This Is Our Blog

Today we tried to go shopping at Home Plus, only to realize it was closed today, went shopping at the pink building instead, and in the evening went over to Jill and Derek’s for dinner.

 

He had a good night’s sleep, waking around 8:30. A lot of playing with the Duplos today and whiteboard. And he got to Skype with Oma and Opa. At the end, he was in the other room with me, and Carly just started saying something to them like, “Alright, I should probably go…” and August picked up on that and ran to the other room to say “bye bye” to them. And in the morning when I was playing with him on the bed and started thanking Carly for everything: “Thank you mama for books,” “Thank you mama for sheet,” “Thank you mama for blanket.” There were others. I made eggs, cheese, and broccoli for August and me for breakfast.

 

Late in the morning we walked over to Home Plus only to realize it was the fourth Sunday of the month. So we went to the pink building instead, stopping at the library on the way to take a look at the children’s area. We will definitely be headed back there this winter. Before leaving, I had given August the choice of the backpack, stroller, or being carried. He very clearly chose the backpack, but was regretting it a bit by the time we were done shopping. We stopped at Tous les Jours to get bread for dinner tonight, and he was not happy about Carly going in there.

 

We went home and he took a nice nap and woke up around 1:30. Carly had made rice and couscous and tofu and zucchini. He ate those for lunch, and also a lot of strawberry, as it was the first time we had seen strawberries in the store this fall.

 

We then played Duplos. He thought it was hilarious to touch the hat of the Duplo guy. We then pretend drew letters on the blanket, and again had a lot of laughs drawing made up things.

 

And as he was playing with magnets on the door he started thanking Carly for things again: “Thank you mama for numbers,” “Thank you mama for D,” “Thank you mama for Z.”

 

We left the house around 4 with August in the stroller. We walked over to Jill and Derek’s place. We stopped to but beverages, then were a few minutes early so we played in the playground in front of their building. Jill brought Logan down and we all played together in the playground. August spent much of his time climbing up this steep plastic rock stair area. He needed help at first, then did it several times on his own. He was interested in the tube slide and the tube you could walk/crawl through, but never made the plunge – he kept pointing at them and saying “ickys.” Finally, he and Logan went on the seesaw together.

 

We went inside around 5:40 as it was getting chilly. August was very different this time. He had a ton of fun interacting with Jill, Derek, and Logan. He especially liked the light up pinwheel Logan had, and the flashlight Jill played with with him. A couple times, Logan or Jill started singing a song – “ABCs” or “Baa Baa” – and August would join in or finish it.

 

They had made a delicious shepherd’s pie for dinner. We ate that and left a little before 7 when August started to show signs of being done. We walked home in the drizzle, as the rain had arrived a little early.

 

More playing with Duplos and the whiteboard in the evening, and some iPad time when Carly took a shower. She gave him a bath, and around 9 tried to get him to bed, but with no luck. He really fought sleep tonight. Thought he was going to sleep a little before 10, but popped back out and ended up reading with me until a little after 10:30 when he decided he wanted to go back to Carly and fall asleep.

 

Reading progress: he now recognizes ‘after’ and ‘dog’ when he sees them.

 

New words/phrases: Santa Claus, snowman, I see a…, lots of letters, sock fuzz, nariz, iron

 

Playing on the bed: 

Ou shopping:

Strawberries: 

Duplos: 

To Jill and Derek’s: 

He slept until about 7:30. That is 13 and a half hours. Some catching up on sleep. A good night of sleep for us all. We played around the house in the morning. A new game was ‘badger hole’, which started because there was a ‘hole’ made by the blanket on the bed. August called it a hole, then we decided it was a badger hole from the Kipper story. The badger would talk to August and try to take his shovel when he put it in the hole. He kept saying “more badger hole.”

We were all ready to leave the house a little before noon. Figured he would take a later nap. But instead, he decided he was tired, and fell asleep. Slept until 1:45. A long nap after a long night of sleep.

After he woke up we walked up to Nowon. We went to the department store to find the rooftop park Jill had told us about. It wasn’t too impressive in terms of toys, but it is a nice space. We spent a good half hour plus up there. August visited the horse statue, did a lot of writing on the ground, and then wanted to dance. We did the dance to his song from class several times, and I had him walk across the park to Carly to get her too. He also really liked the tiger statue and played with it for a few minutes. He and Carly practiced their Spanish using the tiger’s head. We were getting chilly, but he really didn’t want to leave. Kept saying “more dance!” and “more…” everything else he could think of. Back inside he played with the stuffed animals they have in a photo zone for several minutes, petting the bear and the deer.

We then headed out and went across the street to Daiso, where we bought a white board, markers, and an eraser. One more tool in our art/letters/number/words activities. We had a good walk home. He entertained himself and us quite well in both directions, singing or chanting, particularly numbers and letters, loudly. He does one version of the alphabet where it sounds like he is holding his breath and using the last of his air to bark it out. He was also holding a word for a really long time, seeing how long he could say it, but I can’t remember now what word it was.

We got home and opened the whiteboard and played with that quite a bit and had dinner. On the whiteboard, Carly wrote ‘cat’, and before she could ask what it spelled, he said “cat.” So he has ‘cat’ and ‘cafe’ (he’s identified it several times now, including on a sign at Daiso), and ‘coffee’ is pretty solid, although he gets it confused with ‘Cassie’. ‘book’ and ‘art’ and ‘dog’ seem to be coming along as well.

He also played a lot with the letters and numbers on the door. While Carly took a shower, we played with the iPad (we tried out a new math app that he really liked, but was too advanced for him so will be good in a few months, and read ‘One Fish, Two Fish…’ and did some Endless… and the alphabet apps), and I took the opportunity to cut his hair. It had started to look pretty wild. The cutting went well, but he wasn’t too happy about getting a bath afterward. Carly put him in the big boy Christmas pajamas, and between the haircut and the pajamas he looks like a different kid.

He shared a couple of tangerines with Carly and I used a couple more minutes of iPad to distract him and brush his teeth. Looking really, really tired when I changed him about 8:30. Some mama and Marshy time on the bed, but about 9 he was up and wanting me. I read Kipper to him for awhile on the bed, but he wasn’t going to sleep, so I took him out. We read books in the fort and looked at his alphabet cards. He wanted his plastic letters and play dough, but after just a minute he was up and wanting to go in to mama. He fell asleep about 9:45.

Oh, and Korean coat of the day: it said ‘To tiled of shed only’. No idea what it was trying to communicate.

New words/phrases: nope, aplauso, raindrops, I got my ABCs, more badger hole, English, espanol, fountain on, Daiso, persimmon

Eco Park: 

Wild hair:

The stream on the walk home: 

Home: 

Whiteboard: 

Post hair cut: 

August continued his weird sleeping by waking up at 4. He was up until a quarter past 6 with Carly (Skyping with Vivi during that time and typing/sending messages to each other), then woke up at 7:11. Not enough sleep. But, it meant that we could get out of the house by 8:20 to head way south to the science center to meet up with Carly’s field trip.

 

The trip went smoothly, reading some Dr. Seuss and doing words on the iPad on the way down. He was getting sleepy on the way down. After having him turn around to look out the window as we crossed the Han, he just cuddled with me for a few minutes. We got down and into the science center juts before Carly came in with her group. After they got started, Carly took him to the nursing room and he fell asleep. I carried him over to the coffee shop and read with him on my lap while Carly went back to work. He slept for a little less than an hour. He was lying on the floor with his head in my lap, and suddenly popped awake, saying “See…” something. He was either referring to one of Carly’s students, who was sitting next to us, or her drink, which was some sort of smoothie.

 

We spent the next couple hours in the main science center building. We went through the children’s area, partially with Carly. He liked watching the kids at the water table, saying “wet” when we got splashed. And he liked trying to lift the fulcrum things. And there were these robot-like things that could climb ropes that he identified as “robots.” His favorite spot, by far, was a big sculpture of a hand. Underneath it, ticker take-like, ran the words “Welcome to the ubiquitous world” in 4 languages. He walked on and looked at this for a long time. We ended up sitting on it, and I would identify the letters and Hangeul characters as they went past. He also liked the music area, where you could step on drum pads to start different rhythms, and press buttons that would make tones to vibrate sand.

 

We ate lunch up in the cafeteria then went back into the exhibits. During lunch, and then sometime after, he said “fun” several times. His next favorite thing was hearing the saw noises from a construction site behind a wall in one of the exhibits. We tried to watch the dancing robot performance, and he watched a couple minutes, even laughing at the robots a bit as they danced to “Let it Go.” But after that he’d had enough, so we left. From there, we went out to the insect building, saying goodbye to Carly and students as they left to go to the bus. He liked the insect building, but for some reason not the butterfly room. He liked looking down through the glass at water bugs and fish around the cockroaches, and pushing the button so the light would come on in the bee hive.

 

From there we walked around outside. He liked seeing the ducks and chickens in the Eco Park area, then did a little yoga on a bench by the dinosaurs. We went inside, changed him and got our stuff, then went out front to the playground. Ended up playing there longer than planned as he didn’t want to leave. In particular, he was watching a bunch of teenage boys play and found them pretty fascinating. He sat on the seesaw while watching, then I bounced him on the seesaw.

 

We headed home, taking a slightly different route. Went pretty smoothly. As we were waiting for a bus for the last leg, he was identifying numbers in the bus numbers. But he threw a bit of a fit as we sat on the bus, calming down as he started saying “Endless Reader!”

 

Didn’t last long at home, falling asleep right at 6.

 

New words/phrases: nurse with mama, and (ampersand), sweet potato, green bean, praying mantis, Zinnie dada flying

Sleeping on me: 

Awake: 

Science center: 

His favorite spot: 

Music area: 

Sitting on the sand table, clapping to the drums: 

Dancing robots: 

Insect house: 

He’s listening to the sound of cicadas from the speaker above us: 

Cockroaches: 

Chickens: 

By the dinosaurs: 

Trying out the key as we get our stuff: 

Playground: 

He woke up a little before 8. A pretty normal time, but he went to bed so late it wasn’t really a full sleep. We had Cheerios for breakfast. He was using my spoon pretty well, and gave himself at least one “I did it!” We skyped with my parents, then did laundry and got ready to go, leaving around 10.

At the park he wanted to see the animals. First, the horses. We spent quite awhile there, making it our lunch spot. Then one of the horses was over at the fence because people were feeding them. August and I spent several minutes hanging out with the horse. I was petting it, which August found exciting. Eventually, he would touch the horse’s snout, and draw a “little C” on it with his finger. Later, he was patting it and talking about the “pattern” (I think he meant ‘texture’). The Koreans, even the ones feeding them, were keeping their distance from the horses.

From there he wanted to see the goats, then wanted to go “inside.” So he led me up and into the tropical building. He pointed out the lemurs, sloths, and marmosets, then drew letters in the gravely dirt. We watched the birds for several minutes, then headed downstairs where we did our usual lizard/turtle/mole rat/coati watching.

From there he wanted to go see the birds, and wanted to go upstairs. So we did that, then he wanted to go to the playground. We walked up and over the hill to the Adventureland Playground. He seems to have been a little less independent in his playing recently, so when he took his shovel and started walking around the big sand area, drawing and singing by himself, it was kind of cool. That lasted maybe 10 minutes, then he wanted me to draw things for him.

He started getting sleepy just before the 5 hour mark, declaring “all done.” So we walked up to our usual bathroom and did the nap routine. Less than 10 minutes of walking and he was asleep.

Went to the cafe where I got the grain latte there for the first time. I like them, but it isn’t on the big menu here. I had spotted it on a small sign last week after ordering. August slept 38 minutes, 1:19 to 1:57. In that time I finished ‘My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me’ (the collection of modern fairy tales I’d been reading), and started ‘Still Life With Rice’, which my mom had bought while here in Korea. Interesting, but I might switch to the ‘Guernsey Literary and Potato…’ book next week.

Anyway, we sat for awhile in the comfy chairs and looked at a book, then headed out. He was a bit whiney and talking about home/mama/nursing, but when I gave him the choice of ‘serval’ or ‘home’ he clearly chose ‘serval’. We walked over to the big cats/dogs and first got down to look at the lynx. It is usually asleep up in the corner, but was at the glass today. August was happily looking at it for awhile, but then some other people came and started crowding around. He didn’t like that, and started to get upset. I picked him up and we kept heading for the serval. He saw the photo area statue of a leopard in a tree and a big kid standing up next to it. August got it into his head that he should be able climb on top of it, something the girl wasn’t even doing, and he was upset I wouldn’t let/help him. He gave a good frustrated yell, which I haven’t heard in a few weeks.

We briefly looked at the serval and a couple other things, then headed home a little before 3. That was the planned time, as we needed to go shopping at Home Plus.

Made it home, and August was not happy to find the apartment empty. He started making his nursing sound when he got in, and then started saying ‘mama?’ He calmed down once I got him in the stroller and we headed outside.

We went to Home Plus. He did quite well, in part because of all the samples: chicken nugget, sausage, crab, and several pieces of apple. Stopped and got mandarin oranges from a stand on our way home. Carly caught up to us just as we were entering the apartment – which was good because August was just starting to look in and make the nursing noise.

Got out the hangul magnets from the Pororo set, and August had fun with those. And a lot of laughing, practicing Spanish with Carly. Happy bath time with Carly, and then me, followed. And then he just exploded in a ball of hyper on the bed, starting when I tried to put the sheets on the bed. But he crashed pretty quickly when Carly started nursing him and he was asleep by 8:15.

New words/phrases: baby goat, marmoset, sloth, mole rats, head home, sooo much, Spanish: mehia, aqui, Korean: pemang (pepper), dangeun (carrot)

Zoo:

Writing in sand wherever he can find it, including the tropical building: 

Playground: 

The lynx: 

Ready to head home (he is looking at numbers on a sign): 

Home:

We had another interesting day, both in terms of August’s sleep and what we did. He woke up at 8:07. He walked out, and instead of getting upset when I told him mama was at work, he pointed to the table and said “more play doughs.” Seriously his favorite toy at the moment, and he’d later talk about wanting to do play dough a few times through the day.

 

Eggs and grapes for breakfast. He ate a lot, which was good, as he wouldn’t eat much during the day. The other big morning activity was when I got out the matching blocks and the cards that go with them. We used to play with the blocks, but hadn’t tried matching them. He caught on pretty fast and was working pretty intently to match them.

 

Left the house around 10. Took the stroller, as later in the day we would be meeting up with Carly and going to eMart to pick up the clean blanket, so we could put it under the stroller. Only drizzling at first. About halfway to Dream Forest we came across the Wolgye Library so decided to check that out. Turns out they have a whole ‘young readers room’, and a really good selection of English books. We were there close to an hour. Also found two interesting Korean books: a counting book about poop, and a color book that was  about snails eating different things and then their slime turning different colors – yes, just like class yesterday. So this is a ‘thing’ in Korea.

 

We checked out the rest of the building (oh, and August really liked the table full of little painted dolphins in the entryway) then continued on our way. It was starting to rain heavier now. I decided there was no point in going all the way to DF, so settled on a park by the stream we’ve been to a couple times. As we walked up the stream we were first thwarted by a path that ended in stairs. Retracing our steps, we passed covered benches by a playground in an apartment complex. Decided we could eat lunch there. But August had different ideas. There was a lot of trash around, and I think he was frightened both by a loud truck nearby, and by a cup left on a bench – he kept pointing to it and saying “someone’s”. He made it clear he wanted to go, pushing away the food and wanting back in the stroller. When I asked if we should keep walking, he said “more walking.”

 

Rain was miserable now, so I forced him to put his feet inside and zipped closed the cover. He accepted that quite well. So we walked another 10 minutes or so to the park I was aiming for. He still didn’t really eat, but he played in the rain. Wouldn’t put up his hood, so I stood over him with an umbrella. At first this bothered him to – he kept pushing my leg to make me go away – but he got used to it. He played by pushing the toys and moving the seesaw up and down (saying “up, down” as he did so) and just doing a lot of watching/looking around. He pooped so I changed him on the bench. He initially wanted to go back to playing, but just kind of stood around. It was about 12:40, and I don’t usually start any sort of nap procedures until the 5 hour mark, so I asked if he wanted to play iPad until then. He initially said yes, but then started crying. I asked if he was tired, and he made it clear he was, and back at the stroller he wanted in.

 

So we got walking, and he fell asleep on our way back to the library. I had initially planned to go to a coffeeshop, but when I found out the library building had a lounge I figured that would work. So I reclined the seat for him and he slept quite well, 1:06 to 2:22.

 

He woke up and we went to Jill and Derek’s house to pay Jill and Rosie a visit. That was the plan. August had different ideas. He had a meltdown like I’ve never seen. Crying and calling for “mama”. Best we can figure is that he’s always been there when Carly is there. He knew we were meeting up with Carly at some point, so I think he expected her to be there. Did get him calmed down and he played with magnet letters for about 5 minutes, but then he just turned to me, got his sad look, and started crying again. Tried to Skype with Carly to see if that would work, it did for a minute, but that was it.

 

So we left early. Back to the library, where we got a stack of Eric Carle books and a few others. Hung out there for another hour+ reading those, playing on the iPad, and doing stickers/drawing in the notebook. Carly met us there, and she read with him. Also, there was an art class going on in the room we had hung out in before. There were windows into it, and I had shown August that they were playing with clay, which was like play dough. A few times he stood at the glass door, watching, saying “more play doughs.” At one point a woman inside was playing with him, beeping his nose through the glass.

 

We walked to Home Plus where we got the blanket, ate at KFC, and bought two more pairs of pants for August. While there, I put my hat on August and he watched himself in the mirror. Very funny.

 

We walked home in the dark. August did quite well. We took turns entertaining him by running in front of the stroller.

 

Home close to 7. August did not want to go to bed anytime soon. Long story short, he didn’t fall asleep until 11:20. Crazy. He was very funny and amusing most of that time though. A lot of playing with play dough (he really liked Carly pretending it was snot), reading the Spanish books Carly had ordered and that arrived today, and, earlier on, playing on the bed. I read Kipper to him which has a line about Kipper turning in a circle. August whipped around and said “I turn.” Showing some cool understanding and sentence construction there. He did not, however, like his bath, which Carly made a short one.

 

New words/phrases: ‘m’ again (doing play dough), library, Sherbert (monster character), bing-gul, more coming (from) nose, fat S (a fat play dough ’S’), I turn

Library: 

Park: 

Nap time: 

Waking up: 

Library visit #2: 

eMart: 

Home: 

Oh what a day. August woke up at 3:15 or thereabouts. Carly got up with him, then I got up a little after 4 and let her go to sleep. August went back to sleep somewhere around 5:30. Then he woke back up for good at 6:50. In between, he woke up a couple of times, once crawling over to me, and once opening the door. You would think something was wrong, but besides the weird sleeping, he acting completely normal and, in fact, was pretty amazing in class.

 

His #1 activity now is pushing the plastic letters into the play dough. We did this when he was up at 4am. We did this when he woke up at 6:50. We did this after his nap. We did this in the evening. I also let him play the iPad in the morning while I drank coffee and tea and woke up.

 

We did take some time out from all that to play with the Duplos. He had the animals eating from the bricks again, and he chose what each piece was: yellow was mango, other yellow was banana, light green was green soup, dark green was green apple, red was red apple, and blue was “blue wawa.” I’m not even sure where he got the idea that water is represented with blue. I’ve only ever drawn boat pictures in the sand.

 

It looked like he might sleep around 8:30, but he didn’t. He made it to 10:30 and so we packed up and headed to class. And he was amazing in class. He bowed on his own for the first time, both at the beginning and end of class. And he danced a lot to the songs. Class today was about circles, and snails eating foods and pooping the same color (Korea for you). She was teaching them to make circles in the air and saying “bing-gul” (round and round), and August then demonstrated and said “bing-gul” loudly. And while she was showing the class the snails, August entertained everyone by spinning in circles and getting dizzy.

 

At the end of class, I found out we can retake the class, and the books and activities will be different, and that Jungbean might do that. So, August will be taking a Tuesday and Friday class next term.

 

After class, we went home, put August in the stroller, and went for a quick walk to put him to sleep. Took him back, and reclined him in the stroller. He only slept from 12:34 to 1:11 before waking. I held him and he cried for close to 10 minutes and fell back to sleep. He then napped on me until 2:40. I dozed a little and got some reading and emailing done.

 

After he woke up, we went for a walk as the weather was so nice. We walked up some back streets and then the stream (I pointed out some of the art, then August would point to the next piece and call “More art!”) to the Sanggye Station area, and tried to go to the Nowon Children’s Library. Turns out it is closed on Tuesday. But we played in the playground instead, writing in the dirt and playing in the leaves. We then walked home, and just happened to get to the elevators at the same time as Carly.

 

More play dough and letters in the evening, and he had a lot of fun in the bath with Carly. We read Kipper stories on the bed. He really likes the balloons in the story about his birthday, so we read that one multiple times. Fell asleep sometime after 8. Hard to tell exactly, as Carly fell asleep as well.

 

New words/phrases: piggies says trough, wet hand, chusoyo, make a ‘b’ in uh bathroom, 7 in a circle, 7 zero (actually a no left turn sign), heavy backpack (as we were walking), pagoda, badger, badger hole, slipper (from Kipper stories)

4am: 

Morning #2:  

Class: 

An intro to Tia’s favorite kind of gymnastics: 

I was helping with the stacking, but he’s gotten better: 

Right before going out in the stroller and falling asleep: 

Asleep: 

Our walk to Sanggye and back: 

Headed home: 

Home: 

There was rain in the forecast today, but it still seemed like a good day to make it back to Seoul Forest while the weather was reasonable. August slept until 8:14, going on 13 hours. After I changed him in the morning, he just kind of laid on the changing pad with Marshy for several minutes. We then spent a lot of time pushing the plastic letters into play dough, then he played Endless Spanish while I got our snacks and lunch together.

 

We had been listening to Temple of the Dog and when that was over, I put on a Smithsonian Folkways Songs of Camp album. August immediately rejected it, saying “all done” repeatedly and getting up to try to turn it off. He happily went back to the iPad when I put on the new Jesus and Mary Chain live album. So he likes his rock music. He particularly liked the drum part on “Sowing Seeds”, making a ‘shhh’ sound to the snare drum sound.

 

He did get a sheet out to make the fort, saying “yes and no” as he did so, but we didn’t get around to putting it up, as he got distracted by Duplos or something.

 

We left the house around 10. I had to stop down by the garbage cans to make sure I’d zipped up the backpack. As I did, he said “book cafe up there.” I looked up, and he was pointing to the ‘Cafe Mug’ sign. Not a book cafe, but he got the ‘cafe’ part.

 

We got down to Seoul Forest easily enough. We had seats and played on the iPad. At Seoul Forest we went to the playground and played until nap time. The first half of our time was spent with the usual letter writing, with a little time spent on the normal pay structure.

 

The second half was over in the wire man play area, with the concrete snake around it. He kept saying “more ickys” and calling it a ‘fort’. He climbed in and on the lower leg. Then climbed the cover to it. Only as he was finishing that part up did I realize you aren’t supposed to climb the cover. Kind of odd, since you can climb in and through the actual person. We played in and around there awhile longer, and playing in the leaves, then went back to our first spot. He hadn’t eaten much for breakfast besides a little cereal, and he wasn’t much into lunch either. Got him eating a few grapes before we took off for his nap.

 

We walked over to the deer area, then headed down to the Han. He fell asleep right past the deer. We hadn’t been down to the Han here, and there wasn’t much park to speak of. The rain had started when we finished up at the playground and we were in our full rain gear. I found a covered bench for his nap. He slept 1:53 to 2:23, waking up early, I think, as I was putting the rain cover back on him as a bit of a breeze was kicking up. It is just the sort of noise he doesn’t like.

 

He just hung out in the backpack for awhile, looking around and playing with camel. We then walked up the bridge that takes you across the pond/closed forest area and to the deer. Wonderful views up there of the egrets and pond and hills, etc.

 

We went to the deer. Not the inside part, as it wasn’t open, being Monday. Which is good, because there weren’t 200 students around. You could still feed deer though. So we got food and fed the deer in the rain. Unlike last time, August wouldn’t actually feed them himself. He tried several times, but would pull his hand back. But he kept having me do it.

 

A little after 3 we finished up there and headed to the insects and butterflies, only to find them closed. So we went to GS25 and got banana chips and a tuna and rice triangle thing. We sat under an umbrella at a table outside and had a snack.

 

We then headed home, and got home a few minutes after Carly around 5:20. We did some good coloring, and he played with Carly and nursed a lot. He lined up all of his Duplo animals along the edge of the rug again. Ate soup for dinner. Carly prepared the bath and I gave him a quick bath, as he was ready to call it an evening. Went to sleep sometime after 8.

 

Yesterday I forgot to mention some potty training progress. We haven’t been doing much besides having him pee on the toilet before his bath. And he lets us know when he has pooped. While I was gone, he let Carly know he needed his diaper changed, even though he hadn’t pooped, only peed. Also, at some point he made it clear to her that he needed to pee on the toilet.

 

New words/phrases: puzzle, Spanish, wordplay, plus (on sign, not just Endless Numbers), Pinkerton, I love you sooo much

 

Morning: 

Letters are looking better: 

On our way: 

Playground at Seoul Forest: 

Climbing: 

After his nap: 

Feeding deer: 

Snack time: 

Walking: 

Home: 

Kind of an odd day for August. He woke up at 6 or thereabouts, but this was after staying up to 11. He was up for a couple hours, during which Carly skyped with her parents, and then he fell back asleep for a few hours, before waking up around 11.

We had some good Duplo play time before left the house around 12. We had a few minutes to sit and draw letters on the concrete in the park before Meg showed up. We then went into the Buk with her and saw the Wonderland show. August kind of showed her around. He was now really liking the space that the box thing is in, exploring the darkness under the steps, as it is very fort-like. After a quick look through the community gallery, August and Carly were sitting on the floor, eating his banana chips. We went up to the coffeeshop on the second floor and had drinks. August had his banana chips. August sat in the chair next to Meg the entire time. Very impressive, and very big kid-like. Got the notebook out and he and Meg did some drawing together. He really liked the ladybug case she had on her phone. I would send her a message and it would light up, but he didn’t know why.

Around 1 we left. Carly and August would head home. Later, they would head up to Madeul Stadium in the stroller and play in the sand. There was a little girl that was really interested in him, but he was being shy, saying “all done” a lot and calling her “big kid”, even though she was younger and smaller than him.

Meg and I went to the Alessandro Mendini (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alessandro_Mendini) exhibit at the DDP – the same show Carly had gone to with her students on Friday. We enjoyed it, despite the lack of coherent text and context (we can’t say we actually learned much about him, or Italian design, but the objects were interesting).

I got back around 5, soon after Carly and August. They had also stopped at the grocery store. They were skyping with Glecy when I got back. We had some good time playing with Marshy and making him laugh, and playing as a family with play dough. Carly made a play dough hat, which August thought was hilarious, and kept putting on his head and face. He then took a quick bath, as he was getting tired and not happy about that. To keep him awake past 7 we watched his videos and played Endless Spanish, etc. I was able to brush his teeth while he did that. Went to sleep around 8.

Park and art with Meg: 

At Madeul with Carly: 

Some of the art I saw: 

Evening: 

I think I forgot to mention yesterday a moment when we were reading his Baby’s Busy World book and he saw a photo of a baby with a watering can. He pointed and said “Oma and Opa’s”, remembering the watering can at their house.

Anyway, today we made trips to Home Plus and eMart to get a lot of errands and shopping done.

In the morning, after he had slept almost 12 hours and woke up close to 8:30, Carly opened the set of beach toys that we bought on sale a few weeks ago. August was very excited, and he loves the rake and shovel. He said “Thank you mama” and “Thank you mama, dada” several times during the day.

Also in the morning, he wanted to set up the fort. I told him to go get mama’s blanket, and he walked into the bedroom and got it. I heard him saying “No, no, no…yes, yes”, as he got the blanket, presumably talking about whether he could find it, or whether he could pull it out of the room.

And when I was trying to eat breakfast, he wouldn’t let me eat. We had been reading Snoozers and Fox in Socks, and he kept wanting to read them again and again.

Finally, around noon we headed to Home Plus, with August in the stroller. We got more pillows for the reading area along with groceries, socks, etc. August took both his new rake and shovel with him, and carried them the entire time. We were in the store quite awhile, but he stayed pretty content in the stroller.

We went home, and he continued to play with his rake and shovel. I got his wooden blocks out and we used the rake and shovel to scoop them up and put them in the bucket. We did this several times during the day.

His imaginative play seems to be developing. After playing more with his stuffed animals lately, today, he folded up the corner of the rug, then started lining all the animals up along it to have them eat. He then moved a bunch of them up on the blocks, where he also said they were eating. In the evening, he did something similar with Carly, using the wooden blocks as food. August chose what most of the blocks were: green being yummy green soup.

He took a 45ish minute nap. And in the late afternoon, we put him back in the stroller, put a blanket we wanted cleaned underneath, and walked to Home Plus. There, we dropped off the blanket and did some shopping for things we can’t find at Home Plus. Got a pair of pants for August, and a pair of snow pants. The clothing section is right next to the computers, and there was a sign saying ‘Windows’. While in the stroller, August said “Letters over there” and I said, “Yes. They spell Windows.” Several minutes later (maybe 10), I had let him out and he was walking around. He stunned Carly when he walked up to the letters, said, “S W I D N…windows!” Really looked like he was reading it. Still, impressive that he had remembered what I had said just once several minutes earlier.

After paying, we sat at a table by the doors and he ate his broccoli and tofu. We then walked towards home, and walked over to McDonalds to pick up some dinner. While waiting for food, I walked around the stroller and said “Hi, August”. I swear he said “Hi, Ryan” back to me.

We came home, and had a busy evening. As in August not going to sleep until 11. Finally, Carly went to bed, and I was up with him the last 45 minutes or so. We played with his blocks, then spent the last chunk of time reading books in the fort. When we were done, we had a stack of 12 books we had read – many of them several times.

Oh, and I got a few Dr. Seuss books on the iPad today, as I wanted to read all of Hop on Pop and Fox in Socks. He really likes One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish, and immediately started trying to recite it. He also got to show Carly the Hanguel app today, and doing some of the puzzles to make Korean sentences.

New words/phrases: Fox in Sox, chicks, Snoozers, blanket, plus, horsey, they’re eating, French fries, rake, raking, onions, green tea, farm animal, Kipper, Sock Thing, Big Owl

Home Plus: 

Home: 

Shirt we saw on the way to eMart. That is an ‘L’ at the end. Eerily, we found ourselves following the exact same mother/daughter on the way home, in the exact same spot: 

eMart: 

Home: 

Carly had a field trip going to the Dondaemun Design Plaza, so August and I went down to meet her at lunch time, and also to play around the DDP.

August woke up a little after 7, and made it a little difficult to get out of the house, as he kept finding something else he wanted to do. He continues to say “Thank you mama…” for different things. Today it was “Thank you mama for iPad” as we were playing Endless Reader.

But we finally left a little after 10. We took the bus and then subway to Dongdaemun. When we got there, we found it raining pretty hard, so had to put on all our rain gear. Did it on the floor as there weren’t any benches. August was pretty clingy, and didn’t like being set down for this. He instantly tried climbing in the backpack, and when I asked if he wanted in, he said “in the backpack, in the backpack.”

We made it to the DDP and headed to the baby room. We were still there when Carly called. So we went out and met her, then went back to the baby room. She nursed him, and he fell asleep. So when she had to leave she handed him to me and I sat down and read. The first time he’s slept in my arms in a long, long time.

He woke up at 1:15 and wasn’t too happy to find mama gone. Eventually got him calmed down and ate some lunch. We then went up to the Design Experience Zone. August has been there twice before (once with me and once with Carly), but he could do much more now. He saw the building area, and instantly wanted to start building a fort. Pretty sure there was some memory of previous visits there, as there was no one else there this time, and all the pieces were stacked up so it wasn’t obvious what it was.

Anyway, we spent the next hour or so building a fort. August helped by getting out the connector pieces and trying to put them on, and also ‘drew’ letters and numbers on the floor – he was chanting his ‘-teens’ today (and also started chanting 1 to 5 in order for the first time today). We then took a break and sat on a bench and ate second lunch. We went back to the fort to take it apart. August wasn’t upset, but he also didn’t help take it apart and only put away a few connector pieces, so it seemed like he maybe wasn’t happy to have it taken apart.

From there we looked around the rest of exhibits, spending time at two in particular:

The Volvo truck safety exhibit. Mainly because there was a low table with a rug on it with a pattern of a town. August liked climbing on it and looking at the pictures on it, and was doing yoga, etc. He kept saying “more grain (or green)” and pointing at it. Finally, I told him I didn’t understand what he was talking about, and he thought about it and said “more pattern”, and I was like “ahh, that makes more sense.” It also explained earlier, when there were two kids and their parents building a fort next to us. He kept pointing at them, saying the same thing. I think he was pointing out the pattern of the pieces/connectors.

The other thing we spent a lot of time with was the mirror room. Probably 15 or 20 minutes. Just looking around at the mirror and the lights. Eventually he wanted me to sit down in there.

Before we left we changed him and bought a bunch of sticker sets. They were cheap, and featured things like The Wizard of Oz and The Little Prince. Took a different subway this time – line 4 from the DDP, then transferred at Nowon and got off at Hagye. We didn’t have a seat most of the time, so August played Endless Reader on my phone as I held it over my shoulder.

A loss today: we have had a stick with us in the backpack for a couple weeks for all of our letter writing in the sand. August got it out when I put the rain gear on to walk to the DDP and was carrying it. I took a photo right as we were about to enter the DDP, and he still had it. Pretty sure it fell or I set it down in the baby room and then just didn’t see it after that.

In the evening August was really into repeating everything we said. I had a burrito and, and he started saying “burrito”, really emphasizing the last ‘o’. He played with Sophie in the bath, then when I was getting him dressed afterward, he wanted to play with Carly’s umbrella, which was open and drying. I wouldn’t let him, so he went to Carly, saying “More mama’s”, then led her down the hall to the umbrella. After some more coloring and reading of tree kangaroo and watching the 5 Little Monkeys video while Carly took a shower, he decided he had had enough and cried until Carly came out. He was asleep around 8:30.

New words/phrases: just one (number of blows for the balloon), cuffs, Zinnie walking on (he was walking on te circles on the floor at the DDP), in order, burrito, plug (in tub)

DDP: 

Design Experience Zone: 

In the baby room: