Bike riding boys

D is on the verge of being able to ride his bike on his own - big boy style! Over the weekend my husband helped him practice riding without training wheels and he did really well. It's tough because his legs don't quite reach the gound, even though his bike is pretty small. And it weighs a ton, which makes it a little unweildy, but he's getting the hang of it. It seems like an American rite of passage, the dad hanging on to the back of the seat, running alongside as the child pedals; letting go without them knowing and soon they're off and riding and don't even realize they're doing it. My husband took him up and down the street quite a few times and he did pretty good. He's not quite ready to ride all by himself, and the intricacies of stopping and starting without crashing have yet to be mastered. But his balance is there, he just needs some practice.

G also got a bike recently, but this is a new discovery for us - a push bike, or balance bike (I've seen them called both). It is basically a little tiny bike without pedals, low enough to the ground that the child can put their feet flat and walk or run while sitting on the seat. It is designed to teach them to balance on the bike, since they can put their feet down whenever they want. I've seen videos of kids cruising on these things. So in leiu of a bike with training wheels, G gets the push bike and when he's ready for a bigger bike, we'll just go straight to a regular one, no training wheels needed. He LOVES the thing. I think it makes him feel like a big boy, riding his own bike. Nevermind that his helmet is a bit too big and he doesn't move very fast yet. He has fun and hopefully as he gets used to it, he'll start to walk faster and get going a little so he can start to learn balance.

E, of course, is relegated to the stroller during the boys' bike riding fun. She's rather indifferent to the whole process, except to maybe wonder (if babies wonder in the absence of language skills) why her mommy makes her ride around out in the cold all the time. It is January, after all, but the weather has been good (aka, no rain), so we've been taking advantage of it and having some outside time.