Learning to Ride

It was a beautiful spring morning. The perfect Saturday to learn to ride a bike. Dave prepared the kids bikes the night before. After delicious pancakes we packed up the car and headed to Penn's campus. We parked at 42nd & Locust. Lilia had no pedals so she used her feet to push herself along. This is the concept of the balance bike, which teaches kids to ride a bike at age 3. It is so worth the money.
So it probably took us about 20 minutes to ride to the center of campus, 34th and spruce. We were looking for an enclosed space where the kids could bike back and forth and we could teach them. The Perelman Quadrangle, right behind Huntsman Hall was perfect! In the middle was flat and either side had a gentle slope the length to the stairs.
 We put some pedals on her bike and within 3 tries she was going on her own! It was incredible!!! We were all so excited, we celebrated with popsicles from the Lil Pop Shop. Their truck was on Penn's campus for a festival.

Perelman quadrangle

Our goal was to teach both of them. However, Alex feet couldn't touch the ground yet so he couldn't learn to balance. Since his training wheels were off Dave had to hold him up the whole time. His back was killing him by the end of the morning. The next day his hip muscles were sore from running while bent down.
Later we put Alex's training wheels back on and he was excited to keep up with his sister, who had now mastered the bicycle!

Later that afternoon we had a party in the neighborhood to go to. It was a quiet street, 49th & Larchwood. While we hung out on the porch with friends, Lilia and Alex biked up and down the sidewalk for about 3 1/2 hours. She had mastered it! She was a pro! Pretty soon Dave said the two of them could ride to school together, but not on the trailer bike. Instead she could ride her bike and he would ride his!
Lilia was so excited. She woke up this morning, also very sore, and said, "I want to ride my bike everyday!" She discovered that learning to ride a bike was like learning to read. The world opens up to you in a whole new way!