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He was up a little before 8:30. He cuddled in the couch bed for a few minutes, then we went downstairs and he went out and climbed in Carly’s lap for a couple minutes. Back inside we read the first few chapters of The Last Kids in the World and the Cosmic Beyond. We were then waiting for Gilad to be ready for Minecraft, so watched the latest Grian video, where flair was a word of the day. He then had Brother and Sister games with Myna giving them IOUs and them cashing them in (often for silly things), like what happened between Stressmonster and Iskall in Hermitcraft.

We both had oatmeal for breakfast, then he did some piano practice; he’s getting down the second section of “Hacked” and we’ll probably get that learned by the end of the day. He started Minecraft with Gilad about 10:30. They had difficulty getting into one of Gilad’s worlds, and I think August ended up creating a new world. At one point I heard him say, “Gilad, do you think we should start mining? Settle down as a community?”

They played just over an hour until our lunch was ready and Gilad had to go. Good timing. We had grilled turkey and cheese sandwiches and dried mango. We went outside, and he had a whole game of Myna and Sister having a tag battle in Minecraft. We sat in the chairs and read more of The Last Kids on Earth then Shani said she had left something on our gate. It was a little fridge magnet thing where you glue pieces on to make a picture. Very nice of her.

August then had the idea that he wanted to pretend it was bedtime. I got Cheerios and we went up to his room. We listened to “Mouse Tower” on Stories Podcast, then “Living the Dream” on Peace Out and he was curled in his bed. He got bored about halfway through that and we went back downstairs where he went to the piano. He was then on Supersonics Piano when Carly came down. He went and did a really cool piano improve with a unique rhythm to it. He said, “I thought I’d take the beat from “Epic”.” Which is an advanced piece he’s listened to but can’t play.

He went outside and had some more food with Carly out there. Back inside we watched a couple Ted-Ed videos “Why Your Can’t Divide by Zero” and “Would You Move to Mars”. He had also asked something about what caves look like, so we watched a video called “Top Ten Caves” He then had Brother exploring caves and I taught him spelunker.

He then wanted to compose for each other. I composed for him first, then him for me. He never tried playing what I composed, and the piece for me kept getting longer and longer. We did go to the piano after a while so I could try to play it. From there we went to the floor and did some art on the iPad, first an activity from the art book. August sort of did it, tracing the figures, but knew from the beginning it was too hard—it looked like a writing activity, with having to draw curves and the such. We switched and did a little Brilliant, doing a little of the geometry course. He was somewhat impressed when I was able to convince him the perimeter of an irregular polygon was the same as the square that contained it.

We went outside, where Carly was gardening, and I was trying to get him on a walk. He was playing on the teeter totter and hanging upside down with his hair touching the ground. He then was saying of me trying to get him on a walk that “This is absurd…” Except it was coming out more like obscure, so we were discussing what both words meant, and both obscure and absurd were words of the day.

No walk, but good playing in yard. As he hung upside down and had me take a photo he said, “A photo is basically an infinitely long and infinitely still video.” He then showed me exercises and we did his exercises for several minutes.

Back inside I started rice, then he played Minecraft with Vivian and Colin. I went for a walk, then came back and ate. August stopped Minecraft just fine. They started story time and i went up to work. Cherie was then babysitting August over Skype. When I came down he went to the bathroom then talked languages with her and went back to showing her things on the piano. Cherie taught him the word dextrous. I went back upstairs for a couple minutes, then they came up for a bath. I heard him explain to her that even though not all numbers are prime, there are an infinite number of prime numbers. Which I’m pretty sure he figured out on his own and is pretty amazing.

We were in his room at 9:40. We listened to the Stories Podcast’s “David and Goliath”, then Peace Out’s “Living the Dream” He asked what a grandfather clock is. We listened to Glass: Solo Piano. He said “I can’t sleep” again right before falling asleep about 10:50.

“Hacked” progress:

Song with a cool new rhythm:

Hanging upside down:

His exercise:

His song based on “Hacked”:

He called me in once during the night, breaking the three-night streak, but still, he’s been doing well.

I went up just before 8:50 to wake him up. As he stretched I asked what he’d been dreaming about. When I mentioned Minecraft he said, “Something like that.” He also said there were treats involved, and asked if he could have an ice cream bar as there had been ice cream bars in his dream.

Downstairs he played piano, then in Minecraft we were marine biologists, and made more progress in finding animals. August also now knows what mangroves are. We had oatmeal for breakfast, and while we ate I showed him the Xisuma video showing off the Mojang April Fool’s version of Minecraft. August was skeptical when it was called the “last” update and “infinity” version, and liked that it was an April Fool’s joke. We went outside and he told me all about Bar’s infinite update. One of the things in it was a “Chiseled wither.” I don’t know what that meant, but I liked it. We went upstairs for more Minecraft and Ms. safe and Millie games. Back down at 11:20.

I had an activity to learn more about prime numbers, crossing off multiples on a 1 to 100 chart, but he didn’t want to do it, again. Got him to do it after a few minutes though. He was then graphing, and asked why sin(pi) equaled 0 in the graphing calculator, but some decimal in the scientific calculator. As I was starting to explain it was probably because one was set to radians and the other to degrees he figured it out himself, and we talked more about why and the connection to circles.

We then did more piano, and Earpaggio. I took to playing and identifying the chords on the piano, which he didn’t really need, but it was also a good sight reading activity. He was then quizzing me, playing things on the piano for me to identify. Which was difficult, because hew as also throwing in things like inversions.

He did alone time, and listened to the Story Pirates where Peter gets stuck in a time loop. We realized that since we don’t drive now we need to start listening to those at home, and chose that spot to ease back into season 3. We then played Minecraft. He did random worlds to pretend he was doing the book thing in the April Fool’s snaphot, then we were marine biologists for a bit.

We had nutty noodles for lunch with Carly outside. Then back inside we learned a few more measures of “Hacked”. We did math on the iPad, and we did binary and hexadecimal numbers, with him writing the numbers for me to figure out, then helping out with the calculator when I needed assistance. After that we watched the new GoodTimeswithScar video and had crackers and peanut butter.

Got him out on a walk for a chocolate snack bar. He ran out of the gate and almost right into the little dog that lives up the street. The dog didn’t do anything, but August ran back into the yard and took a minute of coaxing to get out. He had a Brother in Minecraft game as we walked. We just went over towards the cloud bridge and on the way back he saw a box of plates in the junk area and chose one with flowers and pomegranates on it. I washed it with the hose before taking it in and washing it with soap.

August went to the bathroom and kept discussing Minecraft. He went and sat next to Carly in the comfy chairs and was telling her about Minecraft, I think. When I tried to go out he asked me to go back inside. After a few minutes he came in and went to the piano. A little later he heard Carly recording a video outside. She said she was doing a video on fractions and he ran out to her. He thought she had said “fractals”. It was supposed to be something to do withVivian and Colin, but then we figured out it wouldn’t work on the iPads. He wanted to show them fractals, but just wanted to do a video of him flying in the fractal Minecraft world.

He did some Desmos, and they called Cassie. I was working on some journal stuff and figured out how to add the covers of the NY Times and Haaretz and Seattle Times to our journal every day with just a click of a button.

I went for a run, then took a quick shower and started working. Carly had been making brown rice, chicken, and broccoli and August had it for dinner, and seconds later. I worked on the couch, August was playing Minecraft with Vivian (they hadn’t done any math today, as Vivian wasn’t engaging with Carly), and Carly was working outside. August had a tough time ending with Vivian as she was still playing; we had let them play long. Handled it, mostly. They were able to switch to reading Stickman with Vivian and I went upstairs to work.

Carly brought him up for his bath, then I finished reading How To with him on the couch bed. Constant and dispose were words of the day. He finished his crackers and peanut butter. In the bedroom he saw Carly typing and asked how a person types. I compared it to learning how his hands move on the piano. He said, “But I need to learn it so I can properly write.”

We then brushed and flossed. He did a better job of brushing while I brushed today and it was the best he’s done on his own teeth in a long time. He was with Carly for a couple minutes and told me, “I just told mama a life back about programming…if there’s a computing error…” He told her about the error correction (or whatever it is called) that we had learned about a couple weeks ago in Brilliant.

We were in bed at 10. Listened to “What You Sow” on Stories Podcast, then “The Three Bs” on Peace Out. He requested Beethoven’s Fifth. Going to sleep was a painful one, as he kept waking me up saying he couldn’t sleep. He was finally asleep by 11:15.

A fast tune:

Lava game:

Fast fingers:

Glove shoes:

Song down the piano:

Just showing them fractals:

These are fractals in Minecraft (sideways):

Automated function:

C’s fraction vidéo:

Third night in a row of sleeping straight through without calling to me. I woke him up just before 9. The first thing he said to me was, “Dada, what do you buy if you’re a billionaire?” We talked about that on the way down. He cuddled with Carly and then me, then went to play piano for a while. He listened to a couple songs on Supersonics Piano, then was doing Desmos graphing. Something about a series of sine equations using pi.

We next played Minecraft. In the world where we’re doing all the effects and fills. We listened to Brains On! about plants feeling/communicating and Wow in the World about laughter. Irreversible was a word of the day. We were then listening to a Spare the Rock, Spoil the Child as he ate oatmeal and heard the song “Stay on the sunny side”: “But it’s physically unpossible to always make it day.”

We had oatmeal for breakfast, then did piano time working on his pieces for a bit. We went outside. He hadn’t heard it rain, but said I had been reading How To in his dreams. We went back inside and learned about counterfeiting money:https://youtu.be/j0ZhqStOwhc

and Genuine was a word of the day. Thenhttps://youtu.be/Xa8SHubMjGw

. He then talked about how “I use statistics to predict how likely it is something will get hacked.” Back to the piano and we watched a couple of counting videos in “Two Minute Music Theory”. He was trying to work in odd time signatures, but his natural sense of rhythm is of course 4/4 so I think he was frustrated when I kept pointing out that what he was coming up with was 4/4. Trying to get him to start with a slower sense of a 3/4 or 6/8, but he wants to go fast.

We next watched the latest StressMonster video. He then typed on my iPad as I got lunch ready. He was figuring out keyboard shortcuts, and now knows how to use them to move the cursor around. He had me do a video of the tons and tons of slashes that he was copying and pasting. We had hot dogs and corn for lunch. He had a game with Brother doing Minecraft building competitions.

Carly came down, and August wanted to go upstairs to combine playing Swift Playgrounds and a Ms. Safe game. We went up and started that, then came back down and helped with groceries when they arrived. We finished another level in Playgrounds. August wanted to do another before we were interrupted. We did Brother and Millie games, then he played some piano for alone time, followed by listening to all of “The Search for Rain”, the newest Circle Round. We played Minecraft in the flat world.

After that I got him outside. We kicked the ball around. He knocked a flower off and thought that was pretty funny. He had his chocolate snack bar. We sat on the bench swing and read the How To chapter about getting places quickly (commute and fortnight were new words) and saw the kids across the street exercising out on the sidewalk. He also had us doing some Brother games about having to share limited water in a drought and the kids not wanting to share their water.

Back inside what we had read reminded him of Kurzgesagt and he watched a couple videos. He then was doing math. Carly came down and started to paint a picture of a truck for Colin. He was finding all sorts of solutions to sine, etc. functions that found the limits at 1s and zeros. He told her, “I’m obsessed with undefines…” They went outside to exercise for a few minutes. He came back in and said, “Tell me what you’ve learned about sight reading…” We did some piano, then he went back out with Carly. He came back in saying, “I got to be going inside; a storm’s coming in, I think.”

They then called Vivian and Colin. When he went to the bathroom he showed more modesty than he ever has, closing the door and not wanting us to tell them he was in the bathroom. After that he was saying, “Just so you know, it’s a well-known fact that foxes can’t fly.” It’s a variation on a story about a turtle wanting to sing, and the other animals tell it that everyone knows that turtles can’t sing.

I went for a run as they played Minecraft. After getting back and taking a shower it was time for the Colin and Cherie birthday party over Zoom. Derek and Andrea and the family were on from Seattle, and a few of Jeff’s relatives were on as well. So that was a new experience. Carly had painted a truck for Colin and he really liked that. August had an opportunity to play his music for everyone.

August requested a Circle Round after that and listened to “Nilsa and the Troll”. I then got him upstairs. We read some How To. Almost done now. I got him Cheerios. He placed Cheerios on his tongue: “It’s awkward tongue day, so I’m decorating…” It was crazy hair day for Carly today so she had ribbon in her hair. Then on the Zoom call Carly had learned today how you can change backgrounds and put on virtual masks, etc. so he had had a lot of fun with that. At one point we both had dinosaur skulls on our heads and could chomp each other, virtually.

Carly gave him a bath, and he asked her, “Isn’t it funny that there used to be chicken pox parties?” I was whistling and he was asking about it, so then I was whistling faster. He was in awe: “What? No. This must be a dream.” I had him brush his teeth at the same time as me. Not that that really worked. It was still a ten minute process.

We got in bed and listened to “Curious Boots” on Circle Round, then the next Peace Out. She mentioned superheroes and August went on a rant: “I hate superheroes cuz they’re not explained by science…The things I love are the things explained under physics.” I was in the middle of doing the meditation/falling asleep and he reached down to just lift my shirt but startled me and tickled my ribs. I let out a sort of yell and involuntarily whacked his hand. Kind of funny, actually. We listened to Beethoven’s First. He again said he couldn’t get to sleep at one point and I sang “Driftin’” to him. He was then asleep about 11:10. Maybe a couple minutes earlier today, but not much.

So many slashes:

Programming:

Quick fingers improv:

Finding the limits of sine and cosine functions:

Happy birthday to Colin:

Crazy video effects on chat:

Playing music for the party:

He was down just before 9 and came down all on his own and “boo”-ed me. Luckily I had heard him coming. While I started to open a book to read he went and started playing “Hacked” on the piano. He was still having some difficulty adding in the base line, but after a couple minutes of coaching he got it down. He was then improving and played a few notes that sounded like “The Streets or Cairo” so I played that for him (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arabian_riff?wprov=sfti1).

We then played Minecraft, splitting our time in two worlds. August discovered Frost walker boots and was having fun with those. We had pancakes for breakfast and ate outside. We went I side and were going to do Minecraft Math but the Apple Pencil was up in the office where Carly was teaching. We did Earpaggio instead, then he was composing in Notion. He was learning his rest lengths, so that was cool.

I got the Apple Pencil and we did Minecraft Math. He wanted to do a bigger pyramid, so we did that. I added in the challenge of building the largest cube possible using the blocks from the pyramid. He spent a long time figuring that out.

Carly came down for lunch as I was making ours. We had a yellow lunch: pizza, corn, and canned pineapple. He jokingly snuck onto his iPad and said, “Nothing. I’m not doing anything.” He was totally copying Carly, including her tone. We ate lunch together, and I ended up teaching him some German words and a German accent, which he had fun with.

He next did alone time: a little piano, listened to a Two Whats‽ and a Wow! episode in which he learned that lobsters have teeth in their stomachs and pee out of their eyes, and then a short StoryNory where we learned about how Herodotus described the animals of ancient Egypt. He then had brother participating in a Two Whats and a Wow in which the truth was that trees can whistle.

We played Minecraft, playing in our survival world, listening to KidNuz and NASA and But Why? We mined diamonds. We ended up with an odd number, 19 I think, and he said an even number would be better, but then I said it was cool because it was prime. I realized he didn’t really know what that meant, so we learned about prime and composite numbers, starting withhttps://youtu.be/jpMYfW9XziU

.

I then got him out on a recycling walking. Which went fine until I was almost done recycling and the wind picked up and he started getting upset and insisting we go back because it could rain. I was able to finish up, then we hurried home. He played piano and had his chocolate bar snack. We discussed hand positions and started to learn the next part of “Hacked”. When he was hungry he had some peanut butter and honey crackers.

At 4 he had a meeting with Gabi via Zoom. We used my iPad and he was up on his bed. August wanted me there as well, but I ended up spending much of the time sitting out on the couch. They started by looking at a series of pictures with kids in them. The pictures told little stories and August was given points for describing the story, naming emotions he saw, and offering solutions if there was a problem. That went really well and they spent more than half of the time on that. When he was describing a kid that looked mean August said he looked like “Darth Vader, you know, Star Wars.” Gabi heard “sour” and repeated that a few times. August ran with it though and called it “very lemony.” When Gabi asked, “How does it feel when you have to accept something you don’t like?” he said, “Disappointed.” For another picture, which I did see, Gabi asked, “What’s one solution?” “Cut the ball in half.”

When he was done with his three crackers and peanut butter he said he was still hungry and I got him a bowl of Cheerios and he munched on those the rest of the meeting. It was like he hadn’t had breakfast and lunch. When they were done with that Gabi showed him a list of online games. August first wanted chess, but agreed on checkers since they didn’t have enough time, but then changed his mind: “No winning games!” So they switched to Tanks, where you try to hit the other tank with the right angle/force of a shot. He liked the physics of it. They went a full session, then said goodbye.

We went downstairs to the piano. Carly came down and he showed her everything he had learned and more. I got ready for a run. First time in shorts, although I could have been in shorts for the last few runs. When I came back he and Vivian and Colin were doing Minecraft. Carly had been talking with Vivian and August about how to handle disagreements in it before I left. That worked well. I took a shower, ate dinner, and went up to work for a while. They finished Minecraft, and I think also read Stick Dog. I came down at 8:20.

He went to the bathroom, and claimed sounds only fade beyond human hearing but never actually vanish (he referred to an asymptote): “I detected the first cave man talk and amplified it and translated it to human language. It said, ‘Kill that bear!’”

He had a second bowl of nutty noodles, then we watched a couple of videos about money, as he had asked, at bedtime last night, what makes it valuable: Ted-Ed and Kurzgesagt. He asked, “What’s an enigma?” A word of the day. He then saw Carly’s screensaver and stared at it, saying, “I’m mesmerized.”

We went upstairs and he spent a long time on the toilet. When he got off he had a static-y foot. We talked about it, and he said it has happened a couple times when he wakes up. Carly took over and washed him. He was being pretty hyper. In bed he asked, “What’s AI?” We read part of How To, finished the chapter about getting elected and starting the next. Pander was a word of the day. We then listened to both parts of “The Druid’s Harp” on Stories Podcast, then the episode about black holes on Peace Out. He requested Beethoven’s Second, so we listened to that. We’re gradually moving bedtime, as he was asleep by 11:10.

Progress so far on “Hacked”:

Time with Gabi:

Progress on “Hacked”:

He slept straight through the night. He was sitting up and stretching when I went up at 9:10. He listened at the office door to Carly teaching, then we went downstairs and he cuddled under the blanket. We started the “How to win an election” chapter of How To, then watched the last few minutes of StressMonster before playing Minecraft. We worked on the jungle treehouse and made a path down to the mine and down into it. After that he looked at Supersonic Piano. Carly took him up to say hi to her students. They were having a pet day, and she had also borrowed his stuffed Puff the Magic Dragon. But one of her students had brought his 4-year old sister, so Carly brought August up.

We had pancakes for breakfast. Lasted a few minutes until he saw a crane fly. We then went to the piano and worked on “Hacked”. Then upstairs for a Ms. Safe game. He was Millie again, and this time he wanted ‘bathroom’ in another language to confuse her, so we looked it up in Maori. The story then focused on the Ms. Danger students trying to kidnap her again.

We went downstairs to the piano. Carly came by so he had a competition with her as he showed her what he could play of “Hacked”. I got him outside for a minute and we did a little catch with a tennis ball. Until crane fly.

Inside I got him to ease into recording videos for Eve and Zoe. First he just played music. Then I had him do a fact for Heather (he told her how to do 2020 in Roman numerals). Then he at least said a little to them and played piano for them. We did more piano practice, then he liked the idea of me practicing with Earpaggio to improve my chord recognition. So we did that for probably half an hour. He did some of it on his own, or would help me by repeating what the app played on the piano.

He did alone time as I kept doing it, although he kept checking in with me through it, but it was kind of a sneaky way to get him to work on it as well. We then played in the flat world and I finished filling the big lake and started putting dolphins etc. in it. After that I started watching a video about whether any pop songs us the Locrian mode. August watched a bit, but then watched Brave Wilderness, about fire ants and when Coyote falls in a cactus. He kept calling out facts to me as I got lunch together.

Lunch was crackers with cheese and meat, the rest of his tuna sandwich from yesterday, yogurts, and chocolate soy milk. We ate outside, and I saw the big flower drop from the bush behind August. He talked about Minecraft, and more and more and more. He went in for the bathroom and kept talking, then he agreed to do an exercise video outside. But once we were out there he said that he had never gotten his afternoon walk chocolate bar yesterday, and that was why he had exercised with Carly. So now he refused to do it unless I give him that bar first (later, Carly said she had said no such thing…)

But I was then bouncing the tennis ball against the wall, and also off the ground. August was really interested in both and we talked about the physics involved and how your brain figures it out (and I pointed out that his brain does similar with piano playing). So August started practicing throwing the ball against the wall. Went well for a minute, until one of his throws went wide and bounced onto the kitchen roof. He was immediately inconsolable, first in the outside chair (“I’ll never throw a ball again!”), then in on the couch, covering his head with the pillows. Carly came down and took over comforting him, and I went down into Shmuel’s junk yard and borrowed a ladder. It got me, using just three rungs to be safe, just high enough to reach my hand into the gutter. I couldn’t see the ball from the upstairs bedroom, but I now used the selfie camera on my phone and was able to find it. Used a small shovel to help, and managed to get it.

At the very end I got a little sliver, and asked August if he wanted to see it: “Yes. I would LOVE to see splinters. I wouldn’t want to GET one…I could look up millions on Google…” We then went to the piano and now he decided we should start working on “Agent X”. I got the first measure down. He did more listening to songs on Supersonic, and was watching a boy playing most the most advanced piece of the curriculum.

After some more piano time we watched Iskall’s latest video. Carly came down, done with work, and made a salad. He complimented her on her salad and said it was beautiful. He didn’t want one himself, but asked for cucumber and hummus. He and Carly were doing piano together and I went for a run, then took a shower. We spent some time putting together parts of the song.

They then were on video with Vivian and Colin. Think they did some math, and I was working at the table. They were then playing Minecraft, and August was trying to build beacons. Vivian and Colin didn’t want him to build a beacon in the house, so then he was building one on top of the house. Vivian told him he couldn’t do that either, so he said fine, he was logging out. He turned it off and ran upstairs. He closed himself in the bedroom. I got him to unlock the door, and he sort of came in and out a few times, and eventually was talking to Carly at the top of the stairs. He kept insisting he wanted to just delete the world, and their work with it.

Eventually, he came down and had 15 minutes of iPad time left. I went upstairs to work for an hour. He came up just as I was finishing for the evening. He asked what the “weird” music was—it was some ambient music playing on my phone and he liked it. I went downstairs with him and we watched about ten minutes of a documentary I had just bought called Since I was Born about growing up in a refugee camp. It was all in Arabic, and August did a good job listening to me read subtitles, but eventually wanted something in English. So we switched to a documentary on YouTube called The Palestinian Kids Crossing a War Zone to Get to School. We watched about 30 minutes of that—enough to get understand what it was saying. We talked a lot about the situation and occupation and settlers, etc.

I then got him upstairs. He was talking about wanting to be able play like the boy playing “Antimelancholicus”.

Carly washed him and I started trying the Superpharm order. It took forever as the website kept resetting and freezing and whatnot. But finally, success. We ordered allergy medicine and toothbrush heads for August and some tissues.

Somehow they were talking and the idea of God came up, and August was arguing that he doesn’t believe in god because magic doesn’t exist and he believes in science and physics. The funniest moment was when he sarcastically said, “What does god do? Give you money? I’ll check my pockets…nope…”

We went to bed and listened to the newest Stories Podcast about bees (“The Bee’s Sting”). We then listened to a Peace Out about constellations. unfortunate was a word of the day. He questioned why we even have constellations if they could be connected in an infinite number of ways.

We put on Reich’s Desert Music and he liked that. Twice he said he couldn’t get to sleep. The first time I suggested we change the music but he said no, as he liked it. The second time was about 11:15. He said, “I can’t sleep.” I went to put on the fourth movement of Beethoven’s Ninth, but I think he was already asleep.

Meeting mama’s students:

Working on “Hacked”:

Music for Eve and Zoe:

Fact for Heather:

Message and music for Eve and Zoe:

Ear training:

Working on “Agent X”:

He called me three times during the night. Only once did he need covers pulled up, but he was right back to sleep all three times. He then woke up at 8:40. As he walked to go to the bathroom he started talking about achievements in Minecraft. He went down and said hi to Carly, then I read a bit of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Don’t know if he’ll be into it. We played Minecraft, then I made pancakes and took one out to Carly, who was meeting with Jeff and Alix.

He and ate, then went upstairs and had a Ms. Safe game which involved Millie being kidnapped by Ms. Danger’s students to try to force her to be their friend. We eventually headed back downstairs and watched the latest Grian video. He played piano, and at one point was really singing along with what he was playing. He then had a game where Ms. Danger was playing Minecraft and got too good at PVP and got kicked off the server. We played 6 rounds of Apples to Apples. Well, 6 rounds of Sister versus Brother, with August being the judge. She won 4 to 2.

We looked at the printed piano songs. He asked what Storm the Castle means, so a word of the day. Carly was in and they went upstairs for a while. He came down teaching her music terminology. He and I started working on “Hacked”, learning the first phrase of the melody. They had cucumber and hummus.

We then had a meeting with Gabi at 1. August watched Phineas Rage. We decided we’re going to try to have August play with him over Zoom on Tuesday. Carly got him some Cheerios to hold him over and I made us tuna sandwiches which we ate outside until a fly chased August in again. He played piano, then listened to “The Love Potion” from Stories Podcast. We played Minecraft, but then I was trying to pay Gabi. Thought I could use Bit, but I couldn’t get it to use either or Israeli card nor either of our American cards.

Carly and August started on a walk with Vivian on the phone over FaceTime. I got out only a minute later after finishing attempting Bit but they were already coming back. He had been afraid of crane flies at the start of the back pathway. He got frantic wanting to get in the house. Carly talked to him about it and I got in the car and headed to the bank and paid Gabi. Kind of odd to be in town. Life goes on, but a lot less of it. And there was a police car in town, likely enforcing the quarantine rules.

When I got back the two of them were outside exercising to a, I think, YouTube video. Props to Carly for August to do that, as he has barely ever joined in when I’ve tried such things. Carly was then working with someone’s help on how to place orders for delivery from the pharmacy. She got distracted by the news that Megan and Tory in India are getting on an emergency flight to get out of India and return to the U.S. They have to go now or are going to be stuck there through the summer. They are flying to Salt Lake City—apparently with the emergency flights you don’t really get a choice of destination and have to make your way from where you end up.

We read How To and timeless was a word of the day as we started to read the “How to know if you’re a 90s kid” chapter. August was impatient for Carly to come down and start the time with Vivian, so we started watching the latest Stressmonster while we waited. Carly came down and started math with Vivian. August and I watched a few more minutes, then he joined in on the math and I went up to work.

When I came down (after he and Vivian and Colin had finished playing Minecraft and some reading had been happening) I found that August was spraying himself with his spray bottle again. He had started it when they were exercising and Carly had said he looked strong. He, not clear if jokingly or not, took that to mean because he was sweaty, so he started to spray himself to look strong, and found that he liked it: “She thinks I’m torturing myself but I think it’s really cool…I was making a pun there.”

He actually wanted to head upstairs, and was trying to convince Carly: “I’d be joyful and grateful and kind…” That emotions poster is paying off. He went upstairs with me (Carly was trying to figure out the ordering again). He took a long time in the bathroom. He had a game where Brother using farms in Minecraft. Bath went smoothly, then got him dressed. We discussed how many days it had been of covid-19, actually he said something “Day 17 of covid-19…” and we talked about how it kind of started for us on his birthday. Of course, we hadn’t told him much at the time, so I filled him in on some of the details.

We were early and he requested a story first, so we started with Circle Round’s “Maushop and Grandfather Sun” He asked “What’s scarce mean?” A word of the day. We read more of How To. Impression was another new one. We finished chapter 23. He was resistant to brushing his teeth again, but I simply gave him a time limit and he eventually did it. Think he’s starting to come around a little, but slowly. After saying good night to Carly we went in and turned off the lights and listened to Peace Out’s “Show Your Glow”, which is about the Northern Lights and stories about them from different cultures. After learning about the valkyries he asked what final resting place and vikings meant.

We initially listened to the new Eno and Eno album again, but he couldn’t sleep. I suggested something a bit more engaging and he agreed to Beethoven’s Fifth. I think he fell asleep sometime around 11:15.

Also, during the day we got an email saying a package was arriving. It was our Amazon order we thought lost! So we just have to arrange with the school to get it when it arrives.

I’m bored:

Song of the day:

Working on “Hacked”:

Spraying himself:

Carly suggested turning the heater off in his room as it might make him less stuffy. So had it on some circulate mode. He did wake up once needing the covers back on, but otherwise was fine, and still nice and cuddled in his blanket in the morning.

He was up at 8:55. I went in and he asked “Is it time to get up?” I told him it was, if his body wanted to. He pulled the blanket over his head. After a few minutes we talked about how it seemed dark (one of the windows was also closed more than usual) and then we went downstairs. He said good morning to Carly outside. I told him I had an idea for a project today. At first he told me not to tell him as he wanted it to be a surprise. Eventually I told him. It was to send a video message to Eve. He said “N O” and went inside and started his morning playing piano. Cool improvs, as usual. I asked why he didn’t want to do it and he said, “It feels weird.” He kept playing. At one point he asked me how he moves his hand down. I realized he knows how to walk his right hand up and down one octave, and up as many as he wants, but not down more than one. So we figured that out (the thumb is always on 4 and 1) and he was excited about that.

When he was done he ran around and turns on all the lights, then we played Minecraft. First though he went to the bathroom, then we watched the “Morning Notes” video with the Seattle Symphony timpanist playing vibraphone (https://youtu.be/iI3FbBI0mPI). He then did some Desmos graphing and asked “What’s a therapist?” A word of the day.

We watched Iskall. He then talked about making a zombie farm in sister’s world. He played more piano, and at one point played a tune I recognized. Took me several minutes and I figured it out: The shovel cave it out 2https://youtu.be/Y5wfQkzZwIo

and The Shovel Caved It Outhttps://youtu.be/1ZjpZUrg4yY

He looked at the galaxy app and showed it to Carly. He found the “Low Metallicity” and “High Metallicity” groups and we looked up what that meant: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallicity?wprov=sfti1 So metallicity was the first word of the day.

I went out to enjoy the yard, and they started playing Minecraft. First the puzzle thing, then switching to D.C. Carly was talking about students, and mentioned that one had a lot of personality on Zoom. August asked, “What’s personality?”

He did redstone world and I let him go long as he was learning stuff. I started adjusting the tuning of the piano. Got the first half of it done. He had some apple and peanut butter with Carly outside and his second bowl of oatmeal, which I had gotten him earlier and she now re-heated for him. For his alone time he listened to “Rabbit’s Wish” on Circle Round. For Minecraft he built redstone stuff in our flat world and I almost, almost finished the big lake.

We went upstairs for a Ms. Safe game. He wanted the whole recital thing, but only longer and longer, so I had her think up of an infinite recital after finding out that the universe and then multiverse were infinite. It involved robots spreading across the universes to learn all the music of every planet, past and future. When Bar wouldn’t help with that plan it was back to using students. August had Millie move to Ms. Danger’s class. Bullies broke her hands (August’s idea). And then Dr. Badder and Dr. Gooder only made things worse until Bar gave her super hands with all sorts of upgrades, like the abilities to heat and cool things with her hands.

Eventually I was hungry and got him to head downstairs so I could make tuna sandwiches. A smoky one for him and I had the last of the lemony kind. We sat outside and ate, and Carly joined us. August talked about how “Whatever doesn’t kill you just makes you stronger.” A fly kept bothering him though and eventually he talked us into going back inside.

He did alone time listening to “Cow Bells and Cow Wells” on Circle Round. He then played Minecraft by himself as he was playing in random worlds that Carly and I didn’t want to play in. He was really excited about playing with Vivian and Colin soon and even though he kept saying he was bored he wouldn’t agree to do anything with me. I had been adjusting the tuning in the piano and got up most of the way while he was doing alone time, and he played it now and it sounded really good. We did a video of one of his latest songs.

He then called Vivian and Colin on FaceTime and talked to Vivian. They did fractions and division. I went up to work. Carly made nutty noodles as they did Minecraft. I came down as they had been reading Junie B. Jones. Carly went up to take a shower and August spent the whole time talking about wither farms in Minecraft. We had Brother comically mining for diamonds and then failing to AFK correctly. When Carly came down they read more of Junie B. Jones with Vivian. August sprayed his hair with his water bottle.

He ate more dinner and I adjusted more of the piano. Not quite done, but it sounds very good now. Although then when he was playing he found one note that I’d already done that could use some more work. Carly had headed upstairs as she was tired.

I took him up and gave him a bath. In the bedroom after he got dressed we watched “The Earth in Minecraft”:https://youtu.be/8_bW3ab8YAk

Took some time, but got him to brush his teeth. We said good night to Carly at 10. We read some of How To, then listened to “The Incredible Singing Tortoise” on Stories Podcast. He randomly explained that “I understand why it is ‘came to town’ and not ‘come-ed’…” using Yankee Doodle, as it is awkward to say ‘come-ed’. We listened to Peace Out’s “Tried and True”. We listened to the Piano 4 Hands album, but he said a few times he couldn’t get to sleep. I sang to him, the first time in quite awhile, “Imaginary Bars”, “Idaho”, and “Animal Life” and then he fell asleep about 11:30.

Morning improv time:

Playing an old tune – the shovel caved it out:

His new song on the adjusted piano:

Story time with Vivian:



He woke up during the night, stuffy, and I went in and we both fell quickly back to sleep. But then this morning (6 or so? Doubly not sure because of the time change) he managed to fling his legs over the side and kick me in the chest. I got up and went back to my usual bed and fell asleep again. So hard to get up this morning, and I heard Carly starting class before I managed to get out of bed.

August was even worse. I finally went up to wake him up about 9:40. He rolled over a couple times as I poked him, and one time actually sat up, then flopped back down on his pillow he finally got up just before 10. He went down to Carly and talked about the time. He said, “Yep, it’s TEN o’clock in the morning,” putting air quotes around TEN.

He did some very cool piano improv. I asked if he wanted to play with Gilad, possibly, this morning. He said yes and talked about how that gives him extra time: “Thank you Gilad, and thank you Minecraft.”

We went outside for a little while. August was shocked about how warm and bright it was this early, and marveled at how the fabric of the chairs was almost done and said “Thank you spring for evaporation! And condensation!” And chanted the water cycle.

Back inside he talked about white dwarfs and how neutron stars can gain mass: “according to the laws of, I think, quantum physics.” He was in a science mood so we read How To. He observed that, “If I was born in 4000 CE I could have a cell phone charging ancestor.”

He played some more piano, we watched the newest Stressmonster video, and had oatmeal for breakfast. Gilad was then available to play Minecraft, so they played in the Washington D.C. world. After a while they switched to Gilad’s Way of the Bee world. Carly got the message that they are locking down campus but could go in today. So I sent her all of the music for the songs August wanted printed, along with some circle of fifths charts.

When Gilad logged out August went to another one of the free worlds, this one about fractals. We started talking about that, and ended up going through the Mysteries of Fractals app, learning about the Julia Set. We learned about convergence and divergence and made fractals like juliaset://?code=8FDD603D62686CE9B81FC3FE.

We listened to the new Pearl Jam album today. In bits. He didn’t seem too impressed as he turned it off a couple times. One other time he started to play piano “with” it so I couldn’t hear it. First impression is that it is better than their last album, but don’t know if it will grow on me much.

He asked me how big a circle would have to be to have an area of 64. I worked on it in my head and decided on a radius of 4.5. When we then checked and I was correct with rounding (it came to 63.6) I was very excited, but he gave me a grade of B since it wasn’t exact.

Carly headed to school. I made lunch. He typed in Drafts and found calculus symbols using keyboard shortcuts: “I found the cosmological constant!” Carly came back for a thermometer. They won’t let you on campus without taking your temperature and writing it down…but you have to provide your own thermometer.

We ate outside (tuna melts and rice milk). He keeps using his numbering system and now expanded it: couple is five, a few is four, someone (his new one he added today, since he claims ‘some’ is two and this adds one to it) is three, some is two, once is one, zedaph is zero. He asked about Eve and her cough, and it was the first time he’s asked when he gets a play date with her. We discussed that. Carly and I later discussed it, and realized that since they are moving at the end of the year anyway that he might just not have any more play dates with her.

He told me, “Just so you know, I hate the mountains on the globe. Know why? Exaggeration.” Inside we started on Minecraft Math. He was really into it. He worked on a rectangular solid, which was doable for him, but also a challenge, then we did a couple of pyramid shapes. We took a long time on those, then built them in Minecraft, as a sort of sculpture across from the White House. The big ah-ha moment for him was understanding that every bigger pyramid had the shape of the next smaller pyramid as a hollow space within it.

He randomly asked, “What’s a bag of bones?” And scrawny. I think from a Circle Round or the such. I then made a page with the sphere equations. We didn’t use them now, but they’ll now be in his line of sight. We started to look at the music that Carly had brought back, and he looked at “Run”. We were listening to KEXP and the DJs were talking about how they are broadcasting from separate booths and cleaning everything. Having been listening on and off for the last few days it has been interesting to hear how people are taking comfort in KEXP and how the station is responding.

We went for our daily walk. Basically, I’ve found I can easily get him out in the afternoon when he needs a snack by incentivizing the walk with one of those chocolate snack bars. He ate it as we walked up the back path and across the park, then up and around the Holly block. He spotted ants along the way, which he was both interested in, but also surprisingly scared of.

Back home he noted it was bright for calling Vivian and Colin. Carly asked if they should push back the time, and he responded, “No, no, no. I’m respecting the time change. I’m respecting the clocks.” We looked at new piano pieces, then they called about 4:45. August wanted to learn about statistics and Carly found a lesson that involved counting cars of different colors on a bridge in London and making a tally chart.

I went for a short run around the neighborhood. We aren’t supposed to go more than 100 meters from the house, so I ran in circles up the back path and around the block to our west and around the Holly block, although that might be stretching over 100 meters.

I got back and they were having problems with Minecraft, as Vivian couldn’t connect. Eventually they all ended up in Colin’s world. They made a slime house together. Cherie called and Carly read them a lot of Junie B. Jones. August had bowl after bowl of dinner. I came down after 7:30.

We tried the Duo ABC app, but August thought it was too easy. He wanted me to install the regular Duolingo app, and while that downloaded he did a little graphing. Carly was roasting beets and August ate some.

We then went upstairs. Carly gave him a bath. When I told them how he had woken up last night and then, as I was sleeping, kicked me in the stomach, he didn’t believe me at first and asked, “Are you telling tales?”

In bed we read some How To. We listened to Circle Round’s “One Speckled Hen”, then Peace Out’s “Neptune”. Looking at the feelings poster he asked, “What’s joyful? Grateful?” I knew we were in bed early when he whined a few times “I need something to do!” He also needed some extra Cheerios. We listened to some Philip Glass solo piano, then a new (to us) Reich/Glass piano album called Music 4 Hands. It took a while, but he was asleep around 11:20.

Morning improv time:

Minecraft Math learning 2:

Minecraft Math learning 3:

Statistics with Vivian:

He was up about 7:55. He asked if it was time to get up yet and I told him to let his body decide. We lay down and after about ten minutes he was ready to head down. He went downstairs and saw the screen of a video she was watching. It involved China and had people wearing masks, so could guess what it was about. He then curled on the couch for a while more. Carly and I were talking about the free things artists had been doing, and I had us watch the first Seattle Symphony Orchestra morning videos, of the concertmaster violinist playing. August really liked that. I then read I Want My Hat Back, which was a cheap book on Apple Books.

We played Minecraft, exploring the International Space Station and being marine biologists in two of the free downloadable worlds they released. He surprised me with his reading of the signs telling us the habitats of the marine animals. I then showed him a Doc77 video of the new mob in Minecraft, the ones that spawn on and walk on lava.

He watched his beloved Mars Base video from Kurzgesagt as I got oatmeal ready and he ate. We then played piano, and we looked at some of the Supersonic Piano pieces we had printed, and I discussed some of the techniques that they teach, like “Lava Keys” and watched the videos. Sadly, that was the last techniques video, as they don’t have them starting with book 2. Those would be helpful for learning from home. He then had a story of Brother being jealous of piano playing girl in the park: “She’s not actually magical, just figuratively natural.” We did more piano playing. He asked what Hands on approach and nutshell mean. I’m not sure where he picked those up. Words of the day.

He elected to do math next and wanted to go up to the bedroom to do Ms. Safe math. We went up. I didn’t really have a plan, but offhandedly mentioned we should do math related to Minecraft Math. So Minecraft Math was born. I used a diagonal lined page in Paper and drew a cube and colored the blocks we could see, then had August trying to visualize how many blocks we could not see. We worked through it using both visualization to figure it out, then checking our answer with arithmetic. I then had him open Minecraft and build the exact same cube to verify it visually. This was all tough for him, and really good exercise. He snuck a little extra iPad time while I drew more shapes for tomorrow.

He wanted to go outside so we got some crackers with peanut butter and honey and ate those outside. We read Paddington in the Garden (finally). Stake was a word of the day. He randomly asked what indivisible means. And we read more of How To where linger was a new word. How To mentioned Terry Pratchett, and we tried The Wee Free Men, but he wanted to go back to How To.

We ended on the chapter about sending a file. This really got August thinking, and he went on and on about storing data in DNA and how he does it. After several minutes of that he went to the bathroom, then we watched Grian’s latest video. Retrofit was a word of the day. He listened to Circle Round’s “Armadillo’s Song” for alone time, then we played in the Washington D.C. world in Minecraft. We saw and talked about things like the MLK Memorial, the Korean War Memorial, the Washington Monument, the Library of Congress, and the Jefferson Memorial.

We started to get outside for a walk. But he saw a “Crane fly! Panic room! Panic room!” And ran back inside. He asked why I was laughing as I know crane flies freak him out. I told him it was the use of “panic room”, which he had learned from Grian.

As we got walking he told me about harvesting ice from Mars to bring to Earth. He said it was “stupid but genius”, like Grian has described his plan to kill himself to get points in the Head Hunt game. He also asked “What’s a hands-on approach?” A few more times during the day.

We walked by the corn flowers and up to the park, then back down and sat on the rarely used bench by the corn flowers and he had his chocolate bar. He had the idea of doing a time lapse of him eating it. So I did. He soon wanted to head home to wash his hands, so I kept it going all the way home and through him washing his hands with the hose.

Inside we played piano and I wrote out a couple new chord progressions from the Pianote video and we played around with them. We went outside at his request, but that only lasted a minute as this time a huge black bumblebee came flying by.

This time we read a couple chapters of The Wee Free Men. He looked at songs on Supersonics Piano. Apropos of nothing he asked “What’s navy mean?”

He asked for a Circle Round and listened to “Fiona and the Fairies”. We then watched a complex video together: “What you will find in higher dimensions”. He wanted to watch the whole thing and a few things stuck as he said “I calculated the kissing number of dimension pi…” He then told Carly that tan(2) equals sine(2) divided by cosine(2).

They then started a Zoom call with Vivian and Colin to do math. Carly was having difficulty coming up with problems for them. I finished dinner. August shared the hundred gears problem, then Vivian had one that involved a man with 7 wives with 7 cats with 7 kittens. It turned out to be more of a riddle, but I didn’t hear why. They then moved to Minecraft. There was a lot of feedback coming from Vivian and Colin being so close together. August said, “You know, I’m not affected by high noises like that. I just go on with my day.”

I escaped upstairs to work. August ate three bowls of the rice/peas/tofu meal. Carly then read Junior B. Jones to them. They hung up and I came down when the Tiv Taam order arrived. Carly cleaned stuff off outside as it started to rain and I carried it all in. It was an interesting experience, and some of the substitutions were odd: the bag of lettuce was larger than any bag of lettuce we’ve ever seen in the store.

August and I did piano together while Carly worked on putting the groceries away. He was teaching me his new song and I got him applying a chord progression to it. We then watched the latest GoodtimeswithScar video. IOU was a word of the day. When he was talking to Carly a bit later wiggle room was another word of the day. He was still hungry, so I got him some crackers and peanut butter and honey. He randomly recited “An affiliate of the university of Washington” Carly asked “where did you learn that?” To which he further recited, “KEXP. Where the music matters.”

We got him upstairs and Carly gave him a bath. I started Skyping with my parents while they were in there so I could chat about the virus. August then came in and talked to them. He did air quotes, which he had apparently learned from Carly. He wanted to show them his piano playing so we went downstairs for that. Paul came up to watch, and August had fun hiding from him when we were back upstairs.

We said goodbye, then Carly was trying to get him to brush his teeth, or simply allow her to do so. He’s gotten really frustrating with this lately, so when she said she was giving up, he started to get it, and with me he agreed to do it himself. He did it partly on his own. We think he’ll enjoy it more doing it himself, as then we aren’t jamming something in his mouth, but he still said it is about the same to him.

In the big bedroom he noted how the clock was ahead an hour. He had helped Carly do it after his bath. He saw it click to 11:00. We said good night and went in to bed. We listened to “The Rusty Cowbell” in Circle Round and then discussed the emotions chart and his old “losing your top” chart (as he called it). I don’t think I have any more paper copies of it though. We then listened to Peace Out’s “Solid, Liquid, Gas”. It mentioned 5 states of matter, but then only discussed the three. He knew plasma, but wanted to know the fourth. So we looked it up and learned about Bose-Einstein Condensates. Another word of the day.

His brain was really going, and he just kept talking: “Black hole that collapses out…infinitely collapsing…only if there’s more mass outside the black hole than inside it…that’s only possible in a 7.5 dimensional universe…” We listened to the new Brian Eno and Roger Eno album and discussed Brian Eno a bit. He kept talking about how sleepy he was “I think I’m a 2 on the scale…” (referring to his old scale). He finally fell asleep around 11/midnight.

Minecraft Math learning:

Improv time:

Chocolate bar time lapse:

A new song:

A new song 2:

A new song 3 – I’m bored:

Air quotes:

He woke up once during the night and called me in. When I went in he startled me, as he was actually standing right behind the door. He said something as he got back in bed but I didn’t catch it, and he fell right to sleep. I was then up, and knew it was close to the Edmonds School District school board meeting. I put that on and listened to it to see how they were pivoting with everything, half sleeping through it.

He was then up at 8:35. I went up and he asked if he could have new pants. I got some and asked if he had had an accident. He then said he thought he had a dream he was peeing. We checked, and his underwear and pants were all clean. He laughed about it and put the originals back on.

Downstairs he tried to say “Boo” to Carly but she wasn’t on the couch. He then went to the piano and was improvising. Eventually we moved to Minecraft. Lots of talk about playing with Vivian and Colin as I tried to add them, but it wasn’t working. August wanted to change his Minecraft name, but they only allow shorter names now, and I eventually convinced him that he’d miss AugustinoMaster when he couldn’t go back to it. We played in the Greek world. He then played piano and had the last of the french toast for breakfast. I made the pieces into an A. He told me I should do Q next time.

We watched a video on black holes (https://youtu.be/UjgGdGzDFiM) and ergosphere was a word of the day. Not for him, but for me. He was excited to already know about it and how it spins faster than light, and he’s already told me about it from the Kurzgesagt videos. He wanted to do graphing, so he did that, and I found the Crash Course Statistics course and we watched the intro and first videos to that. It got his brain going for the day.

We went outside and he told me, “I need to use statistics for my kidding tricks…which day you’re most likely to give me ice cream…” After hanging outside for a while we went back in to the piano. Tons of improvising songs and fragments using really interesting rhythms and dissonant intervals. And his timing has definitely gotten stronger. He still has a tendency to play loudly, too loudly, but he’s also experimenting more with dynamics.

We went back outside and sat in the comfy chairs and he did a lot of graphing. He ate one of the hotdog things and then some peanut butter sandwich and apple. He also said, “I also need statistics to figure out the chances of someone on earth growing up to be a pianist.”

Back inside he did lots and lots of piano. We looked at some of the easier pieces that we had printed out, although he mainly improvised and tried out scales. He found a scale it’s 8 notes (1extra) that we looked up and was E Gregorian No. 3.

For alone time he listened to “Phaeton Steals the Sun”. We then played Minecraft. He wanted to blow up the Greek world and so he made a new version of it so he could explode things. We used a crazy amount of TNT to do so, including a huge block from 70 100 10 to 50 120 -20

I then got him to go on a little walk, with a chocolate snack bar as the payoff. We walked over to the monster blasting park (from when he was Hilo) and sat on the edge and ate the bar. I had to remind him he couldn’t play on the equipment. We then walked home.

We played a few rounds of Apples to Apples. Then we watched a YouTube video about composing and he played piano. We also watched a video about how to read a score. He then saw the short video we’ve watched before on radiation, so watched that. And in preparation of playing with Vivian later I told him that Minecraft had released a bunch of stuff for free, so we worked together to download them all on our iPads.

Carly came down and I went for a run. The new rule that you can’t go more than 100 meters from home on your walks goes into effect, officially, at 5pm. So I got out at 4:30 and ran directly east, stopping on the other side of the park over there to take a photo. I don’t know when the next time will be that I’m more than a kilometer away from home for the fun of it.

Cassie had gotten Vivian set up, so she and August started playing together in a city world. A bit later she had Colin set up and he joined them. Carly worked outside, and I made scrambled eggs and we had them with the rest of the potatoes and broccoli.

I then went upstairs to work, and they had a lot of good cousins Minecraft time together. Carly gave him a bath. I made up a song about brushing his teeth and ended with “like an ant” to make a rhyme scheme work. When they complained about ants not brushing their teeth I flatly said, “deal with it.” August was then asking her to play Minecraft with him in the morning. She said she would play for five minutes. He did the math in his head and said, “That’s one-sixth of what I asked for.” And when he didn’t want to do all of his flossing I told him we’d only listen to half a story. He thought that was pretty funny, and I heard him tell Carly, “I can’t believe he said half a story.”

Got him in bed and we finished listening to “Stella and the Dragon” (which he had listened to for his alone time earlier) and then listened to Stories Podcast’s “Robin’s Egg Blue”. He looked at the feelings poster and asked again, “Why are confused and tired and determined on unpleasant? Determined is SO good.” He went to the bathroom, then we listened to the Peace Out on Pluto. Trailblazer was another word of the day. At the end she asked you to think of someone that was a trailblazer for you. August thought about it and said, “Thatcher…he taught me about playing Minecraft.” I put on a Brian Eno album, but he said it was too exciting for bedtime, as was Tuatara’s Breaking the Ether. He requested Beethoven’s Fifth so that’s what we listened to. He was asleep about 10:30.

A new song:

Developing a chord sequence:

Humming and math outside:

Improv time:

Improv time 2:

Crazy TNT time:

Minecraft with Vivian: