Made a solo run to the old house to pick up some stuff left behind: shoe rack, big poster, refrigerator contents, coats, boots…and the Yepp seat since I didn’t think to leave it at the new house.

I was disappointed I couldn’t also fit the new 20-inch kid bike on board so I went back after the kids were asleep to fetch it. 20-inch kid bikes are much easier to ride than 16-inch ones, though I still felt like a clown.

Earlier in the day, a friend came by to pick up a computer monitor we no longer use (which the kids and I carried from old house to new in the front basket, btw). I oohed at her Mazda5 and I feel weird about it. Am I a victim of our car culture? Or am I overcompensating and trying to seem relevant the way acquaintances force out any random biking anecdote when they see me? I dunno, but it is a good thing her family of five squeezes into a “nano” van (her term) rather than a minivan. And I could certainly relate to her swearing off long car trips after the miserable experience they’d just had dropping her spouse at the airport on the way over. Oh snap, did I just miss an opportunity to woo her to the dark side? Doh! I’ll do better next time.

Today’s miles: 5.8
April miles: 184.5

Today is moving day in which I disappoint my biking peers and reveal that professional movers put most of our stuff in a gas-guzzling truck and drove it around the corner to our new house. The kids and I cleared out for the day so Mr. Family Ride could deal with the moving stuff.

Our first stop was the library to return some soon-to-be-due books rather than risk them getting lost in the moving shuffle. Remember, I went out in Snowmageddon to avoid accruing more overdue fines. Must return the books!

Then we headed to Top Ten Toys for a birthday present. They’re moving in two days–and also around the corner! We scouted the new location, sure that it meant more bike parking (currently I park on the narrow sidewalk, bike locked to itself) since it’s by the newer Piper Village Shopping Center area, but for all the loveliness of the brick walkways and benches, there is one tiny bike rack at either end of the block. Kind of surprising. But in better news, on the way over I got to use this great loop detector (place wheel on icon to trigger light) on Greenwood at 85th. I love that it’s right in the middle of the lane! They’re usually very far over to one edge and put you uncomfortably close to neighboring (or oncoming) cars. I hate the one on Latona at 45th in Wallingford. It’s on the far left of the left lane of this one way street, but on the other side of the intersection cars are parked along the left so it’d be ideal to be on the right side. The street is slightly uphill so cars always catch up and pin me to the left for a while. No fun.

Then we wiled away the afternoon at a birthday party, including awesome face painting. But moving day is not the best day for face painting. Especially if one is moving to a house with no bath tub and hasn’t yet procured the “I’ll take showers if I can wear a snorkel mask” snorkel mask and extra especially if the face paint doesn’t seem to really be face paint and won’t scrub off. Yellow eyebrows all week!

Also at the party I got to see my friend’s “kitchen bike.” When she told me about it, I thought she was talking about some obscure German brand of bike so I nodded like I knew what she meant. Turns out it’s literally an old Schwinn on an indoor trainer in the kitchen. She’s car-free and her regular ride is a Dutch bike with two kid seats. Training on the kitchen bike has made her faster on the heavy bike.

While we were indoors a hail storm pelted the city. It looked liked it had snowed when we got outside. Fortunately it wasn’t slippery to bike on.

I left my snowboard jacket outside on the bike so it was damp and wouldn’t have been comfortable over my three-year old’s pants, but I also didn’t want to stop our progress out (chocolate cake sugar high! all kids berserk! hit the road!) to dig out his Newt Suit and put it on him, so I used my rain chaps on him and they were great! The waist buckle fit around the back of his seat and the knee velcro around his ankles. And yes, unfortunately the snowboard jacket is necessary to keep him from [lovingly] strangling his brother.

Today’s miles: 7.2
April miles: 178.7

Sometimes, the hardest part of 30 Days of Biking is keeping up with the documenting. So here’s the past four days…

Tuesday: 14.5 miles

Took the route by the bike tree home from preschool. Tulips everywhere!

Then took my road bike out in the evening to stop in at our elementary school’s Parent-Teacher-Student Association board meeting to ask for money and support to launch a bike to school program (it’s a go!) and then on to our monthly coop preschool parent meeting. Thank goodness the rain didn’t come back because my road bike doesn’t currently have fenders.

Wednesday: 26.6 miles

The morning was miserably rainy, but then the sun came out and it was GLORIOUS. There wasn’t a cloud to be seen. But then everything reverted to grey and rainy.

During an elementary school assembly at which the Green Team received an award from Washington Green Schools for reaching level 3, I announced our upcoming Bike to School program. The kids all seemed very excited…and that was before I mentioned mini donuts.

Then we biked up up up to Greenwood for tap dance class after school and I thought things might be quicker if I went up and around Green Lake, but then made the mistake of taking 83rd west from Aurora rather than my usual 84th. Too steep! I was able to pedal up and a couple pedestrians cheered (though I was too winded to properly acknowledge them).

After delivering the kids home, I pulled out the road bike (two nights in a row!) to hit the Walk.Bike.Schools meeting to learn more about starting our Bike to School program.

Oh, and the ParentMap article “Balance Bike Basics: Teaching Kids to Ride Without Training Wheels” came out, featuring some pictures and quotes of mine.

Thursday: 9.3 miles

Today had its share of crappy moments. En route to preschool, a crazy guy wandering around in the street kicked a can at the bicyclist in front of me and then spit at us. Blech. His spittle only reached the sleeves of me and my five-year old and the rain quickly washed it away. Just something to add to my very short “This never would have happened if we’d been in a car” list.

Heading back to preschool a couple hours later I had to go around a FedEx truck parked in the bike lane. Extra aggravating given all the space on the other side of the street. Aggravating, but not surprising.

And heading home from preschool we were met with a NO PARKING sign in the middle of the Burke-Gilman Trail. Now that I think about it, I did have to wait for an idling car to move off the trail near this spot last week, but I think blocking bikes with a NO PARKING sign is overkill.

Friday: 1.6 miles

TGIF! The three-year old and I took a trip to our new house–we move tomorrow!–to drop off some essentials: Mega Bloks, toilet paper, and potty seat insert.

But we had even more precious cargo later in the day when we brought Bettie to the vet for a refill of her new heart medication (she’s doing great!). We tried yet another configuration for her with the cargo net holding her little carrier to the front of the FlightDeck. Bettie’s only 11 pounds, by the way. Makes for easy toting. And speaking of dogs on bikes–Elly Blue current Taking the Lane call for submissions is for Dogs on bicycles.

Tuesday miles: 14.5
Wednesday miles: 26.6
Thursday miles: 9.3
Friday miles: 1.6
April miles: 171.5

Today we used the old mamabike so we could use the bus to pay visits to the doctor, chiropractor, and dentist with the slide-damaged kid. I wasn’t tempted to use the car, both because I’d love to go the whole 30 Days of Biking car-free, but also because going multimodal made a day of boring appointments an adventure whereas the car would have made for a nightmare of a day. And I figured if we’d gone the car route, I would have waited at home until all three offices opened to call and set up appointments and have to miss the whole day of school so the bike/bus didn’t put us behind in that respect. The fact that the offices had staggered openings made the whole thing seem more feasible–doctor at 9, chiropractor at 10, and dentist at 11.

First up: 1-mile bike ride to doctor’s office. I intended to go to the coffee shop across the street from the doctor before 9 so we could hang out and call right at 9 and hopefully get in. But we ran a bit late (surprise, surprise) and got there at 9:08 and were able to accost our doctor as she got out of her car. We were in luck and got in right away. Nothing injured, apply more arnica.

The chiropractor wasn’t open by the time we left the doctor’s office so we biked 2.5 miles to a bus stop in the University District and I called to make an appointment while we waited for the bus to arrive and bring us up up uphill. They had room for us at 11:45, but we headed straight over at 11 anyway so the kids could play in the Chiroland playroom. While we were there I called the dentist and said we could get there at 2, which worked great for their 2:15 appointment. Phew! Looks OK, apply more arnica, come back next week.

I started getting a little antsy when the clock crept past 11:45; I wanted to catch a 12:17 bus 10 blocks away to connect to a 1:12 bus downtown. Amazingly, we got to the bus just as it was readying to pull away–success!

On the bus I realized our stop would be in a transit tunnel, which means two elevators to get up to ground level and then figure out which direction to go to get to the connecting bus. Suddenly the “Walk to 2nd Ave & Seneca St/About 2 mins (7 mins to make transfer)” didn’t seem like enough. And it wasn’t! I could see the bus across the street from a red light. Never have I been so impatient for a light to turn! A pedestrian ran through the red light and flagged the driver down and was allowed on even though it had pulled away from the curb. Meanwhile the light finally changed so I rode up alongside and asked if we could please get on board. He shook his head, but said we could try to catch him at the next stop. [Note to self: make notes of subsequent bus stops for future missed buses.] I asked him where that was (please don’t be uphill, please don’t be uphill!) and chased him 5 blocks to Cherry Street. We even saw a friend along the way (Hi, Cathy!). And then we got on that bus.

And this is why we don’t use the bus regularly! It’s so hard to work with a set schedule, especially when I have two small stubborn, barking children to tow along. And to board each bus the same process: remove kids, remove bags, remove windscreen, fold up baskets, buckle seat straps, find ORCA card.

This bus meant a change from King County Metro buses to a Sound Transit bus to reach the east side. The kids loved the Bikes + Sound Transit poster on board. I was confused by the cat, but pets and muscles sell.

Everything went fine at the dentist, too. Broken off spacer was put back on and we stayed in Issaquah for late lunch/early dinner. I fed the kids snacks at bus stops, but I neglected to eat all day. Rushing around from appointment to appointment doesn’t leave much time for meals. Oops.

I love riding around Issaquah. We generally get off the bus downtown and ride by the train museum to get to the dentist, but on the way back head for the transit center for a more rural excursion. Here’s a Canada Goose we honked at. It’s right next to the busy Trader Joe’s, but at the right angle it feels like one is out in the countryside.

My bike leaned precariously on the bus rack home from Issaquah, but it flexed its massive biceps, thought of its loving cat at home, and hung on for the 20-mile trip home.

As you can guess, our three-part excursion took all day and we rode home with the 5:30 commute crowd. Here are 12 bicyclists in front of us en route to the paint-separated Dexter bike lane. These folks are always a serious bunch and I only got one, “That quite a load you’ve got there!”

One last shot: we stopped halfway up the hill home to admire our favorite garden (the kids’ because of the water-spitting frog statues and plastic alligators and mine because it’s halfway up the hill and therefore a great spot to rest). I couldn’t shake any cherry blossoms loose from the tree today, but soon. And notice the front kid’s new Giro Rascal helmet protrudes a lot in the back. We’re a little more cramped on the small mamabike now.

All told, we biked 11 miles and bused 47. And the kid is fixed!

Daily miles: 11
April miles: 119.5

This is my new, heavier cargo: we’ve traded the balance bike for a 12-inch pedal bike.

My five-year old isn’t 100% after yesterday’s slide mishap, but he was up to coming along to see his little brother learn to ride a pedal bike at Cascade Bicycle Club’s Learn 2 Ride for All Ages. Actually, he thought he was teaching the class, so of course he came! It was very impressive that everyone showed up given the downpour. And several more kids showed up after I took this picture.

And it worked! It was so fun to watch the ecstatic kids conquer bicycling. My ringer did figure eights in a huge puddle while his lil bro joined the ranks of pedal-powered people. Then he coaxed a new-pedaling little girl (who’d never been on any sort of bike, just a scooter!) to join him in the puddle. I guess that was his contribution to the course. The class will meet again June 2nd and September 8th ($10)–sign up! I suggested they do it EVERY SINGLE WEEKEND because it really was that fun. Imagine how much fun it would be not in freezing rain.

The only thing that made me nervous was how close my two kept coming to the curb. I told them the story of how I broke my arm when my pedal hit a curb in college (and on the last day of Bicycle Safety Awareness Week!), but my five-year old replied, “That’s OK. I’ve been trained to do this.” Oh, my bad.

After class, we checked out the brand new NE 65th Street cycle track. As I biked us to the top of the hill, we passed the Mayor heading down. We called hello to one another and he said, “You dig?” I think I responded favorably enough that he’ll push for many more miles of cycle tracks.

I didn’t think the new pedaler was cycle track ready, but I let my five-year old loose on it. He did great going downhill, but could only make it part way back up once the incline got too tough.

Here’s a view from the top of the hill. The cutest part is the half-scale stop sign.

I had hoped the cycle track completion meant the bottom of the hill would be easy to navigate, too, but it’s still being worked on. There’s a wonderful closed road that runs parallel to the sidewalk, but it’s not easy to enter from the corner. I’m not sure what the intended bike route is, but it doesn’t seem to be my route of choice.

A bit past the cycle track, we saw a kid bike–16-incher, I think–sporting ape hanger handlebars and an incredibly long seat post, making it adult-friendly. We were all intrigued and the kids began discussing the tandem tallbike they’ll build together from baby bike frames. Freak bikes have a special place in my heart so this made me very happy.

I’d forgotten my keys at home so we stopped at Counterbalance Bicycles to pick up baby’s first lock, a yellow Knog Party Frank so I could borrow it while we had lunch. (Psst…it’s actually orange, but please don’t tell him. Apparently they always sell out of purple and yellow first due to their proximity to the university–school colors.)

And then we arrived home to find my keys in the garage. They must have been there overnight. Oops. But really, I can’t believe this hasn’t happened sooner.

Daily miles: 11.3
April miles: 108.5

Both kids bike-ily delivered to school, I headed to Fremont to meet up with my friend, Alyssa. We often ride our fast bikes when the kids are all in school, but today we were both on our slow longtails. On the way over, I happened upon Barbara and invited her along. Behold our trio of kid carriers: Xtracycle, Surly Big Dummy, Kona MinUte. Yay!

After several days of sun, I’m never prepared for rain. This is Seattle, so I should know better, but it always happens. Must be an innate Southern-Californian-transplant survival technique. The kids were indoors and fine without rain gear, but I was getting progressively damper. I swung by Alyssa’s after our ride (to Goodwill to look for waterproof fabric for one of her fantastic DIY projects) so she could let me use her new rain skirt. It’s awesome! This one is oilcloth, but she’s planning another one with a lighter fabric. Note: if you want people to touch your clothing, wear a waterproof skirt on a rainy day. It was very popular.

Back on the Burke-Gilman Trail I noticed Cascade Bicycle Studio has moved into its new space–by the mama dinosaur and baby dinosaur foliage and next door to The Indoor Sun Shoppe (where you can test out a sun therapy lamp for 20 minutes if you’re having a rough rainy day). I don’t think they get a lot of cargo bikers in the shop, but they kindly let me and my rig drip on their floor while I checked out the new space. It’s big and airy and filled with fancy stuff. They were intrigued by the white cable on my bike–because they couldn’t figure out what it was for–so I demonstrated my Rolling Jackass centerstand. And then I told them about the guys who rode a Madsen bucket bike in a cyclocross race to try to bridge our two worlds. I think it worked. But if CBS runs cyclocross clinics in the fall (they’re thinking about doing so!) and I attend, I’ll bring my cross bike and not my cargo beast.

Then I popped into Free Range Cycles to stick a Pedaler’s Fair flyer on their community board. Free Range’s Kathleen was just written up in OutdoorsNW Magazine (So was I, so they’ll put just anyone in there, but Kathleen is the real [steel] deal). Alex was working on an Xtracycle. I hate to break mechanic/bicyclist privilege, but I bombarded Alex and Kathleen with questions. The owner is an artist who uses it to transport canvases these days since her kids are too old to be cargo. I’m intrigued by non-human-cargo cargo bikes. I expect to have one someday.

Those first two stops were impulse stops, but I eventually made it to Hub and Bespoke to check out caps. I found a great little Ibex wool cap that fits under my helmet. And the ear flaps fold up if need be.

Hub and Bespoke also has a funky VANMOOF on display. I’ve never seen one in person, but J.C. Lind seems to sell a lot of them as evidenced by his Facebook page updates. I’ve only seen pictures of their profiles so it was surprising to see the lights integrated into the frame. I still think they look weird, but weird with function. The H-and-B VANMOOF is from Charley+May, “located on the top of Queen Anne Hill.” I think I’ll suggest to Alyssa we use that as a future kid-free bike ride destination…but with our quick bikes.

Daily miles: 15.0
April miles: 89.3

I’ve been using the car in the afternoons the last few Wednesdays. School pickup by car is such a pain! We leave home half an hour early (school is FOUR BLOCKS AWAY) to snag a parking spot one block away, often involving circling a block or two. Mother Nature has peed down massive amounts of rain just on Wednesdays so rather than hang out in the school yard, the toddler and I impatiently wait in our metal box, watching other families circle and look for parking. Once we grab the kindergartener, we hightail it back to the car and head for tap dance class, hitting several maddening traffic backups along the way.

So why deal with the hassle? Well, we’re moving to a smaller house soon so I’ve been taking advantage of combining trips–first to all-uphill tap dance class and then onto the nearby thrift store to donate a carload of stuff. I’ve made thrift store runs by bike before, but these trips have including fragile stuff (which on the bike I’d have to pack very very carefully) and more per trip. And, yeah, it’s nice to avoid that hill sometimes.

But today we bike! And hopefully all Wednesdays forthcoming.

This morning after school dropoffs, Mr. Family Ride and I walked over to the new place to discuss how we’d fit all our stuff in. I never think we own very much until it comes time to move. Mr. Family Ride thinks we’re going to need a storage unit. I’m determined to prevent that, but it may require more stuff purging.

Before preschool pickup at 1pm, I had time to run three boxes and a metal doggie gate over to the new house. We’re moving 400 feet, all downhill, so I’ll bike move what I can, though the big stuff will be done by professional van-bound movers.

Quick aside: at preschool, I wasn’t the only mom picking up by bike! There is nothing that makes me happier than seeing more bikes!! She has to work this around naptime so biking every day won’t be possible for this family, but this won’t be the last time I have company at the tree.

One more quick aside: heading home I discovered my three-year old has been waving motorists through (appropriately) when we’re stopped at intersections. I sometimes get into “You go”-“No, you go” hand waving wars with drivers. This often happens when I’m turning left onto NE 40th Street which is uphill and has no shoulder and while it’s very polite for westbound cars to wait for me, I’d much rather wait and follow behind than vice versa.

Once home, the three-year old wanted to move some boxes, too, so we did one load together before heading over to kindergarten pickup.

The only thing I don’t like about biking to dance class (well, besides the HILLS) is having to grab my little tapper ten minutes early. Not that driving gets us there on time–we’re still a few minutes late unless all the lights cooperate and there’s a parking spot in the small parking lot. Today’s pickup was anything but smooth. Of all the days for my son to come out of school announcing, “I lost my jacket!” And of all the days for the kids to have been requested to wear shorts or dresses for a Hawaiian dance performance (which was so adorable!). But I remembered to bring along the sweatpants we had layered over him for cold morning dropoff. And thank goodness I ran back into the house at the last minute to grab my jacket. I put my sweater on my son for the ride to dance class:

And then my jacket on him for the ride home (aww, Hawaiian dancing and then tap dancing makes for a tired kid!):

Daily miles: 12.0
April miles: 74.3

I’m sure Engine Engine Engine version 2.0 will make an appearance this month and finally get a write-up, but most days when I want to coordinate school dropoff with some fast bike time, I drag the empty trailer behind the Big Dummy and leave it at preschool for four hours. This morning the bike counter acknowledged us–sometimes the trailer confuses it–and we were bike number 976 of the day at 8:54am.

After dropping the kids at their respective schools, I swapped the Big Dummy for my little road bike and met my friend Astrid to check out her new bike and treat her to breakfast as a thank you for sending me a Craigslist link to the most amazing kid bike (to be a birthday present in a couple weeks–you and the birthday boy will see it soon!). We met at Solsticio on the Burke-Gilman Trail and then hit Recycled Cycles for Brooks Proofide for Astrid’s fancy new saddle.

Speaking of fancy and new, Recycled Cycles has the 2013 Kona Ute and MinUte.

Next we rode downtown (numbers 1371 and 1372 at the bike counter this time) and as I was bidding Astrid farewell at a bike rack, who should pull up but the Jimmy John’s delivery woman I have seen around lately. Naturally, she’s my favorite…though I haven’t seen if she can track stand as well as the guy with the gold components. She pulled up to the rack, swore a bit, and manhandled a bike that was hogging two spots (and by that, I mean that she gently lifted it and moved it slightly to the side). All very exciting!

I had a bit of time before preschool pickup so I did some route experimenting for a Critical Lass ride to Pedaler’s Fair. I think I finally got it sorted out on this third attempt.

I still had a bit of time, because I always seem to have extra time when zipping around with the road bike so I stopped in at Wrench Bicycle Workshop. Last night on the Menstrual Monday ride when my bike started squeaking, Kelli of Yoga for Bikers said it means my chain needs lube. Kelli is among the new round of soon-to-be Cascade Bicycle Ambassadors and she’s already ambassador-ing!

So I pulled the preschooler home in the trailer and later on we used the Big Dummy again to pick up his brother. Slow bike, fast bike, slow bike.

Daily miles: 18.4
April miles: 62.3