Babies Don't Ride Bikes
Posted by Arwen Mosher in Family on Saturday, April 24, 2010 2:00 PM
At the park the other day, we saw a little girl from our parish who is the same age as Camilla. As the kids played together and we moms chatted, I noticed that Camilla’s friend had apparently ridden a bike to the playground. It was parked right there between her older brother’s bike and her younger sister’s stroller.
Her mom said, “Oh yes, she loves to ride her bike.” I feel embarrassed to admit it, but I was surprised. A three-and-a-half-year-old is a baby! Babies don’t ride bikes!
But that evening when Bryan got home from work I told him, “We should get a bike for Camilla,” and he agreed. So maybe this “baby” thing is all in my head.
We never bought a double stroller when Blaise was born. Last summer if I wanted to take both kids for a walk that was too long for Camilla’s easily-tired legs, I’d just wear him in a baby carrier and push her in the stroller. But this year - with him being a very wiggly 27 pounds - I prefer not to wear him, so I’d been thinking that maybe we should get a double stroller to make long walks with both kids a possibility.
Honestly, the fact there is another option - that Camilla is old enough to propel herself around on a frame with wheels - was shocking to me. As clichéd as this sentiment is, I feel it was just minutes ago that we brought her seven-pound self home from the hospital. No wonder I have trouble thinking of her as a child instead of as a baby.
When I was a know-it-all teenager I thought that parents who babied their children were ridiculous. Leave the kids alone! Let them grow up! What’s so hard about that?
(Oh, I was obnoxious. You would have wanted to smack me.)
I still believe that we have to let our children grow up and that babying them is a bad idea. Now that I am a parent myself, though, I completely understand how it happens. In fact, I’ve accidentally done it myself on a number of occasions! The fact that I had no idea my three-year-old could ride a bike is just one example.
We bought her the bike, along with a bike helmet with ladybugs on it (“a whole family of ladybugs, Mama!”) and a little bell that she can ring as she rides. Which she does. Ride, I mean. It took all of half an hour before she was comfortable and confident on the seat of her very own bicycle. Bike-riding is her new favorite thing.
My little girl has taken one more step toward growing up. We’re just along for the ride. But what a ride it is!
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