Our own way of communicating...

Hi All, I apologize for not posting in such a long time. Things are going well and today I want to share about a special relationship that God has given me. I have spoken a little bit about this before and I'm not sure if I my words can give it justice but I will try. My language learning is slowly coming along--I notice that I sometimes can understand what is actually being said and not just rely on "guessing what is being discussed". Many people have told me the Czech language is a difficult language to learn so I try to be patient with myself (not an easy task :) Anyway God has sent me an encourager in a little guy named Tony. Tony is a 20 month year old son of my Czech friends Mirek and Bohumila. Last year when Tony was about 5 months old I started watching him for a few hours one day a week. So Tony knows me as "Teta Colleen" (Aunt Colleen) Many times his mom is in another part of the house working on things she normally can't get to. I am happy to give her this break and Tony is very comfortable in my presence. He knows we will play together sometimes if the weather is nice we will go outside for a walk to the park or we will stay inside and play somewhere in the house. It sounds like a pretty normal situation except Tony is still learning the Czech language--he is a clever and bright little boy and he understands just about everything his mom tells him (more than I can). He only makes a few sounds like mama, tata (similar to what our little ones say). I can only speak a few Czech sentences and sometimes I will speak a little English to him. But many times I don't speak words but I make sounds like Tony does. When he wants me to do something he will grunt and point then I have to try to figure out what he is trying to tell me. It is amazing how well we understand each other. In many ways Tony acts very similar to how my nieces and nephews acted when they were his age. He likes to play the "Where is Tony" (Kde je Tony?) I can say it both in Czech and English and he hides his little face and laughs when I say here is Tony (tady je Tony). He likes to explore his environment and gets mad when he doesn't get his way or isn't allowed to do something like take the colored pencil and write on the wall with it :)

The other night Tony's Mom needed me to babysit for her for a couple of hours. She gave me what Tony's routine was for the evening--taking a bath, what to put on him for sleeping, what to feed him before bedtime, telling me to read him a few books and then the options on how to get him to sleep. I knew this could be a little more challenging since Tony and I would be alone. But once again I was amazed at how smooth everything went. Tony was excited to see me and started playing with me right away. He didn't even realized that his mom had left the house. That is until I had to try to coax him upstairs to take his bath. The cutest part is when I told him the Czech word for "up" he got mad and pointed to the playroom floor that we were in. I kept trying to explain that it was time to go up. He of course cried and started calling for his Mom. This gave me the chance to speak Czech telling him "she wasn't home". He seemed to understand and after a little while stopped crying--it helped that I had my "little yellow ball" that he likes playing with. I call it my special magic ball because it makes him happy to hold it and carry it around. (I try to remember to bring it every time I come. It has become routine for him to go to my backpack and grunt which tells me he wants to play with it ;) His bath and getting him ready for bed went very smoothly. He seemed to accept the fact that I was the one taking care of him. The best part for me was when I went to read him a few books he climbed up in the bed let me read to him and then drifted off to sleep without one tear falling. I have done a lot of baby-sitting but can never remember having a small child go to sleep so easily. Somehow and by some way God allows Tony and I to communicate in a very special way. It always encourages my heart when I see him. He is always excited to see me and even his parents are amazed at his reaction to me. They tell me Tony really likes you--he loves you. Most Czech children are shy and understandably can be afraid of someone who speaks a different language than their own. But with me Tony shows no fear and we are constantly communicating with one another in our own way :) Hope you enjoyed my story... I will try to get a current picture of Tony to post to the blog so you can see why he has stolen my heart :)

I have some unpublished posts from the past few months that I will get published this week-end so I can get you all caught up on what God has been doing with me. Hope all is well and until next time take care.
Many Blessings,
Colleen