.

We got to the station at 4:30. He stayed in the backpack, on the ground, the entire time on the train. There was a girl that got on with a cello case.

We were home at 5:05. As we got to the building I said we could save going to the post office for another day. I just wanted to get some more boxes for packing. He said “No, I don’t want to do that. I want to jump on the bike and get boxes.” I said okay, then asked “Do you need to go to the bathroom first?” He said “No…How far it is?” When I explained it was over on the other side of the art museum he seemed fine with it. He’s thinking about it.

We headed straight over, got 3 size 5 boxes, and drove them home stuck in the middle of the bike. We were home at 5:33, dropped off the boxes, then turned right around again to go down and find Carly on her way home. We found her outside Mama Juice.

They nursed, then for dinner he said he didn’t want anything. I made him up a bowl of rice, broccoli, and cheese anyway and he ate a good amount. He suddenly came out of the parlor pulling the Smurf village mat with all the figurines on it. We played several aquarium scenarios. They nursed and read Five Minutes Peace and Kipper A to Z. He was then playing on his own on the reading area in the parlor, and we were both in different rooms when I heard him say “I’m playing with it. Don’t take it!”

I gave him his bath. He wanted me to stack the cups like Carly does, but I was doing it wrong. I was able to distract him by showing him that the cups connect like a catepillar. So he played with them that way. We got through the washing and hair washing okay. Carly then took a shower, and I put on his pajamas. He said “That’s the pants with nobody inside them that I’m wearing. Now there’s somebody inside them!”

He was asleep just a bit after 8.

I was able to find the Children’s Grand Park theme song, which we’ve headed hundreds and hundreds of times, on YouTube so we can add that to iTunes. Now I just need to find the Korean version of “Way down upon the Swanee River” that we’ve heard just about as often. That one might be more difficult.

Photos: 

Taking another straw and chewing on it: 

Seals: 

sitting on the changing table: 

Scraped knee: 

Asleep: 

Playing on the statue: 

He slept until 7:28. Not upset at all, and just sat on the floor waking up. A bit later he wanted to play Dust Buster on his iPad, one of the piano learning apps, but he only wanted me to play, and said “I don’t want dada to make mistakes.” Ate some banana bread, and played a little GarageBand, but mainly he decided the keyboard was a vacuum cleaner, sucking up notes. Then he wanted it to get hurt and take care of it: “What happened to this vacuum cleaner?” Exercised and took my shower; he played in the sink in the bathroom while I took my shower. He wanted me to keep reciting Green Eggs and Ham, but with having Sam’s friend not like other things, often random, like balancing. Got ready to go, and wanted to grab change for the lockers at the aquarium and he helped me look through the coins for 500 won coins. He found a red ginseng candy in the pocket of his shorts – someone had given it to him sometime. I broke it into quarters and let him try it, but he seemed suspicious of it. Said he liked it at first, but then would just lick it and decided he didn’t like it too much.

On the toilet, he was playing with the toilet paper roll and said “The toilet paper’s dancing.” We finally left at 10:40. We patted the mama statue and he noticed it was warm and kept asking what would happen if it was different temperatures: “What if it’s 200?…twenty two hundred?”

We took the train and transferred at Konkuk University, then went to Jamsil and got off at Lotte Tower. We quickly found the Jaume Plensa sculpture I’d been wanting to find (http://jaumeplensa.com/index.php/works-and-projects/projects-in-public-space/item/324-possibilities-2016). We sat down on a neck by a bunch of Pororo statues (that August liked and wanted to take photos of) and ate lunch, but he mainly was playing, especially when he saw a girl about his age playing on the statues as well. He started playing next to her, then when she ran across to the other set of Pororo statues he followed her. And then when she went across the field, past the Plensa sculpture, he kept following. They went over to an art installation on the other side of the field and played in that, then were both running around the field, chasing each other. I went to get our backpack, and they went back over to the installation. They kept playing, and eventually they brought a box over to August – they were a box of Russian chocolates. We shared one with the girl, then they had to go.

We sort of went back to finish lunch, but then he kept trying to play with other kids. Unfortunately, they weren’t as interested. In fact, there were two girls that seemed to only want to pose for photos and when August got close to them they would run off.

August and I discussed what to do, and he wanted to go to the aquarium. I had looked into going up to the observation floor, but it would have cost about 50 dollars for the two of us. Anyway, but first August wanted to go in the mall we were right next to. We went in, and August spotted some mannequins he wanted to take photos of. He led the way, on his own, up some escalators. Then he found another Pororo statue, we found a statue of a mermaid, and he stuck his hands in some display cases. We took a photo of a pair of shoes he liked, then went and rode the elevator up, then down to the basement. There was a ceiling with white flower shapes on it, and some light fixtures he liked.

Then we left at 1. We took the train a few stops to the west. In the station he spotted a brightly colored billboard he’s seen before and liked and wanted to take a photo of.

As we walked through the mall he hummed Ode to Joy and he noticed that the reflections of the lights on the floor seemed to move. I explained how it had to do with the changing angles between us and the lights as we walked, and he really tried to understand it: “Changes the angle of your feet?”

We got to the aquarium about 1:30. As we put the backpack away he spotted a woman and started to talk about her. They were speaking English, so I was afraid he was going to say he didn’t like her, but instead said “I like that one…Yeah, I like all of them, but mostly that one…I’m comfortable with them…I’m comfortable with them too.”

He talked about the shark statue chomping us, then we went in. We didn’t have a long time, but instead of hurrying, he spent a lot of time in the Korean ecosystem area, then the Korean gardens. He was most interested in where the water was coming in to each of the tanks. And following the paths of the water through the garden areas.

By the tank with snails he surprised a woman. Turned out the couple was from Vancouver. I said we were from Seattle, and the guy got overly excited, giving me an enthusiastic handshake and hug and joking we should have dinner together sometime.

We sped up after that. He wanted to stop at the harp-shaped aquarium though, saying “I want to look at that one. We always do.” Oh, and at the green/orange/red light aquarium he joked about crossing the street, and we took photos of him in each of the lights.

He needed to use the bathroom again, and in the Amazonia area we went back to the bathrooms – we’d also gone before we went in and had talked about how the other doors went to the Amazonia area.

On to the Touch Lab area, where we spent ten minutes or so. He liked the animals, but was fascinated with all the pipes he could see and room full of pump equipment, etc. and wanted to know where the water goes and comes out.

We hurried more after that, then stood on the moving floor. At the gift shop I mentioned finding something for Carly for her fake birthday. He spotted balloon bopper things and said

“I want to surprise mama with that.” He first chose a Hello Kitty one, but then spotted a Poli one and we went with that.

We went back in to get the backpack. I was ready to leave and hurry, but he wanted me to do the shark again: “First, put your hand in that.” We left at 2:50.

On the subway he didn’t like a guy that touched him and jumped off the seat. We moved to a different set of seats after a couple stops. He was eating crackers, and grabbed two: “I think two will do it.”

We took line 2 up and transferred to line 1, then at Wolgye we took the Nowon 15 bus to APIS. Or actually a stop farther, as we went to Tospia and got a mocha for Carly, a strawberry yoghurt smoothie for August, and a drink for me. We then went and got to APIS just before 4:30. August and I sat on the stands, waiting for Carly to come out, as she had told us she was leaving at 4:30. But after 10 minutes or, as August was finishing his drink, he wanted to find mama. So we went in, only to find she wasn’t there. I called, and she had actually left at 4:25. So August said “Happy fake fake birthday” to her over the phone.

We went and used the bathroom, then cleaned up the little bit of smoothie that had spilled when he had dropped his smoothie going up the stairs. He had wanted the smoothie back in the cup.

As we walked across the field he said “I don’t want fake grass in Israel…” And randomly, “I want to wear underwear at night now.” At the busstop we waited. And waited. Two 1130s went by. Then we saw Emmalee and Naara, the music teachers, and went and talked to them for a few minutes. Still no bus. Took about twenty minutes. It came, and we got on. August got the last seat before the second door on the door side. The bus got more and more crowded since it was the first one in so long. August was almost falling asleep by the time we were getting to Hagye. I was singing to him, and said I shouldn’t sing a sleeping song. He said “I want a sleepy song.”

We got off the bus, and said goodbye, and he spotted the camel statue and said “I want to say hi. You used to do that?” Been a long time. We got home at 5:40 and gave Carly her drink and bopper, and the rest of the Russian chocolates. August said “I want chocolates.” Carly had said she had missed her own fake birthday.
August kept asking why, then said “Why mama missed fake birthdays? Because they leave?” We realized he didn’t understand her use of ‘miss’.

He had some dinner, then Carly gave him a bath. They were stacking up all the cups and then pouring water through them. After his bath he climbed on Carly with pillows, and we joked that he was surfing, and were humming “Wipe Out”. He kept asking us to sing it again.

On the toilet he called Carly Dada again, then was joking that all our names were switched. He was now Mama and did his Mama impression: “Why hello there.” He was then teasing her, and instead of saying he loves her just “so much” he said “A ton of Qs…so much Qs.” He was then asleep right at 8.

Plensa sculpture: 

Drink by Lotte Tower: 

Looking up at Lotte Tower through the sculpture: 

Drinking Pororo’s drink: