Spring in February

So, yesterday, the last day of January, I was outside without a jacket. I went to the local big box store and it took everything in me not to go look at gardening stuff. I was there for painting supplies for the dreaded painting project I still need to do. Then I went to the local REI and bought some pedal clips for the BuddyBike that my son and I share. It may have seemed crazy, but I was going to get the bike ready to pick him up from school.

I went home, attached the clips to the front pedals, raised the seat for the ever growing boy, lubed the chain, filled the tires, dusted off the cobwebs from the month of no use and then went to pick up the 6 year old from school. He had the hugest smile on his face when he saw me there with our bike. As a reminder, my youngest son is high functioning autistic. He is fully mainstreamed and doing well in school, but he his a bit delayed in several areas, one being gross motor skills. This whole bike riding thing is something he wants to do, but is a bit fearful to try. A bit over a year ago I found this bike:

 

It was designed for kids with special needs in mind. Instead of a child being pulled behind in a trail a bike, they are part of the main bike. Two adults can ride this bike too, but I'm sure it's much more comfortable with a significantly smaller front rider as it's quite a bit smaller than a traditional tandem bike. Anyway, yesterday, for the first time he put his foot on the pedals and helped me pedal. All other times we have ridden this bike, he put his feet up on the foot rests meant for non-able riders. Seeing he was starting to show more initiative with riding gave me hope that we would be riding much more this spring - like to the pool, the library, and so on. Yay!!!

But it was January folks! I shouldn't be able to ride bikes comfortably in January! And today in February! Huh?

And so, there we are, got a short bike ride in, went to yoga (I'm inching closer to my toes!) and worked a bit on the bike. Today I'm going to ride the bike to school pick up again, clean up the garage a bit (finally getting the bike hanging stuff up on the wall so I can actually organize our bikes better) and then tonight at the gym I'll be doing the double express class of weights and step. My mini spring weather makes me a much more active person too!

Lastly, it's February 1st which is measurement time! Happy to see the fluff of January 1st is gone.

Stats for 2/1/12:

Highest weight: 275  Now: 175.6

Total hours worked out in 2012: 20.5/250

Starting chest: 47" Now: 41" (change since last month: down 0" for a total loss of 6")

Starting Waist: 43" Now: 32" (change since last month: down 1" for a total loss of 11")
Starting Hips: 50" Now: 41" (change since last month: down 1" for a total loss of 9")
Starting Arm: 18" Now: 13" (change since last month: down 1.75" for a total loss of 5")
Starting Thigh: 30" Now: 23"(change since last month: down .5" for a total loss of 7")