The Bike Ride that Might Have Shocked the Neighbors (But Probably Not)

He accidentally spilled a watering can filled with water on his orange pants, and that made him hopping mad.  I tried calming him down, and redirecting.  No success.   I tried explaining that it was only a few minutes until it was time to take a shower and put on pajamas.  He was not convinced.  The wet pants, which were really only wet down by the ankles had to go, and in his distraught state, he simply took them off right on the deck and handed them to me along with his shoes and socks, and then calmly walked over to get his brother’s bike helmet, which he brought over to me and asked me to please buckle it under his chin.

Did I mention that it was nearly bedtime?  I am far too lazy of a mother to do anything about bike riding in underwear at that time of day, so I just grabbed the camera and went with it.

A few weeks ago I was agonizing about whether or not I should buy a balance bike for my little guy.  I had a suspicion it would be just the thing for him.  I went back and forth and finally decided that the balance bikes were expensive and sized a bit too small for my super tall two year old.  I knew he’d outgrow one almost immediately.  Dr. Peds took a look at our somewhat broken little kids bike, and decided with a little bit of work, he could convert it.  He removed pedals and sanded off some sharp parts, and made a few other minor modifications and we had ourselves a free balance bike and a super happy little boy.  As the weeks have rolled by, he’s gotten braver and braver, and now he’ll pick up his feet and coast all the way down the front sidewalk without any kind of training wheels! It’s pretty amazing, especially for such a cautious boy, and it made me want to have a do over with all my other kids whom we gave bikes with training wheels to start learning.  This is so much more fun and makes such better sense.  Lately Mr. TOF’s bike has been his favorite outside toy.