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Bike Riding

An amazing thing happened today. Alex learned to ride his bike. I learned at age 4, but that was in an absolutely flat, Kansas neighborhood with lots of other kids that were all riding their bikes. I had to keep up! Alex has not had any kids to ride with and has not really shown much interest in it. I have tried to show him, but we have the parent/child dynamic where he doesn't want to listen, I get frustrated, etc. Bleh. I almost got him riding on his own, but we were not quite there.

Now the neighbor's grandson is zooming all over on his bike and Alex needs to keep up. My neighbor, the grandmother, also has saint-like patience, and good teaching skills, got Alex riding his bike tonight. We went up to the park where there are some flat, paved areas and by the end of the evening he was able to start himself, ride around, and work his brakes. He came home with a couple of scrapes, but was feeling pretty proud of himself. There is a good bike trail down by the river, so maybe with some more practice we can work our way up to going on bike rides this summer.

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