Today Is The Day

For Cam's 7th birthday (beginning of September) we had bought her a big girl bicycle. Up until this point she had mostly been riding her big off road tricycle. I call it that because it was a big tricycle with big tires that easily went through dirt, grass you name it. She did not have a bike with training wheels on it which would have been rather different then the tricycle and of course, more like a regular bike. So just sitting on this new bicycle that we bought was all new to her.

Now, some of you that really know my child can attest to the fact that she thinks she has to know how to do anything the first time she does it. If she is unable to, she gets very frustrated and upset and also very determined if it is something she really wants to be able to do. Learning to ride this bike was no exception. She got on it the first night, Daddy showed her what she needed to do and held her steady as they started off through the grass. This lasted for maybe 8 minutes and then that was the end of the bike riding. Literally. The bike sat in the house and she wanted absolutely nothing to do with it.

Fast forward 5 months to about a week ago. She started sitting on the bike while it was in the house, first just picking up her feet to see if she could balance on it. Then she started rolling it back and forth a bit with her feet on the ground. Then today she came in from outside where she was riding her scooter and asked if she could take her bike out, "just to sit on and walk it with my feet". My response was "Sure, be care and stay on the sidewalk." I knew after just a few minutes of watching her from the window that she was going to try and put her feet on the petals and pedal it. Sure enough that was exactly what she started to do. And just as I knew she was going to do that, I also knew the tears and tantrums were going to quickly follow. Sure enough they did.

Now I know better than to go out there and try and comfort her and encourage her and help her out (you know, the type of things most parents do for their children). When Mom or Dad tries to do this it just makes her 10x more frustrated. Yeah, we don't get it either. We just know this is how she is with everything from spelling words to sports. So I stayed in in the house and discreetly watched from the window and gave her some time to work at it herself. It was obvious that she was very determined and I felt confident that she was going to get it.

After 15 minutes or so of tears, grunts, foot stomping and dropping the bike she finally got her feet on the pedals and off she went. Pedaling, balancing and stopping were no problem. The hard part for her was learning how to push off with one foot and start peddling. She was pushing with her feet for several feet and then struggling to get her feet just right on the pedals before the bike stopped rolling. Once she gets that down, we will raise her seat and she will be all set.