This has been a great vacation week so far. I've had the boys with me all but one day. Vacation started with me cashing in a reward at work Friday for a Toys R Us gift card so Cooper could get a new bike that we plan on learning to ride without training wheels. I took him to the store and we spent over an hour going through and trying multiple bikes for size and found that he'll outgrow a 16" bike to fast but 18" with the seat set all the way down would be perfect. This is what he ended up with.
After we finally decided on the bike and got it loaded into the car, we ended up going out to a quick dinner as it was already 7:30. Cooper always asks if I can take him out to eat without Cosmo as he likes when it's just the two of us. After we got a bite, he went home and crashed out, excited to put his bike together the next morning.
Saturday afternoon, they were dropped off and we spent about a half hour putting the bike together. The worst part is that the bike has hand-brakes and getting those set right for Cooper took some time. I had to make sure that he could squeeze them, but not so easy that he'd be able to lock the tires up with him. I'd rather he use the pedal breaks until he's comfortable and can stop when he intends than have a crash because the hand breaks didn't stop him. After it was all put together, we spent some time doing other things until later afternoon hoping it would get a little warmer. That morning it was still 32ish outside and windy so not really that great for bike riding. After lunch, we took the bike over to the house to give him a quick ride. It was so cold that he had to wear gloves so it wasn't exactly the best weather for trying to go sans training wheels.
I don't think he's really ready for it just yet so I just let him have them, but they are up as high as they'll go. He's still good and tippy so it'll help him learn a bit of balance and then we can work on taking them off for a few crashes. Cosmo got in on the action zipping up and down the road on the tricycle by pushing along with his feet as hes not quite able to work the pedals.
With a few trips up and down the road, Cooper had had enough of trying to ride in the cold so we called it a ride and headed out.
Monday it poured for most of the day. We spent the day just relaxing and working on a 750 piece, 3 foot panoramic photo puzzle of Times Square on a busy night and playing matchbox cars. We've got a fair amount done but it'll take a little of me working on it Thursday to finish it off. Today, the weather was good so I took the kids back to Toys R Us to get some things to play with at the park. We ended up with a Stomp Rocket and some sort of other AirHogs sling shot rocket with a couple of planes that fly off the rocket at its peak height.
I wouldn't recommend the stomp rockets for a kid Coopers size as he just doesn't have the weight to get it to go much beyond 15 feet. When I stomped it, I wouldn't go much beyond 35 feet. While it seems like a good idea, Cooper got tired of it fast as it couldn't even make it up far enough to come down in it's little helicopter mode.
Moving on to the playground itself, the boys had fun for another hour or so chasing each other and trying to hide from me taking their picture.
Tomorrow's agenda is to spend a couple hours candle pin bowling, followed by a trip to the mall, which will be my first trip on over a year, to get Cooper some cleats and shin guards and tube socks for soccer which starts in two weeks. If the weather men somehow were wrong, we'll probably spend a bit more time at the playground.
