A TALE OF THREE BIKES

 For Ben’s 11th birthday back in July, we got him a new 20 in bike.  This was because he needed one in order to participate in the “I Can Shine” Bike camp.  There’s a previous blog post about that fun week.

 Jonah has an old but very nice 20 in bike from when our girls were younger (don’t worry, it isn’t a Barbie bike.  It’s light blue…and lavender 😊).

Anyway when we brought Ben’s new bike to bike camp, the instructor said he would not recommend it because it had only foot brakes, no hand brakes.  He said it’s too complicated for kids with special needs to use their feet for peddling and braking.

So bike #1 got returned, and bike #2 purchased instead.  

On the second day of bike camp, the instructor looked at bike #2 and said that one wasn’t good either because the hand brake was only for the front.  This is dangerous because kids can topple over the top of the bike if they brake too hard. 

At this point, can you tell I’m not an expert about bikes?  We lucked out years ago when we bought the girl bike.  It has 2 hand brakes for front and back.  The bike instructor just disconnected the front brake for Jonah to use it. 

To continue our bike drama, bike #2 was returned.  We now went to a good bike store and found a used expensive 20in bike with a rear wheel front brake.  Finally, we found success!  Bike #3 is perfect the bike instructor said.

Through all the coming and going of these three birthday bikes, the funny thing is Ben never noticed and/or cared.  It didn’t phase him that we kept taking away his birthday present and replacing it with another.  And he will probably not be bothered that his birthday photos are him with a totally different bike then he ended up with!  Now that’s rolling with it…literally.

So the other part of this bike drama is after many weeks of working with the boys on trying to balance and steer a two-wheel bike, we have decided to put it aside for a bit.  It’s just too hard for our boys right now.

The “I Can Shine” Bike camp did say they have about an 80% success rate with kiddos mastering a 2 wheeler by the end of the week camp.  20% of participants need additional practice at home or at another week of camp.  

Since regular training wheels don’t fit very good or not at all on 20in bikes, Andrew researched and found a great company that makes heavy duty training wheels for all size bikes.  It’s a company that does this to help people with special needs enjoy biking!  

Here’s the link if interested:

Click HERE for Fat Wheels info

We are soooo excited for our dynamic duo.  They can now enjoy bike riding!