When Charles and I visited the Netherlands in 2003, I rented a bike to cycle around Dwingelderveld while Charles attended his workshop. That "sit-up-and-beg" style, typical of Dutch bikes, was so much more comfortable than my bike back in the States. For the next three years I thought about buying a Dutch style bike, and one of my first major purchases when we moved here was my Sparta Stilio.
And of course I was also terribly impressed and enamored with the way Dutch mamas flew around Amsterdam on their moederfietsen (mother bikes). So when I found out I was zwanger (pregnant!), I began dreaming of the day I could ride around Drenthe with my baby between my arms.
Now that Aldus is big enough to sit up on his own, he's also old enough to ride in a kinderstoeltje (children's seat). We took my bike over to the local bike shop a couple weeks ago to try one out. Imagine my disappointment at finding out that my bike was too small. Well, the kinderstoeltje did fit. I just couldn't get on and off the bike anymore. I was terribly disappointed and cranky for the whole day.
But Charles, knowing my disappointment and himself still eager to take bike trips with Aldus and Maui, talked me into going back to the store yesterday. We didn't exactly want to look at new mamafiets; for one of those we would have actually have had to take out a loan or give up our firstborn. But we asked about used bikes, and lo and behold they had a used Batavus mamafiets. And it was comfortable!
They're going to service it this week and order our kinderstoeltje. We'll pick them both up next Saturday and, if the weather's nice (or if it's not -- we are becoming more and more Dutch), we'll go for a spin! Woo hoo!
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