Riding time

For Christmas the Howies gave Daniel a bike. I was wanting to get him a big boy bike with training wheels as he has ridden ones at some friends' places and enjoyed it. He loves riding his tricycle so this would naturally be the next progression. Also, Eliza is keen to start riding a bike too so we wanted her to be able to ride the tricycle so we needed to move Daniel on. 

At the Gower/Kidd Christmas he was very excited to get his present!

 After presents finished we headed down to the frontyard for him to have a go. The poor thing was very hesitant because it wasn't flat like the other times he has ridden and so didn't really want to ride. I found this annoying because he could easily do it if he believed in himself. He did start to get there slowly.

On Christmas day we had the Howies around for lunch and Oscar brought his bike and scooters. The kids had a fun time riding around the street together and Oscar was so beautiful encouraging Daniel on his bike because he was still so hesitant.

On Thursday mornings, Eliza has been going to swimming lessons. Rather than having Daniel with us because I still needed to go in the water Dad has been fantastic in taking Daniel for a bike ride home from the pool. With the bigger bike the ride would be a bit too tricky with the hills so instead Dad has been taking him for a ride up to the park. This has helped Daniel grow in confidence which is wonderful! I am really grateful for Dad doing this (and Mum in the last few weeks too). Daniel also looks forward to it. Here is Daniel riding with Dad.

He has also grown in confidence to ride around our pavers on his own.

One Thursday night we decided to have dinner at the park instead of at Mum and Dad's place so the kids could have a play and a ride. It was great seeing Oscar become much more confident on his bike and Daniel was doing pretty well on his own one too (with coach Poppy helping him). Eliza had fun being pushed around by different people on her bike as well.

A couple of weeks ago Daniel had a fall off his bike which seemed to have shaken him. When we tried to take him and Eliza for a walk on the weekend he was refusing to get on his bike, refusing to try riding on his own, refusing to give it a go. This was really frustrating because I know he can do it, I believe he could ride really well, he just needs to! It took us 1hr and 20mins to just ride to the park and back. Probably 40mins of that was just going down our street. On the way home he started to feel a bit better. We were chatting about different things which I think distracted him and helped him ride on his own. On Thursday Nana and Poppy took Eliza and Daniel for a ride and they said he did pretty well which was great to hear. 

On Friday Daniel asked if he could ride on the road. I was surprised by this but decided to give it a go. He asked if he could ride his tricycle but I said no, he needed to ride his big bike for at least 1 lap first. Pushing Eliza and helping Daniel can be tricky but he was a lot more confident and wanted to ride without help. I sure was surprised! We rode around the loop and as we came back to our house I asked him if he wanted to keep going to see the house that was being built. He said yes and we continued to ride to the house. Again, I was surprised! After sitting and watching the builders making cement for a few minutes we headed back to our house and I was so very proud of his riding!

Of course, when we made it back to the house Daniel was straight back onto his tricycle and much more confident when riding but I was still very proud of his riding!