Wheels!

I might be wrong, but I think we now hold a record for the most number of wheels housed in a garage. There's the eight that are on our two cars, of course. Then there's the three strollers which add another ten wheels total. Two cars is certainly quite ordinary; three strollers is maybe one more than we need, but I would argue they are all very useful and important. Where we really go a little overboard in the wheels department is in all things related to kids' recreation. Our garage has turned into a regular bicycle rental shop for the younger set. In addition to a very ancient cozy coupe, a baby stroller (that is used as a lawn mower), a wagon, several ride-on cars, and a scooter, we now own four bikes for our two kids. And yet these boys STILL fight over who rides what! We had been wanting to get Ethan a "big boy bike" for some time now, so when we took our bi-monthly family trip to Walmart on Friday, he got to pick out some new wheels. Correction: Dad actually picked out Ethan's new bike, and was taking so long to decide on what we should buy that the boys and I left him there, took Ethan to his swimming lesson, had the swimming lesson, and drove back to Walmart, all in the time it took Dad to do his number crunching, comparison shopping, review surfing, and other analyses necessary before making any sort of purchase. Oh, and there was some back and forth via phone, text, and email during the swim lesson because the decider needed some advice. But I digress...

Ethan ADORES his new bike.

And maybe it was all the time Ben spent picking the bike out on Friday, or all the time he spent teaching Ethan how to ride it on Saturday and Sunday, but the whole biking experience is ALL ABOUT DADDY.

It's very sweet, actually, and nice for them to have an activity all their own. Like everything else that this boy tackles, Ethan takes his biking so seriously - yesterday he told me "I really need to work on my braking Mommy. When is Daddy going to be able to work with me on my braking?".

And to prevent future feelings of favoritism, or cries of "All you ever gave me were Ethan's hand-me-downs, scarring me for life!", Adam scored a new set of wheels too. So now in addition to the tricycle he inherited from Ethan and the Skuut we got him for his birthday (which he's not quite big enough for), Adam now has his very own "big boy bike" too. But for now, he's content mastering his new (to him) tricycle...

...and pushing his brother around when he decides he needs a break from learning to ride his new bike.

I see lots of long family bike rides in our future. Maybe Ben will spring for an adult bike (his current bike is circa 1989), or maybe he'll just borrow the Skuut.