Two Wheelin'

Cooper continues to be our little decorator and he's been begging me for two weeks to please hang Easter eggs from this tree as we did last year.  Of course I chose to give in to his constant begging on the coldest day we've had recently!  He is over the moon with the results and loves the accessories in his favorite climbing tree.  Monkey man Hudson has decided he loves to climb as well and is definitely doing his best to keep pace with his big brothers.  I was sitting in the driveway just the other day and heard Hudson call my name and I looked up and he was hanging above me in the tree!  Mom of the year moment for sure.

We tried Cooper's bike without training wheels over the summer and he just wasn't quite ready and was too stubborn to even give it a try so he's been riding his scooter instead of a bike for some time.  As I am also stubborn, I refused to put his training wheels back on and told him he could either learn to ride or go without a bike.  I know I'm mean but Carter and Cooper both are the type that need a push to try things that scare them initially.  I did the same thing with Carter and just took him to a big parking lot one day against his will and came home with a bike rider.  As we were decorating the tree Sunday, I asked Cooper if he wanted to give it a try and much to my surprise, he was game.  I honestly thought he would take off immediately but that wasn't the case.  I was so proud that he didn't give up, though, and after about 20 minutes, he was a two wheeling speedster.  The only problem was he couldn't start himself, turn, or stop, which meant I would get him started and then sprint next to him so I could stop him at the end of our street.  Needless to say, there was no need to exercise that day as he took care of that for me!  One day later, we've now mastered turning and stopping but have a little more work to do with braking and starting.  He is so proud of himself and wants to spend every second outside cruising the street!

This one on the other hand, has mastered pedaling with training wheels after much ado.  He has zero patience so the first time he hopped on and pedaled backwards and the bike didn't move, he was done and used his 3 year old swear words to let us know just how dumb that bike was (stupid dumby if you must know).  I asked him if he wanted to try again about 30 minutes later and he hopped right on, only to get frustrated again immediately.  He yelled at the bike, squeezed it with all his might, and then proceeded to bite a nice chunk out of the seat.  He was furious (and has a temper that rivals mine I do believe)!  I picked up his bike and told him fine, if he wanted to be ugly to it then I'd give it to a nice little boy that wanted to learn how to ride and wouldn't mistreat it.  He gave in and said he'd be nice so he hopped on and I made him put his feet on the pedals but not pedal himself.  After a long walk down the street hunched over and turning the pedal with my hand for him, he figured out that pedaling forward was actually where it's at.  He's now speeding up and down the street and also wants to spend every minute he can outside.  Thankfully for me, the temperature has finally decided to be nice enough that I don't mind a bit!

 This is definitely a favorite!