We went out for a rather early morning bike ride this morning. This was Cole’s second full bike ride without any training wheels. He’s done amazingly well in such a short time. In fact neither Steph nor I ever thought one of our kids would learn to ride a bike this way. Cole got so good at riding his 3 wheel scooter we got him a 2 wheel scooter – it wasn’t but 3 weeks and he was as good on his 2 wheel scooter as he was one his 3 wheel. All of that practice had a huge impact on his balance. When he moved over to his push bike (no pedals) he almost immediately was able to pick up the balance and pretty quickly was riding it. Oddly, he really didn’t enjoy it much and still kept going back to his 2 wheel scooter. We decided he was ready, and with his very clear guidance, we removed his training wheels on his regular bike. He needed about 2 tries and he was riding it just as if it was completely normal for him.
Going out on regular trail is interesting for a boy who just learned to get on a ride a bike – lot’s of people, 2-way traffic, the path goes within feet of the Sammamish River, so there’s a lot of distractions. Both Steph and I were a bit worried but his first trip last weekend he did really amazingly well. He didn’t like the hills (especially the one’s that headed very near to the water) but with some coaxing from mom he did them just fine.
Today’s ride he was even more comfortable and we went for quite a ways. By the time we were done, Cole was exhausted. So proud of that boy for picking up riding a bike so quickly!
Alex has been crawling for a little over a month. Now he’s pulling himself up on Steph and I, furniture and is comfortable taking steps as long as someone is holding him. In fact, it’s the only way he can calm down when he’s angry – just grab his hands and pull him up to his feet, then everything is alright.