Here’s a quick shot of the boy riding his bike last weekend at Douglas Park:

Today we went back to West Point Cycles to look at the Compact Trail-A-Bike. After sitting Aidan on it and adjusting it as much as possible, we made the decision that it was just too big for him. And so, the decision was to get a seat for the back of Gwen’s bike. We got it installed, took it home, had some lunch, and took a bike ride as a family. After some initial uncertainty, it was pretty clear that the boy was thoroughly enjoying himself. Gwen seemed to be having fun too.

So the problem we have now is that due to the odd shape of Gwen’s bike’s frame, it has to be mounted upside down in the bike carrier for the truck. This makes it impossible to have another bike on the carrier (you know, like mine) at the same time because the handlebars of the two bike interfere with each other. We’re still working on that one.

OK, so it’s Monday 7am. Aidan’s had 3 nights in the toddler bed. Putting him to bed hasn’t been the easiest thing in the world, but for the past two nights, it hasn’t taken any more than 10 minutes for him to calm down. It could certainly be much harder. In fact, we were expecting it to be much more difficult.

He hasn’t fallen out over night. He hasn’t gotten up over night. In the mornings he does his (now) typical morning routine … he sings and talks to himself until one of us comes down and ‘gets him up’. It’s funny: I’ve heard about the phenomenon of toddlers staying in the bed because they don’t think they can get up until someone comes in and ‘gets them up’ even if there’s nothing physically preventing them from getting up … but I didn’t think it would happen in our case. And I don’t know how long it will last. Yesterday, I merely poked my head in Aidan’s room (around 7:30-ish after letting him sing and talk for an hour or more — he’d been making noises on and off from about 5:30 am) and then he swung his feet over the edge of the bed and got up and started playing.

We spent a little bit of time yesterday letting Aidan ride his bike. It’s obviously going to take a little bit of time for him to get used to it. He liked walking it (pulling it by the handle bars) almost as much as being pushed on it. There was a little bit of peddling, but not a lot. We need to go down to Charleson Park to let him free-wheel for a bit.

On the geocaching side, Aidan and I headed off to pick up a cache that we didn’t attempt last weekend. California Roll and Blue Chevy Mad Science is by Acadia Beach on the north side of the Point Grey pennisula.  I thought it’d be a quick find, but I didn’t read the logs too quickly.  Turns out it’s about 30 m off the trail on a small hill and it required a fair bit of bushwacking.  It was just Aidan and I, and typically when we’ve gone after caches that have been off-trail, it takes one of us to wrangle the boy, and the other to search for the cache.  I weighed the options, and given the enthusiasm of the boy I decided to take the plunge.  I was a bit worried that a muggle was going to wander by and ask what I was doing leading a 3 yr old boy into the woods, but … oh well.  Anyway, we made our way to ground zero and proceeded to spend … I don’t know 20, maybe 30 minutes looking for the cache.  Aidan kept himself quite occupied by poking at trees and leaves, and playing with the hiking pole I had given him, but it was still distracting having to keep one eye on him and one eye on the ground looking for the cache.  Plus, I couldn’t very well range too far away from him.  But his humour kept up, and my humour kept up and eventually I stumbled across the cache.  I called Aidan over (erm, and helped him climb/scramble over the brush and fallen trees) and he happily checked through all the damp geoswag while I signed the log and deposited one of our pins.  After that it was a quick trip out, and as far as I know no one called the RCMP to report me. :)

Postscript: It’s 7:20 am now and Aidan’s been awake for the past 10 minutes or so.  Happily singing and talking in bed.  I guess I’ll have to go down and get him up!

Gwen’s birthday came early today. We bought her a new bike. It’s the one shown to the right, a Norco Corsa 2. She got a pretty helmet and a basket to put on the front too.

It met all her requirements: Easy to get in and out of, lighter than her previous bike, and ridable on a number of different surfaces. Plus it has a number of other features: fenders, a full chain guard, V-brakes, trigger shifters (rather than the typical thumb or grip shifters), front shocks, and a seat post shock. She says it’s the softest bike ride she’s ever had.

So now, we need to figure out how to transport Aidan around until he’s proficient on his bike. We’ve looked at seats that sit over the rear tire — but they max out at 40 lbs and Aidan’s about 37 right now. We’ve looked at trailers, but MEC’s write up on them seems to indicate that 12-18 mo age is the sweet spot for trailers. We’ve looked at Trail-A-Bikes (left) and while it’s the alternative I favour, Gwen’s not so thrilled about them and we haven’t been able to try Aidan on one that’s the proper size. A bike shop is bringing some more in and will call us when one of the smaller ones is in so that we can give it a go.

So, hopefully sooner than later we can be a stereotypical Vancouver family toodling around on the seawall with our bikes.

It’s funny, they creep up on you.

Today we bought Aidan his first bike. Well, technically we were proxies for Grandma and Grandpa who wanted to buy Aidan a tricycle for his birthday. Unfortunately, our living arrangements don’t really allow us to have a trike — no where to store it, and really no where to ride it except on the side walk. But we live on a hill — 22% grade according to the signs — and trikes don’t have brakes. And frankly, Aidan’s a bit of a small guy and last year he wasn’t really big enough for a trike. This year, though, he seems to fit the 12″ bikes quite well. And, we found a bike with a parental handle on the back — which seems to be ideal! The one shown to the right is the bike, but the one that we bought doesn’t have the Tigger head on it, or the tassles. Instead it has a black handlebar bag with a Tigger on it. And instead of spokes, it has solid discs in the rims. We must have the ’08 model.

We also bought him a helmet (skateboard style) that came with elbow and knee pads. The kicker is — they’re sized for ages 5+ and Aidan’s head size is at the top end of the head sizes that the helmet will fit (21″ vs 21 1/4″ max size). 5+ years old? Do these kids have freakishly small heads? After I got the proper size pads in the helmet, he stopped complaining that it hurt when it was on. :) He seemed to like the elbow and knee pads, and wore them over his pyjamas for a good portion of the night. Actually, he seemed to like the idea that they were to keep him safe if he fell (or in toddler terms, ‘crashed’). I know this because he proceeded to throw himself at the floor, repeatedly. At least his elbows and knees were safe. I did worry a bit about his wrists, though.

At any rate, we’ll get some pictures once we have a sunny day.

Of course, it’s supposed to be a birthday present so unless he specifically asks for it we might keep it from him for the next few weeks.

The other milestone that we’re dealing with today is moving Aidan from the crib to a toddler bed. Well, that’s not strictly true — his crib converted into a toddler bed. And, he’s been down since 7:30ish. There were tears, with him saying that he wasn’t ready for his crib … and I’m not sure if he meant that he wasn’t ready for the toddler bed, or if was just generally not ready to go to bed. Gwen stayed down and calmed him down. I’ve been down twice in the half hour that followed to calm down more tears. But in the past half hour (it’s 8:45 now) I haven’t heard anything from him. And, not once did he get up out of the toddler bed. Let’s see if that holds all night long.

And we’ll deal with tomorrow night tomorrow.