A few weeks back, my cousin Angie wrote me an email and at the end of it, she put, “I can’t wait until Imanuel talks!  I think he’ll be silly.”

Imanuel’s repetoire is becoming quite extensive…(although still behind Bentley’s – a post in honor of his 2nd birthday – coming soon).  The following lists his communicative skills that he has accomplished in the order learned:
1.  “Give me five.”
2.  “Stretch!”  (which we’re in the process of Koreanizing to “Mahn Sae!”)
3.  Clicks with his tongue.  He’s quite proficient and will now respond when clicked to.
4.  HIS FIRST WORD – “ka-koong” – He mastered this one right after GYC.  This is his first word.  Unfortunately, it’s a Korean sound that is the equivalent to “peek-a-boo” or “koo-koo”…not really a word.  Kind of like Juan’s “uh oh” when he was first learning to talk. 
and most recently (on Jan. 9)….
5.  “Jem jem” – When you say these two sounds, (or start chanting/singing it,) he opens and closes his fists.  It’s very cute and it’s perhaps one of the first things a baby Korean learns to do.  I should try to get pictures of it because it actually looks like he’s motioning “come here” with both hands because he always points the palms of his hands up when he does this.   And, to add to the humor, he’s always smiling when he does it!

It’s amazing how quickly babies learn.  The crazy thing is that, except for him saying “ka-koong”, all of the other motions (even the clicks!) were things he did on his own first, and then I put a name to them.  So, he was then able to associate the name with the action that he was capable of doing.  I’ve tried teaching him other motions, but it hasn’t been successful yet.  He hasn’t been able to do them on his own (like folding hands together to pray and clapping).  It’s interesting to see parallels to my teaching experience and methods that help students learn quicker/better…but I’ll save my thoughts on that for another time.

Anyway, back to the point of this post.  (It’s 1:31AM, btw.)  Imanuel has been sleeping for 13-13.5 hours each night, but tonight he drank more milk than usual closer to his bedtime, so what I feared would happen, did happen.  He peed through his diaper and it got his pjs wet and he woke up…at midnight.  We changed him and then I held him for a while to get him settled down.  He got into his “I’m tired” position (laying his head on my chest, snuggling his face against my cheek, and thumb in mouth) and I sang him his bedtime song one more time.  After that, anticipating that I would put him down in his crib, he kept jerking his head up as if to say, “I’m not sleepy yet!  Don’t put me down!”   But, he was so sleepy that he couldn’t resist it.  He ended up with his head back down, snuggled under my chin, with thumb in mouth.  Anyway, just when I thought I should put him down, he whispered something to me.  At first I wasn’t sure if I heard him right, but he repeated it again.  He whispered, “ka-koong”.  I had to keep from laughing.  I said, “Okay, ‘ka-koong’, now go to sleep.”  And he kept saying it but louder with full intonation and everything – the entire time laying on my chest with thumb in mouth.  It was as if he was telling me he wasn’t ready to sleep…that he was still awake…it was so funny! 
When I put him down (and he did fall asleep soon after) I tried to go back to sleep, but I just couldn’t help thinking about how much Imanuel’s personality is beginning to come out.  And I thought to myself, ‘Ang must be right.  I think Imanuel is going to be a silly boy’.