Mason - Just shy of 2 years

I realize that I've moved far, far away from my monthly developmental updates about Mason, when he is just getting so interesting. I guess his self-sufficiency has lulled me into complacency and laziness. But, oh to enjoy it for another 6 months or so...
In the last few months his speech development has been very impressive...moving from a strong vocabulary of 30-40 words and signs to actual sentences and directives. I wake up each morning to "Baaah-na-na!" and "Hi mommie, hi mommie, hi mommie" (as in "Get up, it's 6:30am the day is a-wastin'!"). Then he crawls all over us until we get desperate for coffee, which today was at about 7.
Pronunciation is still being fine-tuned - for example two consanants in a row usually give way to a completely different consanant...think of how he could possibly say "truck" if the "tr" just don't come out right. Crackers still comes out as "dah-dows" for some reason.
Mostly, he is on the right track...even this morning I was impressed when I realized he was telling Zola the door to our bedroom was open and was instructing her to go downstairs. It went a little something like this: "Vova, doah open!...down." Also imagine ridiculously cute inflection as if every word ended a pitch higher. He is also very big on possessives: "Mason wah-wah" or "Mama butt" or "Daddy beeyah."
He is a repeating machine and usually just wanders around the house saying the same word over and over again just because he likes the sound of it so much. With my parents here, his absolute favorite words are "big bus" to mean the RV that they stay in and is also his all-time favorite toy. I've relinquished my refusal to let him to watch TV because You Tube "Airplane Takeoffs and Landings" keeps him transfixed for sometimes 10 minutes.
He LOVES being outside and riding his "ba-da-da" (a.k.a. tricycle.) He can say "bicycle," but can't translate it to tricycle, funnily. You can frequently find us laying down in the front yard looking up at the sky in search of "bee ehplane" or watching stars come out at night.
His favorite skills are playing "Take-book-jackets-off-and-stand-on-books," "Take-hangers-out-of-closet-and-hang-on-doornobs" and my favorite "Put-kleenex-into-toilet-bowl-one-at-a-time-until-box-empty."
We have a few playgroups that we go to now and then, but are trying to find some routine kid activities with others his age. When ever he runs into any other child (especially girls) he immediately gives them a hug (regardless of if it's the first time they have met) and sometimes even gets a kiss. My favorite experience with this was when we were in the check-out line at Ingles two weeks ago and he was sitting in the front of the grocery cart and this little 4-year-old girl walks up and stands next to the cart at eye level with Mason. They both looked longingly into each other's eyes then both leaned in for a long hug. Then they gazed adoringly again for a moment and gently leaned in for a kiss...and another...and another...and another. He's a lady-killer already! But I guess that's also where pink eye comes from.
We still have to pinch ourselves as we feel so lucky to have such a down-to-earth kid who is so easy going and interesting. We are trying to enjoy it before the teenage years kick in.