Maria finally got on her bike by herself tonight!  Yes, sounds strange but that’s life for ya.  She is right in between bike sizes and we went with the bigger size for her.  Therefore, she has trouble getting on the bike by herself and stopping the bike herself.  When she stops, she used to have to fall into the grass or onto the sidewalk because she could not reach her feet to the ground.  She has recently gotten tall enough to lean to the side and place her foot to the ground.  It is much easier to the eye to see her do that versus falling to the ground with her bike on top of her.  Two nights ago, she stood by her bike on the driveway, raised one leg over, and jumped on her bike as it rolled down the hill – she got on the bike all by herself!  I was so pumped up! Maria was even more excited asking me to watch her over and over until I yelled “My baby is getting on a bike by herself!” at which time she promptly told me to hush because I was embarrassing her. 

Mario, not to be one-upped by his sister, got out the scooter and tried to ride around on it to impress me.  After I congratulated Maria again for working hard on her bike, Mario looked up at me with sad little eyes and said “Mom, why aren’t you being nice to me?”  I tried to explain to him that Maria was accomplishing something at the moment and he would have a time when he was accomplishing something big, and I would congratulate him.  It fell on deaf ears.  He held his hands up to cover his ears and ran away.  When I went inside to talk to him, he ran to his bedroom.  He only came out after I tempted him with baseball. 

I pitched the ball to him and he whacked the ball all over the yard.  I kept congratulating him for his stellar performance.  After a few more hits, he looked at me and said “Maybe we should let Maria try to hit.”

Maria swung and missed.  Again.  Mario looked at her and said “Too bad, Maria. When you get better, you will get congratulations.”

That little sh–.  He was setting it all up and I did not even see it coming.  He has always got to one-up.  Maria is luckily unfazed by his behavior, but I am going to break him of this nasty little habit eventually (although I am sure there will have to be some congratulations involved).