First, let me start off by saying this is my third year blog-iversary… Blog birthday? I don’t know. But I’m starting on year number four. 426 posts later, I’m still doing it. I’ve been so incredibly bad about going to other blogs and visiting all my old friends and reading about their lives. But I have managed to keep on writing my posts and not giving up. Few and far between these posts may be, but I don’t plan to ever stop.

Next? My daughter has learned to ride her bike.

This week, we decided, would be the week. And by we, I mean me. I know that icy cold grip of winter hell will be upon us soon so we don’t have much time.  It turned out to be not quite as traumatic as my early bike learning experience.

DAY ONE

I figured we wouldn’t rush things. I didn’t want to turn her into Lance Armstrong in an hour. I know that if I push my little girl, she will push right back. I also know that if she fell too many times in one day, she would probably suffocate me with my pillow while I was sleeping.

I took her training wheels off the bike. I adjusted her seat, filled the tires with more air. We fitted her knee and elbow pads on and strapped her helmet down. I was jealous. I never had those things. So I made them fit slightly loose. Kidding…

I gave her lots of tips on how to ride her bike. She ignored me, I’m fairly certain. I’m like all the adults in a Charlie Brown TV show to her - “Wha-wha-wha-wha-wa-wa-Wha-wa.”

We pushed her bike out to our sidewalk and got started. She pedaled like crazy, I pushed for about 10 yards before I ran out of breath, and I let her go.

Immediately, she veered off course and headed straight for our neighbor’s dragon. Yes, you read that correctly. My neighbor has a dragon. In his front yard. And it holds a glowing red orb in it’s hands. And it’s in his front yard. Where everyone can see it.

So, I was reeeaallly worried about her damaging that. I was worried it would damage her… She missed it and came back down toward the sidewalk. She did much better than I expected. She stayed upright for those first few seconds and pedaled well. She zipped past the sidewalk and crashed just off the curb.L.A. Girl was unharmed. But… she was done. That was it. Lesson over. She marched back to the house as I tried to coax her into one more attempt.

DAY TWO

Our next attempt the following day was pretty much the same. I got about three attempts out of her. Each time, she would stop pedaling a few seconds after I let go of her and she would veer off the sidewalk and into the street. She would usually come to a full stop and then fall over, or just fall over to stop herself. But she never got hurt.

We needed a change in venue.

DAY THREE

On Wednesday, we picked up L.A. Baby from daycare and the three of us went to the nearby park. It has a web of smooth paths that cut across the park and I figured this was the perfect place to ride. No nearby streets or curbs or… dragons.

My wife gave her some advice to help her learn (because, apparently, my advice didn’t seem to be working) when she told her to, “focus on an object in the distance so you don’t look down at your feet.”

We got her gear on and I gave her a good push. Amazingly, she took off. She zipped straight off the path and out into the grass. But she stayed up. She pedaled fast and kept it going for a good ten seconds. I shouted directions to try to get her back on the path, but she refused.

We did it several more times. Each time she would fire off the path and out into the grass, but she was riding the bike on her own. She was pretty good at it. She could even stop on her own without falling over.

I wanted to see if she could “take off” on her own, but she wasn’t quite ready for that. So, I decided to try to get her to do a few more runs and we would head home. I gave her a running start and let go. Naturally, she veered off the path (which I decided later was because she didn’t want to crash on the path, only on the grass) but she pedaled furiously…

Straight into a tree.

I tried to shout out directions when I saw where she was headed, “No! Tree! Go right, go right! Watch out for the… oh, shit.” Bam!

I was expecting tears and screaming, but L.A. Girl laughed. She pushed herself up and got back on her bike. We tried again. I gave her a big push, in the other direction, and she was zooming away from her old man.

And headed straight for another tree. Bam!

I couldn’t help but laugh. People milling about in the park didn’t seem to appreciate my laughter…

I picked her up and brushed her off. But she was fine. No weeping and wailing. No teeth were gnashed. Still smiling at each other, I asked her, “Why did you ride into the tree? Again?”

She told me, “Mommy said focus on something far away so I did…”