Biker Chick

The Des Moines Bike Collective is Changing Greater Des Moines 2 wheels at a time!
Their Website

That's their motto. It's a non-profit, made up of a bunch of great people who care about bikes and the earth. When I heard about the place, I knew that would be a good option to get Chiya, my Little Sis, a bike, as biking is an activity we'd like to do together. Our new home is right on a bike trail - and there are many miles of trails all around Des Moines.

The first time I looked it up on the Net, the Bike Collective Store was in downtown DSM. Then my co-worker Scott told me they were moving to the East Village near my office. Yay. A couple weeks ago I walked down during lunch and checked the place out - it was still in progress. But the guy behind the counter gave me some good news. If I could get a letter from the Big Sis program people, Chiya could get a bike at no charge!

I spoke to Chiya's grandma Valerie first, before talking to her about a bike. I wanted to make sure Valerie was okay with Chiya having one. She was good with it! So C and I talked about it the weekend before, when we went out for pizza. She seemed enthused about the idea.

Chiya was at a "sleepover" Friday night, so I didn't pick her until 1 p.m. Saturday - when she told me she hadn't gone to sleep until 6 a.m. I'd forgotten about those. We called them slumber parties in my day. The key themes - little sleep, and the first to sleep gets "pranked". Chiya said they threw hot dog chunks on the unlucky gal. We did mean things like put toothpaste on them. Some things don't change...

Despite the party, Chiya seemed pretty alert when we got to the Bike Collective. It was a busy place too - we weren't the only ones with the bike idea, even though it was chilly out. A nice guy helped us pick out a refurbished bike and directed us to a parking lot so C could test ride it. I thought she should check out at least one more bike, but the first one was her fave. Then, because we had the magic letter from Big Sis, they presented Chiya with a helmet, bike chain, head/tail lights and a trail map - all at no charge. What a nice thing for this organization to do for kids!

She was pretty excited, but is hiding it well. The two gentlemen in the background helped us - nice guys!

  To celebrate, we decided to go to Zombie Burger down the street for a shake. First we loaded the bike and other stuff in my car. I had a Smores shake and C had chocolate cake.

She doesn't look too worried that the zombie is going to get her

We were lucky Chiya's grandaddy was in the yard when we got back to her house - he helped us unload the bike. Chiya wanted to know when we were going to go ride our bikes. Guess Paul needs to get that bike rack put on his car! I'm looking forward to hitting the trails soon with her.

Sunday, unfortunately, I must have opened up that crack in my tooth again because hot food gave me a "zing!" I first did it last summer before we went to Cannon Beach and Dr. Dave Buck fixed me up before we left for our vaca. I should have known that he told me to chew on the other side for a reason. I searched our church bulletin for dentists and called one first thing this a.m. I fear there is a root canal and a crown in store for me...

Scenes from lunch today - taken with my new phone camera.


Buffalo fountain on the west steps of the State Capitol

West side of State Capitol