Our good friend Clark posted a shot the other day that hit home with a few of us daddies out there. http://www.pbase.com/image/96531480 . With all the shots I post of Ian all the time, you'd think we were doing stuff together 95% of the time. Truth is, 5 is kind of an awkward age for both of us right now. He's going to 1st grade next year, and I'm getting the feeling that it's going to be rough on all of us. 1/2 day kindergarten isn't so bad, but a whole day? 5 is also the age where he is so upset that he can't do certain things, but isn't quite driven enough to really learn them. Catching a ball with a mitt for instance. He asks to do it quite often, but he gets frustrated that he doesn't throw and catch well, and loses interest quickly. I set up a pitch-back in the yard so that he could practice whenever he wanted to without the pressure of anyone watching. I'm just having a hard time getting the point across to him that you can't just be good at something overnight, that it takes practice.


Clark's shot got me thinking about how even though 5 might be awkward for us both, I still need to get out there and experience it with him. So today we went out to ride his bike. I thought maybe 5 might be the age that we try taking the training wheels off. Hmmm...not yet. We both decided that maybe just raising them up to the upper limit might be a good first step. He did quite good a few times, and also took a few spills. His training wheels are quite loud, so you can tell when he's balancing nicely, as it's very quiet all of a sudden.


I grabbed some action shots of him cruising by. He's trying to stay balanced, it's just funny watching him over correct. Just rocking and rolling along.