Yes, this is Maggie on her new bikeacycle she got from Santa. It's a special "pre bike" that's all the rage nowadays. The theory is, kids learn how to balance on two wheels -- the hard part -- before they are distracted by pedaling -- a pretty easy task. So tykes who get these pedal-less bikeacycles start by walking over the frame like Mags is doing. Then they sit on the seat and use their feet to scoot. Then they sit on the sit, push off, and coast for a little. And low and behold, they've learn how to keep the bike upright with their feet off the ground, aka balance on a bicycle. So Maggie is in stage 1, but she's loving it and didn't have to be told what to do the first time she was given free reign (that is, we weren't in the living room). She walked astride that bike for at least a half hour the first time we were out. We went somewhere flat so it wouldn't be too hard going up hills or scary going down, and she just went to town, even trying sometimes the sit and scoot. She asks for her bike-a-cycle all the time; thank goodness we haven't been snowed in yet!
In other news, potty training is clipping right along. We're not going overboard with anything. I haven't set the timer for every 30 minutes to make her sit in the bathroom or anything. It's pretty much, if we're at home and interruptible a while after a meal, I ask her if she wants to try to pee. Much of the time she says yes; almost always she says yes if I shake the MandMs container. She has a couple of times before nap and bedtime told us she wants to pee on the toilet, which has been awesome; otherwise she lets me take the lead. We did have a breakthrough today when she let me whisk her up and run to the bathroom when she excused herself to poop (when she suddenly stops whatever she's doing to run to a room alone or yells at me to leave her alone, I know to get a clean diaper ready). I promised her special chocolate if she pooped on the toilet, and woo hoo! One less dirty diaper I had to change in my life. She was very proud and really liked the mint chocolate 3 musketeers. We'll see if we can have a repeat performance or two or three in the next week. Last box of diapers, here I come!