We didn't get much riding today. A quick jaunt to drop Big Brother off at school then to Trader Jose for groceries. Poor TJs is still waiting on city approval to improve their bike rack situation. Until they do, I'll just continue parking my bike inside like I own the place.

Little Brother and I decided to walk to get the Biggun at noon. It was already heating up and the walk involved me carrying a 32 lb toddler for most of it. On the way back, Big Brother loved riding his bike on the sidewalk and did a great job stopping at driveways and intersections and not getting too far ahead. Little Brother was harder to corral and didn't want to be held. needless to say, I needed a nap this afternoon.

After a midday, 100+ degree day, I needed to get out of the house. My aunt had borrowed the Mobic for her niece and I realized that I needed it for class tomorrow. It was the perfect excuse to head out for a quick ride. Even though the sun was setting, it was still warm out. Blech. However, it was still 1000x better than driving!

Today was the first day of a new routine in our lives. Two weeks ago, our daycare provider told me that she was closing on the 28th. My heart sunk as I started researching new daycares and preschools, I realized that we couldn't afford my job at Practical Cycle anymore. Turns out, we had been paying about 1/4 of what standard places charge and there was no way for us to balance out a regular job with the cost of child care. So, as of yesterday, I'm back to being a stay-at-home mom for the first time in a year. 

On top of this big transition in our lives, Big Brother's new school make for a crazy juggling schedule, Jose's new evening classes mean I'm in charge of all night-time duties four days a week, and my folks left town for the next month and a half so we've got easy access to a car (and a cat) for that time. It all makes for a whirlwind of emotions and activities. However, great change brings about new opportunities and right now, I feel like there are many out there for me. There will be more time for me to plan bike trips, more time for writing, and most importantly, more time to spend with my family. 

While I am really going to miss my Practical Cycle family, I am looking forward to being able to still be a part of the shop in different ways. I've learned so much about bikes and bike shops from these guys, I am so grateful for the experience they've given me this past year. 

I also have some contracted days with the Safe Routes To School program in one of the local school districts and Sacramento Kidical Mass is gearing up to be a regularly scheduled ride each 4th Saturday of the month. 

Finally, bike overnights are coming back into our lives! We're starting up by squeezing one into August so we don't miss another month. This next one is going to be a doozy! Wish us luck! The boys and I head out tomorrow...

I realized today that the Bullitt box is exactly the size of a shopping cart at Trader Joes. Handy to know. Hopefully we're set for the week, now. 

Speaking of hauling, we ran into our friend, Jarrod, yesterday. Check out his newest upgrades: 

Today was Big Brother's first day of Transitional Kindergarten. I can't believe how lucky we got when we found his school. It's a Spanish immersion program charter school that is less than a mile away from our house. The kindergarten lottery kept getting larger and larger, without increasing their enrollment. We found out they were starting a transitional kindergarten for 4-5 year olds and since Big Brother wasn't ready for kindergarten yet, I jumped at the chance. He was automatically accepted into the school and, therefore, is set for the next 9 years (so is Little Brother, too!). I am thrilled. 

In perfect Bustamante fashion, we loaded up our bikes this morning: myself on the BionX, Jose and Little Brother on the Bullitt, and Big Brother on his Fire Bike (a Specialized Hot Rod, 16" bike I got at a garage sale for $10--score!!). 

Before I get into how awesome Big Brother's school is and how much he learned today (in the 3.5 hours he was there), I'm going to rant about kids' bike options. 

You may recall that Big Brother had been rocking the Cupcake Bike previously. That was a 12" Performance bike that we were borrowing from a friend because the Fire Bike was too big for him. It was the perfect bike for him to learn on because it was small enough for him to control. It was awesome to see him move from the Strider to a pedal bike so quickly. Now that he's been growing a bit and getting more comfortable with riding, we wanted to test him out on the Fire Bike. Big Brother was a bit nervous at first because he could only put the tips of his toes on the ground but after a few rides, he was fine with it and very excited to be on his "big boy bike." 

However, now that I've been watching him ride, I'm noticing that this bike doesn't fit him any better. In fact, I think the Cupcake Bike might still be a better fit (even though it's about 15 lbs heavier and smaller). The Fire Bike may have bigger wheels but the frame geometry is ridiculous. The handlebars come up really high so they're either pinned against his chest or they're like ape-hangers. There is no way to adjust the handlebars so that he has secure control of his bike. The other big issue is that the crankarms for his Fire Bike are the exact same as the Cupcake Bike. This means that even though he is on tiptoe when he's stopped, he still can't get a full leg extension when he's riding. His knees are just as cramped as ever. 

Of course, none of this bothers Big Brother. He just cares that his bike is awesome and he's riding it like Mark Cavendish. I know that he's going to grow through bikes like crazy and it's a toss-up between getting something that's functional and not breaking the bank every year or two. I would be happy to invest in a light, easy to control kids' bike that he'll feel comfortable riding. Looking into Isla Bikes just might be the perfect answer. They have a wide array of sizes and some great looking bikes. Even their balance bike has a hand brake! I think I'm in love. 

As per Isla Bikes website:

Definitely something I'm going to be looking into. Look at these faces, how could I not want the best for them? Also, I hear that Isla Bikes also has a trade-up program. These guys know their market--us--serious biking families who can see quality as value! 

After dropping the big guy off at school, I rode to Practical Cycle for work while the remaining boy stayed home with Jose because he had a cough. I was so glad to have had the BionX today as riding home in this hot, muggy weather was no fun. Although, coming home to hear Big Brother recite Oso, Oso, Que Ves Ahi was the best ending to the day. He's been really hesitant about embracing Spanish and after one half-day at school, he's beaming and showing off his new language skills! (BTW, did you know that kids who walk or ride to school perform better?) 

I finally got to spend some real time at the 4th annual Safe Routes To School conference today. I was a bit nervous about leading the Kidical Mass ride with real people in the industry. I always feel like such an impostor. I just ride a bike, I don't make policy changes or anything important. However, finally meeting Shane MacRhodes of Eugene Kidical Mass, helped put me at ease. Having an expert help organize the ride was fantastic. He even brought unique spokecards for everyone! 

I had already ridden my planned route multiple times in the last couple of days and made a few changes here and there. There was heavier traffic than I would normally plan for a Kidical Mass ride but because the conference is at the Sheraton Grand, we didn't have much choice other than Downtown Sacramento. We already had about 30 people signed up for the ride so I knew that we'd be big enough to have a presence on the larger roads which were mostly multi-lane one-way. The areas that didn't have bike lanes still had sharrows and bicycles were pretty common vehicles on these routes. Our riders were almost all adults and the few kids were all riding on their big buddy's bike (in various forms). 

Our route was 13th st. to T st. (which is usually lovely but it was garbage day...), 10th street led us by the Capitol--where the bike lane disappears and is replaced by sharrows. J street was the biggest and busiest road we were on and the bike lane is pretty useless but it was just for a couple of blocks and we were fine. 

We ended up with about 30 riders total, including some locals and a few kidicals. We had a great variety of cargo bikes including my Bullitt, Shane's longtail Bike Friday, Mina's Madsen, Jen's Yuba, a homemade bakfiets, a demo Yuba Lux with Monkey Bars, a couple Boda Bodas, and Grandpa Greg with his grandson on the trail-a-bike (4th grandkid to pedal that ride!). There were also a few "regular" Bike Fridays, a Brompton, and a handful of Practical Cycles's rental fleet that had been donated to the conference this week. 

After a quick informative intro and ride briefing from Shane, we pulled out into traffic. We followed all traffic laws with me as leader and Shane as sweeper. Every so often, I'd hear on the walkie-talkie "hold up ahead" from Shane and we'd pull over where it was safe to allow the rest of the group to catch up. No one gets left behind on a Kidical Mass ride!

It was an easy but thorough 3 miles around downtown. We made one longer stop at the Capitol for a quick photo op and fortune cookie (thanks, Elena!) snack. As we got back to the hotel, some of the riders broke off to the Farmer's Market a few blocks away. The rest of us closed the ride with a visit to POPcycle (I had garden mint chip--amazing! Thanks, dad!). Rachel had pedaled the POPcycle down to peddle her homemade gourmet ice cream pops. Yummy! It was the best way to close out a fun but warm afternoon ride. 

After the ride, I sat in on one of the breakout sessions--Fleets and Geeks--to learn about bike education and bike fleet options. It really helped me get more excited about the breakout session that I get to be a part of tomorrow morning--Family Bicycling: Empowering Tomorrow's Leaders. I'm having a great time absorbing all the expertise from these folks who are very involved in all the planning and implementing of these great programs to get safer streets for all. I am so inspired to bring some of these wonderful ideas into our future Kidical Mass rides. 

I always think that my life will calm down, once whatever it is that's making me crazy ends. Then I realize I've always got something crazy following closely behind. Yesterday, my last exchange students boarded their plane home. I was looking forward to doing nothing but sleeping today since my boys were having a slumber party at 'Nama's, but of course, something came up. I have a few more days of cleaning, organizing, and wrapping up and then I'll be ready to jump into my next event--the Safe Routes to School conference next week. I get to help lead a Kidical Mass ride on Wednesday with Shane from Eugene and am joining in a breakout session on Thursday morning entitled Family Bicycling: Empowering Tomorrow's Leaders. The following week, I go back to Practical Cycle for more days than before. Truthfully, I can't wait to check out what they've done over the last month! I keep seeing all their great posts about new bikes they're carrying and demo-ing--Strider Bikes, Xtracycle conversions and Edgerunners, and the Boda Boda Lux! 

I feel like this is the perfect time for new beginnings and changes for my career and life. Since I've barely (relative to me, of course) been biking this past month, I feel like I have to crawl my way back to my previous riding. It's like starting from scratch. However, when I think of all these fun things I have just around the corner, I am overwhelmed with excitement. I have some great ideas and plans that I might just have the time to get started.  

I feel so American these days--rushed, busy, frantic, lazy, tired. I've been able to ride a few days during the program but I gave up a bit these last few days. We were hosting one of the students for a couple of nights and it's difficult to transport an extra person that you don't know very well. He would have actually like riding bikes, especially since he has been getting really carsick, but it was one extra thing that I just couldn't manage right now. Then, as soon as I dropped him off to his real host family, my phone was overloaded with calls about a sick student in the hospital. More driving needed to get to him quickly and deal with that situation. Then today was a driving day because I needed to run a bunch of errands on opposite sides of town. Tomorrow, I'll finally get to ditch the car for a bit but it's only temporary right now. 

Today, I realized that I'm so normal right now. I "don't have time to ride." It's an excuse I hear every where I go. "I would ride, but..." Then they go off and list a bunch of things: too far to go, not enough time, too much stuff to carry, too tired, too many people depending on me, there could be an emergency, etc. I realized that I'm ticking off every one of those excuses. Because of that realization, I made myself take the Bullitt to pick up the kids from daycare. It was only a 4 mile trip but I decided to extend our time out by bringing dinner with me to the park. Yes, dinner was only yogurt, blueberries, and graham crackers but it was the best I could do today. We all needed it. 

I did end up doing the cardinal sin of biking with children by clicking Little Brother's chin with the helmet buckle. A few too many of those and you risk losing your child's trust completely. 

This little ride gave me the perfect amount of time to slow down and remember the journey. I'm lucky to have a job where this schedule is a very small fraction of my life. I can put up with 2-3 weeks of disruption to my usual biking routines. It's not always about doing it all, sometimes it's just about doing what you can. 

I have to remind myself not to look at all the reasons I can't ride and instead look for all the excuses that I can. 

Today we ran around a ton. We started off at coffee to fuel the day and locked up at the new bike rack they installed at Old Soul 40 acres. Jose and I trucked that bike rack over from our house, about a 1/2 mile away. Since it wouldn't fit on my bike, and almost squished Little Brother in my attempt to get it on the bike, we decided to push it down the sidewalk on two skateboards, with the boys in tow...literally. It was rough. We only managed to totally mess up as we were crossing the busy street in full view of everyone in the coffee shop. Fun. I was so excited to see it up this week and even more excited that it directly benefits our family and caffeine habit. 

Both Big and Little Brothers rode their respective bikes for this ride. At home, Little Brother went down for a nap while Big Brother couldn't sleep so Jose took him out for another ride, about 4 miles round trip, to go play baseball. Mama got a nice little nap in and Little Brother was out like a light. 

Later, we made plans to have dinner at One Speed with my folks and our friends. Big Brother decided, again, to ride there. I took the Bullitt with Little Brother and Jose rode his skateboard. 

Dinner was wonderful but the place was busy and it was too slow for the boys. They melted down. It was quite a mess. We managed to get through dinner (and dessert, yum!) but we were sure that Big Brother wouldn't make the ride home. 

He proved us wrong! Out of nowhere, he found some energy to go another 2.5 miles home. Towards the end, we could tell he was starting to bonk, he couldn't hold his line anymore, but he kept calling himself Mark Cavendish and cranking down on his tiny pedals. This kid is a beast! I count 9 miles of riding for the day! At 4.5, I think that's pretty awesome! Part of the rides were on the street and part on the sidewalk, depending on the location and who was with him. He's starting to understand the rules of the road, obeying stop signs, and looking out for obstacles. I'm really curious to see how he does on a single long ride. We'll have to test it out on the bike trail one day soon. 

Here's a video of our morning ride: The boys battle it out in a ride to the death! Big on the cupcake bike and Little on his Strider. Watch until the end for a nail-biter finish! Enjoy! 

The blog will be a little quiet for the next month as I will be neck-deep in exchange students (although not literally). They arrive on Thursday and I am busy running around trying to get everything in order (or at least as much as it can be). Sadly, I've been driving more than I'd like, but at the same time, this job only requires a moderate amount of driving 1 month out of the year. While it is still 1 month more than I'd like, I can handle it. 

Some funny things happened recently to make this crazy time just that much more crazy: 

• I obviously bragged too much about never getting flats and my ability to change them because in the last week, I've gotten two (I'd only had one since the beginning of the year). One on the Mobic and one on Oscar the bike. Time to upgrade some tubes and add liners to all my tires! 
• I got an infected bug bite on my calf that swelled my gastrocnemius to roadie status. Too bad the antibiotics took it away (although, thankfully, it also took away the pain...). 
• While I was showing my ID to the bank, they noticed that my license had expired two months ago! Guess who got to spend the entire morning at the DMV--yep, me! 
• I also spent a couple days off the bike, perfect timing to heal my leg, while celebrating my cousin's wedding near Santa Cruz. We rented a 7 passenger van, filled every seat, and drove down with my parents and uncle. I suppose if you're going to drive, that's a pretty efficient way to go. 

Now the next four weeks are going to be a blur but I am still hoping to get some riding in each day. The cargo bikes are  really going to help with all the hauling of stuff that I always seem to have to do, whereas previous programs ALWAYS depended on car trips. As you now know, cargo bikes are the "new station wagon," I guess that means we're becoming mainstream! Super exciting! 

It's hot! The first week of unbearable heat is always the hardest. It's when people hide in their air conditioned boxes (whatever they may be) and try not to exert too much energy. Believe me, I want to do the same! However, we don't have a/c at home and no car to duck into and drive to the coast. I had actually forgotten what air conditioning felt like until I popped into a Target yesterday. Then there's the random parking garage with it's obscenely cold air cooling the street around. I hate to admit it but I love it (although I also hate it and believe that maybe it'd be a good thing to stop doing for energy conservation, expenses, and global climate change...). We also like to make detours to ride through sprinklers for a little on-the-go pick-me-up. 

We do leave the house as little as possible on these kinds of days. The air quality is always especially grimy, too. If we don't have to leave, we don't. If we can, we do our errands in the early morning or once the Delta breezes pick up. 

When we do have to leave, it's nice to have the cargo bikes so the boys aren't working, they're just getting the cool air. Biking is never too hot when you're moving, it's when you stop that it becomes suffocating. I try to stop in the shade, finding a tiny patch at stoplights. 

I've been enjoying wearing skirts with shorts under while I pedal. A light top is helpful to minimize the sweating (which tends to pick up about 5 minutes after I stop riding so watch out!). 

Some of my thoughts on riding in summer (and please add your own in the comments below!): 

• Wear summer-appropriate clothes. For me, that's skirts (you men could rock an awesome Utili-kilt!), light tops-usually wicking material or quick drying something. I like shorts under my skirts (there are many great sites dedicated to finding the right skirt and how to wear one on a bike). 
• If you need to bring an extra set of clothes, allow extra time to change so you cool down. Baby wipes or a wet towel can help speed that up. 
• Make sure to cover your exposed skin with sunblock. I like having the kids under the weather-protectors, although I'm still working on putting that together on my bikes. 
• Lots and lots and lots of water. And ice cream. I have about a 4:1 water to ice cream ratio. Our ice cream budget is through the roof. It's worth it. Good thing we're not paying a car payment. 
• Choose when to ride, avoiding the worst of the heat. 
• Remember that driving isn't fun either. It's easy to talk yourself out of riding if you have a car beckoning. Keep in mind that getting into a sizzling car is terrible. What if your a/c cuts out? What if you get stuck in traffic? What if you have to park a mile away and still have to walk to the store? Remember that driving is bad for the Earth and adding extra pollution to an already-highly polluted day is worse (driving in polluted air is just as bad as biking in it). 
• If you do need to drive, do it. I choose the BionX Breezer for hot days when I can. It's great not to work very hard to ride somewhere but it's better than driving around in 2,000 extra pounds, spouting emissions everywhere. It's a great supplemental vehicle for those trips that we would resort to driving to. 
• More ice cream. 
  

Now, what do you have to add to the list? 

What's your cut-off point for biking in Summer?