Riding a bike has to be one of those big childhood milestones - I can still remember learning to ride myself and whizzing around. I’d really wanted Max to start learning on a balance bike, but he was insistent for a long time that he couldn’t ride a bike as he was “too little”. But a few months ago, he became obsessed with bikes and couldn’t stop asking about getting a bike for his birthday - “one with pedals”.

I researched a lot, as if he was going to have a bike with stabilisers, I wanted it to be as lightweight as possible to make getting the hang of pedalling easier. Max can be easily off-put if he finds something difficult, and I didn’t want a bike to be something that he tried and gave up on easily. We tried out the Frog Bike at our local bike shop and it seemed perfect - lightweight but solid, and most importantly for Max, it came in green!

 

 

We picked it up on the morning of Max’s birthday party, and we took him out on it for the first time later that afternoon. Seeing him sat on the bike suddenly made him seem like such a little boy - so grown up! But the thing that made him seem even more grown up was his determination to get the hang of it. At first he struggled with the pedalling, not quite managing to keep his feet going round in a circle when they reached the top. He wasn’t going to give up though, and he kept on trying, with me and his Daddy running behind him, shouting words of encouragement. And then after about 10 minutes, he was off! No problems steering, braking fine, and even pedalling fine. He looked like such a confident little bike rider and he couldn’t stop smiling. We just hung back and watched him go, and I couldn’t help but feel so proud of him. I think so often I can worry that Max will struggle with things and it was wonderful to see him take to riding his bike so quickly. I need to stop stressing and trust a bit more that he can handle things!

 

 

In fact, he loved riding his bike so much that we returned to the bike track every day for the next 4 days - that’s dedication for you! He’s now whizzing around the track and you’d never know that just a week ago he’d never ridden a bike. On his third day, he even asked me to take his stabilisers off as he wanted to go faster to keep up with the older boys who were overtaking him! We’ll have to hold back a bit on that one though as he can’t quite touch the ground. I suspect by the end of the summer they’ll be off though…

 

 

I can see us spending many more hours down at the bike track this summer, and he’s already keen to put on the mountain biking tires and go riding in the woods. The bike was definitely the right choice for his birthday present!

 

Joining Donna at What The Redhead Said for The Ordinary Moments