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The bike, the smoothie, and the banana

Today Eleanor really rode around a lot on her bike. Yesterday our neighbor saw me holding Luke and a kite, while keeping Amanda from getting run over and trying to help Eleanor ride her bike, so he came over to help out. He's a good coach, and I think someone other than her family encouraging her really had an effect. At any rate, she learned to turn around. This allowed her to go up and down the driveway. This evening she went down to the cul-de-sac, back up past our house to the top of the hill, down to the cul-de-sac, to the hill, for 25 minutes.... She said she was going as fast as a racer! So fast Daddy couldn't keep up! But when she fell down and hurt herself, Daddy ran really fast to her.

This girl, who last weekend didn't want to ride on the driveway (she didn't want to hurt herself), now prefers to stop by standing up on the brake and screeching to a stop. She also likes to go as fast as she can while sticking both feet up in the air and shouting "wheeee". I remember her as a 3 year old going down a steep hill on her tricycle, doing exactly the same thing. I'm not sure which scares me more, actually.

Daddy said she's learning to stop at the stop sign, but she still needs to learn to get over to the side of the road, so I still have a week or two to get my bike fixed up. She was surprised that I still knew how to ride, but I told her this is something you never forget.

This morning Amanda had a smoothie for breakfast...except she spilled it all over herself. (Mama was really mad, but that was because mama got up on the wrong side of the bed). We went up to change clothes, and she said, "This time I want a not smoothie dress on." Right.

They always say that you shouldn't laugh at your children for doing things you don't want them to do, even if they are funny. For example, when your 1 year old smears banana all over his hair by playing "sooooo big" while he is eating, you shouldn't laugh, even if he is grinning from ear to ear. However, these experts do not take into consideration his older sisters, who are perfectly willing to reward any inappropriate behavior with laughs and encouragement. At least Amanda helped wash his hair out tonight.

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