Balance bike

Lucia is taking the next step in bike riding by using a balance bike given to us by Jon's co-worker Brandon. We had every intention of getting her a balance bike from the start as we heard that kids learn to ride a bike without training wheels faster if they start this way but then a year ago we saw a pink bike with training wheels at a garage sale and the decision was made. We thought to ourselves "we learned with training wheels and so can she". She loves her pink training wheel bike and likes to ride it often and she's become quite good at steering and turning and going fast on it but then one day Jon came home with the balance bike as a hand me down and so she's now been riding on this one ever since. Our house is on a slight hill so she will walk up the sidewalk and glide down and in just a day has mastered balancing with her feet up. She loves going fast so she often pushes off before going down the hill which sometimes means she loses control and runs into a bush but after crying and dusting herself off she gets back on the bike. I think this weekend we'll remove the training wheels, find a good flat place to ride and let her try riding the regular bike and see how it goes. Looking back I'm glad we did it this way. She picked it up in no time and I think she loved riding a big bike for a year with the extra wheels.