You think YOU have it bad!

(This one is for Sam..)

I was very aggravated the other day with my sons as they were telling me something that I "have" to do for them.

I stated to them in my clear, direct "mother tone" (that I have currently perfected and sound strangely familiar to my own mother...)

"I only have to teach you FOUR things and then I've done the minimal requirements for a parent of little boys (It clearly gets more complicated with teenagers!). I have to teach you about God, how to read, how to swim, and how to ride a bike. Besides the first, I never care if you ever do those things again once you've learned but YOU HAVE TO LEARN...otherwise, I'm a failure and I can't live with that!"

Much dramatic sighing followed.

By all of us.

Sam has recently learned to ride his bike and he hates it. I have to force him out the door and threaten him to ride around the yard several times until I have appeased my own guilt that I am not doing my job as a parent and the nagging concern that my boys aren't normal!

Sam pretty much refuses to ride on the cement road. Although I know that it would be tons easier and that that may be the only chance we have of him learning to like riding, He is terrified of falling and only agrees to ride on grass.

Pathetic.

So...I'm posting this picture that shows the hill that my dad made me ride down the day he took my training wheels off. I remember it vividly because just at the bottom of it...I tumbled over.

As usual, what I anticipated being a mountainous-like incline that was unreasonable for any parent to require of their child on a first bike ride...I found a few weeks ago to be quite subtle and acceptable. Isn't crazy how much smaller things are the older you get?

Suck it up, Sambo! You think YOU have it bad!