...Its like riding a bike

Alicyn made a HUGE step in growing up this past Saturday...She learned how to ride a bike. YEP, no training wheels. And we are like...OH YEA!!! Some 8 days before she turns 7yrs. old
I (Rich) was hanging all the bikes up in the garage because I'm tired of dancing around all of them all the time. What the heck, right? While hanging them up, I thought, "I'm not too sure this is a good idea because now, I'm not going to be walking around them, but I'll be hitting my head on 'em all the time"...but time will tell.
Anyway, Alicyn and I were talking bikes. Her BFF just learned how to ride and it took her 3 days with a relentless Grandpa leading the way. I could see it in her eyes that she wanted to ride this time and that glare was a little different.
Ya see. We've been through this before. "Dad take the training wheels off and give it a try. Nope, put them back on"...I think that I've taken those training wheels off and on at least 6 times. Trial and error..Fear of falling was the big catch, I think.
When we would ride to the park, I would make her "practice" riding on two wheels, trying not to let her training wheels touch the ground. That was our game.
I told Alicyn to get on her bike and go practice this balancing game while I finished up my new bike hanging, head ache inducing idea. Needless to say she was practicing hard.
I finished and called her in to take off the training wheels. Excitement was building and Jaxon was still wanting to see what his bike looked like, hanging from the rafters:)
A practice run was done in the grass, and I was shocked....it really looked like she was ready!!! I gave a quick text to Laura to get the camera while we took the first run since I didn't want to slow down any progress and get any scared Hee-B-Gee-Beez in her head.
On we went to the street. She said constantly, "Dad, don't you let go of me". Every time I came back with, "Don't worry about me, I'm here for your safety. You just concentrate on keeping your pedals moving and look where your going".
And that was about it...I was shocked as we went down the street for the first time. I don't think I put one hand on her and all of a sudden we were 3 houses away??? Stopping is still in the works, but she's doing pretty good. We turned around and Laura was ready with the camera. Alicyn had a smile that could light up a city block!!!!
We couldn't end up there, though. A ride to the park was due. We made it to the end of the street, Jaxon was in the child seat attached to my bike so we wouldn't be dragged down by Mr. snail BMX'er. No cars were coming, she set her pedals and we were ready..But this time she wasn't ready enough to push a little extra to make it up the little pitch that the street has and bang, boom; Alicyn fell on her knee and elbow. Tears followed...
Poor Ali was in pain, crying and need to take a break on the curb. We took inventory on possible blood and scrapes. Check--NONE!!! Ali continued to cry and insisted on going home, "I'm going to walk my bike back home"!!! I said, "No your not, your going to get back on your bike and we are going to the park to have fun and celebrate YOU riding your bike for the first time without training wheels. We have time, take a minute to gather yourself, and we will continue". Jaxon, God bless his heart when he chimed in and said, "Good Job, Ali"!! :)
So on we went, after we walked across the street. Ali found out that riding on the sidewalk is a tough task to master, but she did much better on our way back since we stayed away from the busy street with sidewalks and stayed to the back streets with the open road.
I never thought this day would come. At least not until she was 8 or 9. Now we just have to keep practicing.
I'm just a proud Daddy, that's all I can say...
The video is out of focus, but that's us way down there and coming to ya. Yea, I know about Jaxon. Lets just say we live on a very low traffic street and Jaxon is still learning about safety. He only goes into the street when we are there too and was just excited that Mr. Billy and Barbra (our neighbors) were outside to see this event.