Big Mack, Macaroon, Mack Truck...

At Mack's 2 year old check up, back in March, the doctor did all sorts of cognitive development tests with him.  She, of course, checked him physically (and mentioned that he's huge compared to the Swiss children-no shocker there), and then went on to play all sorts of games with him.  He was in heaven!  Pointing out colors, matching shapes, building blocks... all without saying a word.  Just grunts here and there with really big smiles and a lotta laughter.

"Is he saying much at home?"

"Not exactly."

"How about 'mama' or 'dada?'"

"Nope."

I realized this wasn't ideal, let alone "normal."  I wondered a little if I should feel concerned, but hadn't gotten to that point yet.  

And then Luke, who was with me, piped in.  "It's Ok, he doesn't have to talk, because I know what he wants!"

And there you have it, folks.  The baby of the family.  Doesn't need to talk because everyone does all of his talking for him anyway.  

Well, the doctor said that if he didn't start saying some words by 2 1/2 years old, then we might need to take some steps as to figuring out why.  

What do you know?  Just shy of that-- 2 years and 5 months old, suddenly Mack started talking.  I guess he didn't feel like doing further testing ;)   He started with "Dada" and then just exploded from there.  Some of our FAVORITES that we hear constantly are, "Otayyyyy!" (with a thumbs up sign to go with it) and "Tank tu mama (or whomever he's talking to)." (thank you)  I can't get enough of his little voice and the communication that we have now as he slowly puts his words together to form short sentences.  

It's funny, he reminds me a lot of Jake at this age.  They have the same build.  Jake's first word was "thank you,"  and when he spoke, he put a period after each word, just like Mack does.  

Here's our little man at almost 2 1/2 years old.  It represents him well ;)  I turned around and for a split second thought Mack was the unfortunate beneficiary of Turd Birds...until I saw his empty yogurt container, and realized he was just trying to get to the bottom of things.  

Love him so much.  Again, I think Heavenly Father is just giving us a little blessing by allowing Mack to grow up slowly.  He crawled "late," he walked "late," he talked "late," but really, for us... those milestones have been right on time.