Almost three years of riding with kids with no problems, but today I had my first crash. It was a solo crash, so it could have been worse, but it was plenty embarrassing. We rode out of the way to hit the ATM on the way to music class and it was out of service so the frustrating part is that we shouldn’t have even been there. I was turning right from 45th onto Stone, right in front of Archie McPhee. So at least I chose an extremely high-profile intersection in which to crash.

I’ll admit I don’t have any experience in riding on icy roads. I barely have any experience driving or walking on icy roads. Nothing seemed slippery for the mile on the way to the bank and I saw the white on the road, but I didn’t think my slow right turn would end in disaster. The bike slid out from under me and we landed on our right sides. A woman pulled over right away and helped me lift up the bike. Thank goodness, because it’s impossible to lift it alone, even with the extra adrenaline from a crash. Another woman pulled up in a minivan and offered to put the bike in the back and the kids in her two car seats and drive us all somewhere. If I hadn’t been so embarrassed, I would have been very touched. Baby Rijder was understandably scared and crying, but Brandt still wanted to push on to music class. He got a little freaked out by the women fussing over us and started crying, too, but as soon as I thanked them both and got us on our way, he was totally fine.

I can’t believe we got off with barely a scratch. My right knee took the brunt of the fall and has a nice big scrape to remind me of the incident. Baby Rijder got a mini road rash scrape on his nose. Of course when we got home and I said, “Wait here a sec while I grab the camera!” he walked into a table and gave himself a nice big welt on the forehead. Plus the skin under his nose is chapped from runny nose plus weekend in the snow. So he looks more banged up than he really is. Sheesh.

The bike didn’t make it out scot-free, either. The handlebars are pointing off to the side a bit so we crookedly rode home (what a way to avoid a trip up 50th!) and got the car. Amazingly, we were only five minutes late to music class. Naturally, Ride Bicycles is closed on Mondays, but I plan to drop the bike off tomorrow to have it fixed back up. Actually, I was very tempted to lock it up outside the shop today and be done with it.