A Boy and His Bike

An amazing thing happened this weekend.

Dawson has been pestering me for months to 'kindly remove his training wheels from his bicycle' (in his best British baby Stewie accent). Since we don't have the greatest insurance right now in the event of broken bones and smashed out teeth, and also since I always have a small tribe of semi-violent villagers hanging from me, I have been putting him off for quite some time.

But as the story goes, he finally asked at the right moment this weekend, when his Dad was home and screwdriver ready, with nothing in the whole world better to do on a Saturday afternoon than teach his son to ride a bike.

So the training wheels came off, the bike rolled down the driveway, the boys settled in for the first of many failed attempts in age old cliche of learning to ride a bike...

OH, WAIT. That's right, my child is EVIL KNIEVEL. SO, actually, what happened was... the kid freaking TOOK OFF DOWN THE STREET and only looked back over his shoulder to see how big the cloud of dust he left behind was.

No, but seriously. I was in the house cleaning out Anabelle's closet, and not more than FIVE MINUTES went by when Tyson said "um.... are you coming out to see this?"

I was half annoyed that Ty was asking me to stop what I was doing to stand in the street and watch my kid eat pavement over and over and over again, so imagine the shock when I walked outside and saw THIS:


Oh, yes. That's right. My three year old dare devil is a big-boy-bike riding fool. I mean, the kid literally just took off, and that was it.

And it was the cutest thing in the history of all things cuddly and warm to watch him flying down the street, completely fearless and wide eyed with a smile like Ive never seen before slapped on his sweet little baby boy face. In fact, he was SO proud of himself he knocked on every single door on our street to show the neighbor kids.

The men were out until almost dark Saturday night, exploring the neighborhood from the seat of an unbridled steed. When he finally got home, all I heard the rest of the night was "Mom, aren't you SOOOOO happy I can ride my bike now with no training wheels? Aren't you soooo proud of me?"

And Sunday morning we were up before the sun as usual, and we hardly had a chance to wipe the sleep from our eyes when Dawson started pestering his Dad to take him back out again. And since I am married to the best father I know of, Ty of course couldn't resist bundling up the little spiders and hitting the streets at sunrise.




And then, to repay the kindness of their hopelessly devoted father, who braved the cold Autumn morning for the sake of the cause... the little thugs repaid the good deed by spinning webs all over their helpless victim.


But something tells me he didn't mind.