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August was awake at 7:20. I had chills by the time I went to bed last night and turned out I had a temperature of 102.7. Was up in the morning while August and Carly Skyped with Vivi, then I went to bed, basically from 9ish to 2:30.

 

Carly took him to the Home Plus play area a little after 10. Not many other people there. He spent pretty much the entirety of his play time in the sand; he would wander around and look at other stuff, but head back to the sand to play.

 

It was the synthetic sand that clumps together when you squeeze it. He spent a lot of time “making” stuff, and they pretended to make things like soup. He also just spent a lot of time filling and pouring.

 

 

Didn’t want to do the train or bubble things they had and would start screeching when they tried to get him to do it. After they tried to get him tho do the bubbles thing, Carly asked if e wanted sand or bubbles, and he said “sand.”

 

After they got home he took a nap, half in on the bed, then out in the reading area.

 

I got up at 2:30. He hadn’t eaten much through the day, but made up for it with a big lunch: she had to make him a second egg, and he dipped a lot of “zucchini soup” and olives in ketchup. And he had some orange.

 

Carly took him back out about 3:30. They went to Hangeulbi Park – the one over near Toys R Us. Spent most of their time by the Hangeul area, as he was loving the Hangeul sculpture. Also, there were three little white dogs that went by, and he got to pet/visit with two of them.

 

They came back and went to the pink building and did some grocery shopping. He decided to do some shrieking while there.

 

Back home, a lot of drawing and writing, particularly on the iPad.

 

Asleep at 8:45. Dreaming about iPad as he said it once and was waving his finger around.

 

New words/phrases: try again, teal, reading baby mama dada Zinnie, teriyaki sauce, it’s a whooping crane, Spanish: xilophono, grande, coche, becoming ‘now I know my’

Eating “nummy orange”: 

Who did that? Zinnie do that: 

Focused on little ‘i’s:

Probably a short entry, as I’m ready for bed. We got back from Natalie’s house for a early kid’s New Year’s Eve party a little after 8. Feeling pretty exhausted, so lay in on the bed with them while August fell asleep.

 

He was awake about 7:40. We did a lot of art, some reading, and watching of Teuni Teuni in the morning. He didn’t express much interest in food, but kept eating strawberries and then cheerios/milk in the morning as I fed them to him. Oh, and as his notebooks are filling up with drawing, I taught him the concept/word ‘tracing’ today, and he took to that, although he wanted me to do all the tracing throughout the day. And on the iPad I introduced him to the ‘fill command’ in the mew art program (Sketchbook) I downloaded. He liked that, but unfortunately difficult to access in all the menus.

 

We went to his Teuni Teuni class at 11. They had these round bouncy mats set up, and he was instantly into it like never before. He let the teacher put him through multiple forward roles, several times. Class was all about kimchi, so first they picked cabbage (‘caboo’ to him) and put it in a box. Then they poured salt (styrofoam things) on big cabbage pictures, then they used plastic hands to beat cabbage leaves – the leaves were attached to each end of one of those sticks (like a bracelet) that you hit in the middle and it rolls up. He was much more interested in this because it looked, to him, like a capital ‘I’, and he kept showing it to everyone around him, saying “I I I!” He was also Qing everyone and everything, starting with those round bouncy matts, but including other kids’ heads, etc.

 

We went down and did some shopping. He did fine with that, then we headed home.

 

He napped from 1 to 1:50. After that, he wanted to nurse, but there was the blanket I was using sitting on the couch. He pulled it off, saying “No. Nope.” Did this multiple times. When it was in the reading area, he did the same thing. I was asking him where it could go, and he pointed towards the door to the parlor and said “Over there.” I set it on top of his high chair, and he came and pulled it off again, saying the same thing. So I put it in on ‘Oma’s chair.’ After he was done nursing, I said I wanted the blanket, and asked if he could get it, telling him it was on Oma’s chair. He went and grabbed it and pulled it in to me.

 

We are still working on the coloring on the floor thing, and today I pointed at it and said “Who did that?” He kept using that sentence throughout the day. Luckily, no lying, and eventually he would say “Zinnie do that.” He was also excited by the concept of ‘question’ and I think he ‘got it’ when I pointed out that was a questions, and he excitedly said “Q for question!” He also was saying “Who did that?” it at the party, and on our way back when we were stopped at a crosswalk and he pointed to the crosswalk, saying “Who did that?” He then said “11”, because the stripes looked like an 11.

 

He was being a bit difficult by the time we left the house at 5. We think it has to do with the fact that we almost always go out somewhere in the afternoon, and today it was late. Once he was outside he was just fine, and he did very well at the party. Lots of singing of numbers on the way there and back. Left him in the backpack both directions, just 4 stops, and he played Endless Academy on the cell phone.

 

We were the first people at the party for about 45 minutes. So he got to explore and play a bit with Chloe, and have a pear and honey popsicle and drink our mango juice. More drawing, and a lot of food tasting, mainly liking the lentil chips from Costco and the mushrooms in the stew. They also had some small puzzles, which he was excited about, having learned ‘puzzles’ in the Very Hungry Caterpillar app the last couple of days. But there was so much excitement it was hard or him to focus on much.

 

Before we left, Nathalie found little transforming ‘Q’ thing and gave it to him.

 

Carly gave him a quick bath when we got home, as we had totally forgotten to change him before we left and he was leaking. He wasn’t happy about that, and he was asleep about a quarter to 9.

 

New words/phrases: tracing, fill, puzzles,who did that?

Class: 

New Year’s Eve party: 

Getting the transforming Q: 

August was awake at 7:40. He was sitting next to Carly on the couch a little later, and I came and sit next to him. He was patting our legs, and surprised us by saying “Dada is sitting by me.”

 

Carly had to leave to go to her annual dentist appointment. I was thinking of taking August along and going to the National Museum while she had her appointment, but I had a weird back pain last night and didn’t feel like going so far. Luckily, it went away quickly in the morning.

 

Anyway, August and I had out his leftover stickers from class on Tuesday and he was trying to figure out where to put one. This was when Carly left. 15 minutes later, we were still looking at the book, going through all the pages again and again, him saying “another page.” I was pointing out all the funny places he could put the sticker of a digging mole (like in the center of a snowman), so I was saying “That’s funny,” He picked up on that and kept pointing out things he thought were funny. This continued throughout the day, as he called the fork and knife on the floor of the cafe funny, and the wooden penguins funny.

 

We’ve been trying to get him to cut down on writing on the floor with the crayons, so when he does it, we make him stop and clean it up before he proceeds. Today, that happened and I had a wipe out but he didn’t want to do it, telling me “Dada wipe.”

 

We finally headed out of the house at 10:40, headed for CGP. We met Carly in the subway station, and bought a couple sandwiches for lunch. August had told me twice on the trip that he wanted to go to the children’s museum first, so that’s where we headed. As we headed in, he told Carly “Play area is fun.”

 

We went up and changed him and ate, then went to play. He wanted to go to the “big kids area”, so we started at the spaceship. Spent most of his time kind of dancing/counting numbers in front of the screens, playing with the Hangeul magnets, and air writing Spanish on the floor.

 

He wasn’t quite ready to go when we left, but it was getting close to 1. We put him in the backpack and did our usual walk, with Carly for the first time, and he fell asleep from 1:09 to 2:22. He woke up all excited, as he saw Carly right away and said “Nurse!” He then saw her iPad and said “Mama’s Nook book!” After he woke up he played in the cafe until about 3, pointing out letters and words on the ground for most of the time.

 

Carly headed home to get some work done. As August saw her walking away he did his best “Miss Mama” a few times while she could still hear. He didn’t really get upset though when she was gone. We went to check on the new playground, but it still wasn’t open. I gave him the choice between animals, the other playground, and the children’s museum. He chose “other playground.” So we walked to the Adventureland Playground. As we got close, I asked “Hmm, can you find the playground?” He surprised me by pointing and saying “Right there!” as opposed to his usual “I see it!” Or just pointing.

 

We played there until 4. Mostly writing in the sand, although we also went on the musical instruments for a good while. He sang ABCs while hitting the xylophone, but I didn’t get my phone out in time to record that. The drums are falling more apart, and all that is left is the big one. I had August sit on it though, and I could hit the side of it and still make a nice sound, vibrating him. He kept wanting me to sing the numbers song over and over as I drummed to it.

 

As we were writing, I wrote ‘Mama’ and he first said “M A M A pattern!” Awhile later he was asking me to draw patterns. Also, when I started doing a crosshatch pattern he identified it as “crosshatch.” We’ve also been working on punctuation.

 

At 4 we headed to the entrance. He wanted to walk though, and it was his longest walk yet. He made it all the way past the fountain, close to the bathrooms, but the walk ended when he fell and scraped his knees. About 400 meters by then, without wanting to be picked up. It took a long time though, about 20 minutes, as he was carrying a stick and stopping along the way to write on the ground, trees, vending machines, and everything else.

 

We stopped at the grocery store, him in the backpack, on the way home and got strawberries and crackers and a couple other things.

 

Came home and skyped with Glecy and shared dinner – more turkey, zucchini, rice, and cheese – with me. Then spent a long time in the evening coloring with Carly. He kept turning the pages so they would color on another page. The notebook is getting very full and colorful by now. In the new crayons gold was his favorite, and he’s already used that crayon, and almost one of the blues, up.

 

When Carly changed him before his bath he started another joke – saying “Happy birthday” to random people, including “Happy birthday, Auntie Q.”

 

She gave him a bath and they did more coloring, then it was time for bed. He said a lot of “Miss dada”s, but went to bed pretty quickly, around 8:40.

 

New words/phrases: Dada is sitting by me, another page, that’s funny, right there, crosshatch

 Children’s museum: 

Cafe: 

Playground. Trying to trace my letters: 

He found this bent stick and was turning it back and forth, as it looks like two Hangeul characters: ‘g’ and ‘n’ :

You get an idea of how much writing we did in the sand: 

Our long walk: 

“Upside down V”: 

Seeing the Hangeul N in the bricks: 

Home: 

He had been holding the water bottle just by his teeth. I caught it just as he dropped it: 

I think today was the first day of break that a.) Carly and I were up at the same time and b.) we were up before August. That was a little before 8, and August woke up 8:30ish.

 

Carly Skyped with her mom at one point, and when reading/singing Puff the Magic Dragon, August surprised my by knowing a full line – I think it was “Noble kings and princes…”

 

A little after 10, Chuck skyped from Derek and Andrea’s new house. We got to see them and take a tour. August saw one of their chairs and thought it looked like a Hangeul N (basically and L shape). And when I gave him a slice of orange, he thought it looked like a C, then turned it around, saying “backwards C, upside down C.” Had to cut the call a little short though, as we had to get ready and leave for his class. Turned out that August didn’t want to leave the house for once – in part because he still wanted to play with his comb, and because he wanted to nurse. He was pretty unhappy until I got him to calm down in the park singing the “A is for…” song.

 

But he definitely wasn’t into class to start with, spending a lot of time standing by the door. But he started to get drawn in, first when the teacher was acting like a bear hibernating (and then the kids got to do the same), but definitely so when she brought out the tunnels for them to crawl through. He liked those, and crawled through one once, but preferred to pull them apart, saying “together, apart.”

 

His favorite part definitely came though when she brought out a big stuffed bear with a blanket. He kept patting the bear and feeling its fur, and kind of hugging it. We warned him when it would be put away, and he said “bye, bye” but still got a little upset. But then the teacher was holding it and a couple of the kids came up to see it again. He went up and hugged it and said “bye, bye” again.

 

We came home and had some time before his nap as he woke up late. He wanted to play with the closet again, asking “Please” very nicely. I opened the door for him, then he wanted his socks off, so he could feel the cold metal strip with his feet. When I changed him once, he took a crayon with him and started drawing all over his hand and leg. I told him he should go show mama, but he didn’t do it right away. But a few minutes later he walked in to her in the other room and said “show mama.” We then made a smoothie, after which he fell asleep from about 1:50 to close to 3.

 

Carly and I started watching The Martian while he was asleep. After he woke up, we headed out for a walk. Carly had to stop at the hospital to rearrange an appointment, and while she did that August and I walked around a few back streets. He had said “iPad” when we first entered the hospital with Carly, because we had played iPad while waiting for her yesterday, but then we left. As soon as we were out the door he started saying “Miss Mama.” We walked around for 10 minutes or so, then headed inside to get warm before the walk back. Had some time, so we did play iPad. When Carly was done he wasn’t too worked up about missing her though, and in fact was saying “Miss mama” when she was right there.

 

We walked home. In the evening there was a lot of coloring and some iPad time. He played with the closet again, again asking to get his socks off. We hadn’t brushed his teeth in the morning so we watched some Teuni Teuni and did that. I made up a bowl of mashed potatoes and vegetables and one of rice, turkey, and vegetable soup, and August and I shared those for dinner.

 

He was being creative with his “Becoming…” joke this afternoon/evening, using “play in the sand,” “pig,” “Teuni Teuni,” and “color the paper crayon”

 

Carly gave him a bath that went pretty well, then she read Picasso’s Trousers, a book that Glecy got him, a couple times. He started really liking it a day or two ago, and finds it funny. She also tried translating it into Spanish for him, and reading The Going to Bed Book to him in Spanish. She also has a Spanish book called 100 Palabres (Words). Since the beginning he has expected it to have numbers in it, since he sees ‘100’ on the cover. Now it is a joke, where he still claims the name of the book is ‘Numbers’ if you ask him.

 

Some more coloring, then he wanted to play with the closet again, using his cutest “please” a couple times, but was sad when we wouldn’t let him. Carly took him in to bed and he was asleep about 8:50. Carly and I finished watching the Martian, which was great, except for the gratuitous 5 minutes at the end.

 

New words/phrases: get more, says Vivi, dada eat the bread, Zinnie eat it, mama ate it

 

Class: 

Home: 

On our walk: 

Home: 

He was awake around 8. In the morning, when writing sentences for him, I got him saying “Dada is the best,” then “Mama is the best.” Later, he wanted me to help him do a forward roll. Did a couple, then he just lay there looking up at the ceiling and the Christmas lights. He started saying “Hangeul D”, referring to the shape they made around the room.

Carly went to the clinic at the hospital to see about getting an appointment today for her stomach pains. August and I stayed at home and ate lunch. I made a turkey sandwich, and he had fun helping make it (putting pieces of cheese and turkey on the bread) and picking the cheese and potatoes off the plate to eat.

He went to the reading area and pulled out the Puff book to read. We read it while sitting with Puff.

We then skyped with my family at Dee and Grant’s for Christmas. Although as soon as he saw Skype, August started missing Carly and went and stood at the door, sad. After a few minutes, I went down to try and get him, and he said, real sad, “Miss mama.”

Carly came home right then, with him still at the door, having made an appointment for 4. Skyped for a few more minutes, but couldn’t really hear their end of the conversation anyway. August fell asleep right after we hung up, pretty much, a couple minutes before 1. He slept until about 2:20. Carly had made vegetable soup, and he ate some of that after he woke up.

About 3:30 we all left. Walked Carly to her appointment, then continued on to the park. He started saying “miss mama” right away, but played well at the park for awhile, writing letters at first, then getting up on the play structure. Carly called to update and August heard that, then he got upset that I wouldn’t let him go down the climbing wall. Also, I think his hands were getting cold. That was the end, and he was pretty upset by the time I got him back in the backpack and boots (he’t not a fan of the boots yet, and wouldn’t wear them in the park. Luckily, I had brought his shoes in case that happened).

We went back to the hospital and played on the iPad while waiting for Carly. When she was done we all walked home. He ate some of the rice and beans from my burritos (and probably something from Carly) and did a lot more coloring/writing throughout the day and into the evening. I gave him a bath around 7. In the bath, he started spelling ‘cat’ on his own. I then found out he could spell ‘dog’, ‘mama’ and ‘dada’ (although sometimes he just says M A or D A once), and ‘is’. We had never practiced is, but I use it in a lot of the sentences I write for him. Then, as I was getting him dressed he spelled ‘poop’ (but he usually only says one ‘o’).

While Carly was taking a shower we were doing more drawing, and I ate a Frango. August looked at me and did is ‘ahh’ thing, like the dentist asking you to open your mouth. I was busted. He knew I was eating something and went into the kitchen, saying “more”. I gave in and gave him most of a Frango as a treat. He tried for “More treat” when done, but was allayed when I told him mama was going to make popcorn.

He ate a ton of popcorn (plain) with Carly, and came up with the line “P is for popcorn.” That just shows that he really has the ‘P’ sound down, as he keeps coming up with these “P is for…” lines with words we’ve never spelled together: people, play area, and now popcorn.

He was doing some writing on the floor, so I told him we needed to put the crayons away. He got upset, and Carly took him. He was clearly tired, and fell asleep instantly – like the fastest ever, right at 9:00.

New words/phrases: back and forth, cardboard, August becoming a big kid, cleaning, clean on the floor, mama’s clothes

Can spell: cat, dog, Zinnie, mama, dada, is, poop (spelled pop)

On our walk: 

‘Cardboard’ he gets from the back cover of his drawing notebooks. No idea how he decided to incorporate it into a song: 

Similarly, Endless Reader has nothing to do with Korean: 

At the park: 

Carly wasn’t feeling well, and as she is wont to do when not feeling well, she went and slept in a different room, this time out on the reading area mat. August got up three times during the night and went out to her to nurse. The last time was a little after 7, and he fell back to sleep pn the mat until close to 9. I woke up around 7:30, but just stayed in bed reading, etc. until they were both up. So start of a lazy Sunday.

 

He started his day by playing on a blanket piled on the floor and inventing a new chant: “mama dada zeta wawawa” Carly spent the morning resting, and August and I spent much of that time drawing.

 

I got a message from Derek saying that he was headed to the kids play area in the pink building, so I took August over there, from a little before 1 to 2. He enjoyed seeing Logan and Chloe there, but mainly played by himself. He wouldn’t let me put him on the octopus, but we made a game of hitting the arms of the octopus as they went around – and he thought they looked like Ss. He first went to the food, and also spent a lot of time in the ball area. Got him to climb up to the back of the trampoline area once, but he slid down before going in the upper place space, and he also climbed up the round stairs once, but slid right back down. But his favorite toy was one of the push cars. He sat in that and played with the attached cell phone and opening and closing the door. I then pushed him around a bunch. He kind of rode side saddle most of the time, with the door open and one or two feet out the door.

 

At 1:50 he was ready to go, but as he stood at the door to go I asked if he was sure and ran through the list of things that were there. One of the things was blocks, and he said “Blocks. More blocks.” So we spent another 10 minutes playing with the blocks, then he was ready to go.

 

We went home and he took his nap. I ran back to the pink building and went to the store to get pho and Sprite for Carly.

 

After he woke up, I took him out for a walk. It was 30 and getting dark and colder, so I didn’t think it would last long. Left about 4:30. We walked by the stream, to the women’s business center, then took a right and walked main streets to the art museum. As we walked he waffled between wanting to go to the play area in the art museum and wanting to go home to mama. He started sing the “A is for…” song and that cheered him up. He had a bunch of new lines, both serious and jokes: Q is for quiet, b is for wawa, d is for zoo, p is for play area etc.

 

At the art museum he spent probably 20 minutes in the play area. Really wanted to climb through more of it, and did just a little bit, crawling into the round tube in back. But he wanted me to go with him, which isn’t possible. He kept saying “More dada fit.” But I would just scoot partway into the opening.

 

He kept saying “miss mama” and decided to go. But he got distracted by the “There’s no place like home” video sculpture. He would watch it for several seconds, then look down at the art area below (the place where he wants to climb, but can’t) and listen to the audio (the speaker is in the back of the sculpture), then watch it for awhile, then look down, etc. Eventually he left it and was exploring the lobby, but stopped across the lobby and crouched on the ground and watched it for awhile longer.

 

Finally, about 6:20 we went outside. He liked feeling the edge of the revolving door, but that meant the door just kept turning, so I picked him up to get him away from there. We walked around the park a bit, then he started asking fore “More shop.” It took me awhile to realize that was what he was saying, as he has never requested shopping before. But then he started saying “crackers and markers” as that was what he wanted to shop for. But then he wanted to do ABCDs and I convinced him we already had markers at home, so then he wanted to go home. It was about 6:30 when we got home.

 

We came home and ate – first the last cracker we had, then I fixed up a bunch of the leftovers for him, and he had fun dipping them in dongatsu sauce – and did art. He politely requested the iPad, so we played on that, mainly drawing with the stylus. At 8:30 he didn’t complain when I said it was time to put away the iPad.

 

At one point he wanted to play with the closet – the one to the air conditioner unit, etc. We let him play with that for awhile, but it was letting cold air in, so we said that was enough for the night. He really wanted to play more, and was very, very politely asking “pleeeeaaasseeee” while doing the ‘please’ sign. Very, very hard to not give in.

 

There was a lot more art after that, and some hanging out with Carly, and helping me put the covers back on the reading area mattress.We did some more reading – he requested the Puff book twice, which we read with Puff sitting with us. He went in to Carly and fell asleep about 10:15.

 

Three notable language things today:

 

He can spell his name. ‘Zinnie’, that is. He was Qing me this morning, so I decided to get him back by Zing him instead. I drew a Z on his head and said “Z”, and then he said “I N N I E”. He did it a good 10 times in the day, but never for the camera.

 

And his favorite numbers in Spanish are “quatro, cinco, seis.” He says them a lot.

 

He is getting quite good at fake reading the Polar Bear, Polar Bear book. I may have mentioned that already, but today I heard him saying more of it – he knows a few of the rather complex sentences, like “I see a bald eagle soaring by me.”

 

New words/phrases: find it, dongstsu sauce (spotted it in fridge), Derek, ‘reading’ Panda Bear Panda Bear

Kid Cafe: 

Went straight for the food: 

Our walk: 

Art museum: 

Looking down: 

Watching from across the lobby: 

Home: 

Shaking things: 

He woke up at 5:50. I was still in bed and heard him say ‘Q’ as he was getting off the bed. He went out to Carly and fell back to sleep in the reading area, then woke up again around 8. They Skyped with Chuck and Cherie for a bit in the morning. He was really into Qs. I was reading with him in the reading area, and he wanted to “Look for Qs.” He was also requesting “another book.” We were reading Sir Cedric, the book that Carly’s grandmother gave us, and he liked that. He started making the ‘more’ sign after finishing it once. He rarely pulls out the sign language now.

 

We did a lot more coloring (we had the big set of crayons, and when we started using another one he would say “nice color”), then headed out, going to Hoegi to hang out at our favorite coffee shop, 8 Street. On the walk from the subway to the campus, he was singing the “A is for…” song to himself, but started to make up lines, such as “P is for people.” In the song, P is for pig, and while we’ve made up lines together, this was entirely of his own making. He also spotted Qs in a magnifying glass icon on the front of a store.

 

Took quite awhile for him to fall asleep, so we walked around the Kyunghee campus. He finally fell asleep and slept from 2:11 to 3:19. We got beverages and sat on the second floor of the coffee shop. When he woke up, we took turns with him, going downstairs to see the fish, art, and dog. He really wanted to touch things, and I was clear what he couldn’t (the tiny plants for sale) and could (the aquariums, pumice stones in a big plant pot) touch. He was then very careful with his touching as he felt the texture of the pumice, etc. He Qed the dog, but only after trying to get me to do it. When Carly took him down, they gave him jerky snacks to feed to the dog. Again, he tried to get Carly to do it, but did one piece himself.

 

He then sat on a chair and we drew together on the iPad for quite awhile. He started drawing Ws for the first time. Carly also had her iPad from work. August saw it and called it “Boring.” Carly was getting hungry, and when we asked if we should eat there or find food on the way back, August said “stay here” and was also saying “mama hungry.” So we got a strawberry smoothing and sandwich. Unfortunately, the sandwich had pesto on it, so Carly didn’t have any.

 

On our way out, August visited with the dog again. He found the dog’s ball in a corner and took it to the dog. Then, when we said goodbye, August picked up the ball and put it back in the other room where he found it.

 

On the walk back, August started singing “R is for Ryan” as well. Then, he pointed to another sign and said “Pattern Ws”, then “Pattern Vs.”

 

At home we went straight back to the drawing. There was a lot of that in the evening. Carly was feeling worse (stomach ache), so went to bed. August did a good job staying out with me, for the most part. He had me writing a lot. Tonight was the first night where he was really telling me to write words and phrases, and use a lot of cursive. He had me write ‘cold outside’ several times, as well as ‘patience, grasshopper.”

 

At one point, when Carly was awake, he was running up and down the hall, almost actually running, if not quite. Very much on his tip toes, at least.

 

More August humor: when in the reading area, he hit me on the side and immediately said “sorry.” He did that 4 times in a row. And while playing with Baby Q he would gently touch her eyes, then seriously say “Noooo” because you aren’t supposed to touch a real baby’s eyes. After his correct new lines of ‘A is for…’, he started to also do incorrect ones, like saying “A is for wawa, cold cold wawa” and finding them funny.

 

 

Anyway, he finally, finally fell asleep just after 11.

 

A couple of interesting misunderstandings today:

 

Before we left, I had a pair of August’s socks and hit him with one as I asked “are you ready to go to Hoegi?” He thought that was funny, and grabbed a sock and kind of put it on his nose, and hit himself and me with it, saying “Hoegi” each time. He repeated this at some point later in the day.

 

With Carly doing art, she was coloring in shapes, and said something like “Do you like it?” He took ‘like it’, it seems, to mean ‘coloring in shapes’. So anytime he or one of us would color something in he would say “like it.”

 

 

New words/phrases: look for Qs, another book, nice color, gold, silver, boring, pumice, mama hungry, stay here, mama needs her backpack (pulling her backpack down the hall when she was sleeping)

Walkjng in Hoegi. Do you see the Qs? 

Getting sleepy? 

8 Street: 

Pumice: 

“Pattern W…V”: 

Home: 

Using all the papers: 

August chose Christmas to sleep in a bit. So I had time in the morning to send some email and Facebook messages. He woke up at 7:50. Carly made Swedish pancakes for breakfast. There was some flour on the counter, and August stood on his stool and used a spoon and his finger to eat some of it, saying “Yummy flour.” He started a new thing this morning, which is saying “Hi” a lot, particularly to Carly. He did it throughout the day, including at the party.

 

Carly tried to Skype with her parents, but the connection wasn’t good, so we will try again tomorrow. A little before 10, we skyped with my parents. They and my my aunt and uncle had sent gifts, so we opened gifts over Skype. August’s haul included a wooden toolbox and tools, a wooden backhoe puzzle, a wooden train that spells his name, a Puff the Magic Dragon book and stuffed animal (the book he and I had read at the children’s library a few weeks ago), a book called Frogs Sit on Logs, and, from us, a baby doll which we have named ‘Baby Q’ (which is sort of what he was calling himself as a joke, and then babies that he sees). And of course some nice clothes, and Carly and I got sweets.

 

We skyped for an hour and a half. August took a nice nap and was up around 2. Carly had finished the enchiladas and we ate some for lunch. Derek was taking Rosie out for a walk our direction, so he came to our place, then we all walked back to his house around 3:30. There, we were inside for awhile, then Derek and Carly took Logan and August outside for awhile. I switched with Carly after awhile, just as Nathalie and her family showed up. August soon realized Carly wasn’t outside anymore, and wasn’t happy about that. So we all went inside.

 

With only the 3 families there for dinner, it was much less crowded than Thanksgiving. But it still felt very full and lively. August did wonderfully and was talking a ton, which everyone else hadn’t really heard before because he’s been more cautious before. There was ham and turkey and stuffing and enchiladas and green beans and plenty of other food. August, as usual, loved playing with all of Logan’s toys, and also liked visiting with the baby. I held her for a couple of long stints, and August would pull on my shirt when I was standing to get me to crouch or sit so he could see her. He would also see things that were similar or identical to things we have at home and say “for home.” At first I thought he meant he wanted to take it home, such as the doll which he was carrying after I came out of a room. He was carrying it by the head and kind of seriously said “Baby Q. For home.” But as he continued to do it with identical things (like the Where is Baby’s Belly Button? and Boynton ABC book) to what we have, I think it meant more like “like at home.”

 

August didn’t eat a ton of food, but he really liked the ham and mashed potatoes, and then shared my apple pie. The ice cream was his favorite part though, and he kept asking for more.

 

Derek took Rosie out for another walk as we left a little after 8 and walked over to Brownstone with us. At home, August and I played with Puff and Baby Q, then sat with them in the reading area and read his new books. He then spent a long, long time writing his 2s and Vs and other letters on the pads of paper. He had initially wanted to do stickers, so we went and got a bunch of those, but then he changed his mind.

 

Finally, around 9:30 he had to be coaxed/forced away from the paper and taken to bed, where he and Carly fell asleep.

 

At night, when he nurses, he has started to climb over Carly to do so.

 

He’s also been developing his sense of humor. In addition to the long-running “Becoming…” joke, today he was saying “O turns to Q turns to chicken!” And when I was reading or singing “Puff,” I paused because he knows the line “by the sea.” But instead of saying that he said “lived by the Q!” Finally, he knows a few author’s names, but the only ones we’ve been practicing lately are Mick Inkpen and Dr. Seuss. So we were reading the Boynton A to Z book, and I paused after saying “by…” He initially said “Inkpen.” I told him it was Sandra Boynton, and tried again, but he would only say “Inkpen” and laugh.

 

Also, it turns out that Derek knows the same numbers/letters songs as August because he using them with the classes he teaches. So August was singing the “Q is for question” line a lot. But because of the Carle book, he also really likes the word ‘quetzal’. So at the party he was singing “Q is for quetzal” a lot. And at home, before we left for the party, August was singing it and ran to the piano so he could play along while singing.

 

Eating flour:

Carly’s Christmas tree: 

Opening presents: 

Christmas party: 

Ham: 

Minions shirt: 

He saw a Hangeul ‘d’ and ‘m’ in these blocks: 

Full moon on the way home: 

Baby Q: 

Puff: 

He slept in just a bit today, almost to 7. A long night considering he went to sleep early last night. When he and Carly were drawing in the morning he started to say “crossing the T”, which he hasn’t done before. I think it was also sometime this morning that they were playing with Duplos and Carly made a new playground.

 

We left for his class a little before 11. This was the first time Carly got to see a Teuni Teuni class. August was a bit more hesitant early in class; he would participate, then want to leave, then participate, etc. To keep him from leaving when he was standing by the door, Carly had him looking at letters on all the shoes. It worked. They set up a cool walking course with different textures, which August liked. They also used little kickstands to introduce kicking. This was perfect for August, as we could see him picking it up during class.

 

After class we headed down to the grocery store to pick up some things for lunch and for enchiladas tomorrow. We headed home and August nursed and went to sleep before eating any lunch at about 12:40. Slept to 2.

 

In the afternoon we put him in the backpack and went for a walk. Up the stream, stopping at the Tolerance Cafe for the first time (on the second floor over by the youth center and power plant). Got our coffees and kept walking. Walked up to the park but turned around and came back the other side.

 

Walked over towards the library and August saw the playground by the dinosaurs and wanted to play. So we let him out and played there. Did the usual climbing and shaky bridge stuff and running around. Got the little ball out and threw/kicked it around a little. There was a smaller boy – just walking – there and he was crying at first. August went over close to him and started Qing him from a distance, saying “Q baby!” It was about 40 and shady and we were all getting cold (August occasionally considers his hat, but then takes it off), so we continued on to the library.

 

Carly took him upstairs while I grabbed some books from the English shelves. Upstairs, he liked grabbing all the Korean board books and we looked at a couple of the books I grabbed. He particularly liked the book about peeing (something like Time to Pee, by Mo Willems, the guy that writes the pigeon books). Lasted about a half hour then August decided it was time to go.

 

Carly went to the grocery store. I gave August the option of following her or going home and getting a snack and he chose going home. At home we ended up reading some of the new books I bought on the iPad, namely a Biscuit book and Chu’s Day, by Neil Gaiman. He thought that one was pretty funny.

 

Carly came home and made stir fry and we ate dinner. After dinner, August and I spent a lot of time doing art on the iPad. Our pieces are getting better and better. I was looking for a better Spanish app and downloaded a free one and he and Carly spent some time on that.

 

She gave him a bath and I did dishes. Carly took him in to get him to sleep a little before 9, but it didn’t work. He came back out, and ended up getting Angeles. He took Angeles into the other sitting room, where only the Christmas lights were on, and held Angeles up to see the lights. He then, all on his own, started having Angeles feel the patterns on the the playmat squares. This went on for several minutes. He even had Angeles feel the xylophone blocks and the couch and closet door. It was pretty amazing.

 

August didn’t want to go back in the bedroom. I was trying to lure him with Kipper stories, but he wasn’t biting until I said “Angeles wants to listen to Kipper.” He instantly grabbed Angeles and headed to the bed.

 

Carly and I read Kipper to him. He was totally focused on finding the Qs, and repeatedly counting them (“one, two…no Qs”). I had the book kind of setting on Angeles and August made me move it. He took a drink of water and then decided he needed to put it away out on the table. He walked down the hall and set it on the table and we heard him say “two wawas!” as there was already a bottle on the table. He then went and tried to find the floor wipes. We asked why, and he showed us there was some water spilled on the floor. Carly gave him a paper towel and he wiped it up. She then got him (against his will) back in bed and he was asleep by 9:50.

 

New words/phrases: mama has an idea, crossing the T, so many people, not for Zinnie, new page, lavender, tan

 

Class: 

At home. Writing 2s: 

Park: 

Library: 

Home: 

When he woke up at 6:30, once again, he and Carly spent a lot of time going through books just looking for Qs. We’ve gotten to the point where we know where the 1 or 2 Qs in a book are, but this was taking it to the next level. After I got up a while later, his big “Becoming…” joke was “Becoming Megan. Nope!” Carly left for APIS a little after 8:15 to work with an NHD group. August and I did quite a bit of reading, during which he started counting in Spanish for 1 to 10 (before she left Carly said he had been doing 1 to 8) and he randomly started spelling ‘poop’ and ‘book’, then watched the Teuni Teuni video and brushed his teeth. A little after 10 we left, headed for Children’s Grand Park.

 

Rain wasn’t in the forecast, but it was drippy to start with. We got down to CGP and August wanted to see animals. He first wanted the horses, and since  it was still icky we spent most of the time in the covered area nearby, looking at the signs and displays. He was really into turning the the squares that have a picture of an animal on them to find out what they eat on a picture underneath. We’ve looked at them several times, but this was the first that he was saying them on his own, such as “Bears eat (turn) fish” and “Sea lions eat (turn) squid.” He was doing that when a big group of teenage girls came by and were admiring him. He gave them a little attention, but eventually he got frustrated that they were keeping him from playing. Luckily, they moved on.

 

It was getting close to nap time and we hadn’t eaten, so we used the step in front of those animal food displays for eating a snack. He ate all the pickle and a bunch of zucchini (exclaiming “Thank you mama for zucchini!”), then noticed that the baboons were now “outside.” So he took off towards them and I followed with the backpack and zucchini. He looked at them and kept eating zucchini and walking/looking around. He started drawing a crowd of teenagers again, including the girls he had seen before. This time, he was more in an entertaining mood and lasted quite awhile. Eventually, he was done with zucchini and we moved along for nap time. In fact, I’d kind of been mentioning nap time to him. He then took about another minute walking around, then came walking over to me saying “nap time, nap time.”

 

Took him to the building with Peace Cafe. Looked at the books in the little outside library and set aside a few to take with us to the cafe to look at after his nap. Changed him, then went back to a covered table and chairs and had a bit more of a snack and put him in the backpack. As soon as we started walking he just lay his head back. Took a few minutes for him to fall asleep, but not long.

 

He slept 12:23 to 1:51. Carly showed up about 20 minutes before the end of his nap, and he was happy to see her when he woke up. Carly was finishing her coffee and they were looking at books for awhile. After that, we went to Han’s Deli for lunch. Carly and he shared the chicken cutlet. He liked both the corn and the cutlet, particularly with the sauce. He kept asking for more sauce (“yummy sauce). While eating, he had fun Qing the tray on the high chair (which he didn’t use, preferring to sit in a regular chair on his own), and he lost a shoe, saying “uh-oh!”

 

We then went to the children’s museum. First took him downstairs, as the ‘Visible/Invisible” exhibit is now open. Played down there for a good amount of time. First just roaming around to various things, but then spending most of our time in a block area that had these really big, really cool soft, blue building pieces. They were all sorts of shapes (rectangles, noodles, gears, arches) and you could build forts and all sorts of things. Were probably there about a half hour, until a little after 4, when he decided he was done and wanted to go upstairs.

 

From there we went up to the little kids area. Carly wanted to play with him, so I sat and read most of the time. They went down the slide together, and he actually went down once on his own. They spent a lot of time playing with a doll, and August picked up a stuffed pretend chocolate bar and said “chocolate.” We were both surprised he knew that one. He must have seen a chocolate bar at some point, but I can’t think of when that was.

 

Finally, he kind of just decided he was done in there as well, so we left. Got 3 seats together on the train and got off at Sangbong and walked to Costco. Got a couple things for us, an apple pie for Christmas dinner (they were out of pumpkin, or we would have gotten both), and then 3 chicken bakes for our dinner/lunch tomorrow. Got back on the train, but it was crowded now. After a stop I got next to a woman who has lived in LA for 33 years. She and her husband travel back and for every couple of months for business, I think (but I didn’t catch the full explanation).

 

Came home and ate dinner. I was trying to see what he remembered of the ‘animal eats’ display, but he pulled out a joke (two, actually) instead:

 

 

Me: What does a hedgehog eat?

 

Him: Dinner!

 

Me: What do they eat for dinner?

 

Zucchini!

 

He did remember that kangaroos eat leaves though.

 

some coloring and reading after that, then he went to sleep at 7:45. He was really acting and looking tired, first at Costco and then on the train, so we weren’t surprised it was an early evening.

 

 

New words/phrases: Mama’s at work, uno to diez, spelling poop and book, bear eats… (And other turning signs at the children’s zoo), worms, leaves, want some more, Qed the tray, more sauce, archway, fits, press hard

Zoo: 

Peace Coffee:

Children’s Museum: 

Home: