Friday, February 18, 2011

Max rides a bike!

Yesterday afternoon was beautiful and sunny.  In our house that has come to mean that bike riding will be the activity of choice after school.  For the last several months, Max has rotated between riding his scooter and his glider bike, with occasional turns on his two-wheeler with training wheels. But when we got home, Max immediately asked Dan to take off his training wheels - he wanted to give riding a two-wheeler a shot.

Now, when we tried this last June, it only took about 5 minutes before it became really evident that he wasn't ready.  The balance wasn't there, and he was too nervous about falling to keep working at it.  In fact, that was part of what pushed me toward purchasing his glider bike.  Since then, he really hasn't said a word about it.  But between the scooter and glider bike, we've watched his balance grow and grow.  We knew he was ready - he just needed to decide that he was.

So, today was the day.  Dan popped off the training wheels, told Max to take it to the top of the driveway and coast down,  just like on his glider bike.  No problem.  The second time, he told him that when he got to the bottom of the hill, he should try peddling.  And seriously?  That was it.  He was off and riding. No tears, no fear.  I'm so proud of him.  And I'm still trying to figure out when he got so big. 

Here's a video about 5 minutes after the training wheels came off: