This kid, I swear, is sometimes the reason I get up in the morning. His name is Baby Silas, although he’s not much of a baby anymore, as you can clearly see! I’m not sure about his exact age, but he’s somewhere around a year and a half.
Every time I walk through the gate, he comes running up to me and dives into my arms. The way he runs is the cutest thing ever. It’s almost like he doesn’t have knees, and he really waddles and swings his arms side to side to get momentum.
Well here’s a story about Baby Silas that started with a ring.
Whenever I wear this ring, the kids at the home are all mesmerized by it. They have great teachers who clearly inspire them, because they’re constantly pointing out letters and numbers on anything they see. So when I wear this ring, I usually have several little hands grabbing at the ring and pointing to each letter, saying “Letter L. Letter O...” I've taught them that it says “love” and we'll talk about what love means, and how I love them and God loves them. One of the many sweet moments that are peppered through my days at work.
Well one day a month or 2 ago, I was holding Silas and talking about love with the kids. Silas started mimicking the sounds of the word “love!” So immediately that became my new project: get Silas to really say the word.
Now, I can’t count it as a first word for him—he says a few other little words—but it’s still one of the first and it makes me insanely happy to have taught it to him. I also taught him to say “I love you.”
Now every time he sees me, he grabs my hand, looking for the ring. If I’m not wearing it, he looks a little confused. It’s so cute, I can’t stand it.
I finally was able to get him on video saying “love” and “I love you.” Check it out, it’s so sweet. I had to add a segment at the beginning of him running up to me so you can see the run-waddle.
I’d like to get to share a little bit about Silas’ story, although I’m not sure how much of any of these kids’ stories I should share on my blog, for confidentiality’s sake. So I will just keep it confidential and only let you know that Silas was referred to us when he was about 4 months old. His parents were unable to take care of him for various reasons, and essentially this sweet baby was dying. I’ve been to his home and met some of his family, I’ve seen where he comes from and what could have been his fate.
And instead, the first phrase he learned to say is "I love you."
