Smarty pants

It is always so fun to see your baby getting smarter and smarter. Zack is such a good verbal communicator now. He'll be 2 next week, but he sure talks a lot for his age. It is so fun. And also very helpful when trying to diagnose the cause of irritation.

For example, last Sunday as we were driving home from Utah, we were about 2 hours from home, and Zack woke up and started screaming. Really screaming. He was crying and screaming for about an hour, but I kept thinking he would just get over it and we could blast on home as fast as possible. But while Zack was crying, he was saying, "Mommy, Zacky done! I'm done! No buckles. Zacky done!" It was very sad, but I had to be happy about his use of words in trying to solve his problem. When he got no response from me, his words changed to, "Aubrey, Zacky done! Zacky done! No buckles, Aubrey!" I decided it was time for a stop, so with an hour left of our drive, we pulled over at a rest area by the river and let everyone run around for about 1/2 hour. Zack was a whole new bubba, ready for the trip home.

The other night Zack said something that made me realize he is not just smart vocabulary-wise, but his understanding of concepts is very impressive. I took him outside with me to deliver a Tiger Woods green Gatorade to Mark, who was spraying around his trees in the back 40. We gave Mark the drink, and Zack was pointing to things and telling me what they were. He pointed to trees, the orange truck (trackhoe) and yellow truck (bulldozer) parked in our backyard, rocks, airplanes, etc. Then he pointed to one of the big 150-ft douglas firs we have and he said "Daddy tree." He moved his arm and pointed to a 6-ft tree nearby us and said, "Baby tree." He made his tree-lovin' daddy so proud.