Monday, February 27, 2012

Donut Pajama Birthday Ride!

The thing about house guests is that you want to be able to go places together.  As we'd prefer to go by bike, it is most fun if our house guests can bike too.  This is easy enough for average-sized adults: we have spare bikes, locks, and helmets that they can use.  But for the very tall or very small, things get a bit more tricky.

We had house guests with 8-month-old twins last week.  They were on a longer multi-modal trip, including Amtrak from their home in Mountain View to Seattle and then back down to Portland and a lot of public transport-- they didn't even bring car seats along, which I think was a pretty bold move. We borrowed a Winther Wallaroo from Splendid Cycles, and they came out for Kidical Mass one day, then for my birthday pajama-donut group ride the next. It was exciting to get to share bikey Portland life with them.

We also had to borrow a tall-seatpost Bike Friday for the other adult in the couple, as they are both WAY taller than we are.  Fortunately, our downstairs neighbor could help us out.

IMG_4353, originally uploaded by airship_flyer.

IMG_4292, originally uploaded by airship_flyer.


IMG_4281, originally uploaded by airship_flyer.


IMG_4277, originally uploaded by airship_flyer.

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Thanks to the always-charming Kip Pettigrew for child-wrangling, pajama-rocking, and these lovely photos.

6 comments:

Stacy said...

Happy birthday. I wanted to let you know that from over here (WV) you are admired greatly. Found your blog somewhere (who knows now) and subscribed in the fall. This is the first post since then and I am glad you are still writing!

I listened to you on Sprocket Podcast (not knowing it was you until you mentioned the green Yuba and wood boxes-they are your icon).

Great work, wonderfully resourceful, inspiring blog, and lifestyle. Thank you.

inkandpen said...

Thank you, Stacy! Your comment brightened my whole rainy day.

kyouell said...

I'm totally stealing the idea to ride for donuts in pajamas on my birthday. Since mine is in October (brrr) I may do it on my half-birthday in April... or my son's birthday in June... or both!

sara said...

YAY! What a fun weekend and how great your friends were such sports. Love seeing twinney bike set-ups being a twin mama myself.

Just spotted your CHAIN GUARD on your Yuba. Please share details. Desperately need one on ours.

melanthius said...

Sara- The chainguard is a Velo Orange but a design they no longer sell. A very similar one is here: http://store.velo-orange.com/index.php/accessories/chainguards-stay-protectors-kickstands/vo-alloy-chainguard.html and is much easier to mount that the one on the Yuba. The newer one is mounted on Katie's mixte so I can vouch for it. It works great. Note: it can't be used with a front derailleur.

The Yuba only runs a middle ring on the crankset and the outer ring has been replaced by a bash guard. That makes the chain practically fully-enclosed from the perspective of keeping your pants clean.

-Dave

sara said...

Dave--

Many thanks for following up about the chain guard. Much appreciated!