Grandma's Trike

Danielle riding her grandmother's tricycle. Copyright 2015 David and Mercedes Rizzo. All rights reserved.

Today was a beautiful sunny day, perfect to ride Grandma’s trike. Danielle’s grandmother used to ride an adult-sized tricycle for exercise. Before she passed away, she gave it to Danielle. Danielle can ride a two-wheel bicycle but we feel more comfortable with her riding the trike for safety reasons due to her autism.

Girls just want to have fun!

Sometimes children with autism need to attend therapy to improve their gross and fine motor skills. Danielle has pretty good gross motor skills, and she loves to exercise. So whenever the weather cooperates, there’s a good chance you’ll find Danielle outside. This was the case today.

Danielle likes it when we ride with her to the school not far from our home. It has a great parking lot with plenty of room to ride all around without cars getting in the way of her fun. She can ride as fast or as slow as she wants, and is never out of our line of sight for any length of time as one of us is always looping around or turning in her direction.

An opportunity to remember Grandma

Grandma’s trike is one way Danielle can stay connected to her grandmother and remember her. Unfortunately, Danielle’s grandparents have all passed away. The loss of a loved one is very hard for children to understand, especially children with special needs. So if an opportunity presents itself to remember a deceased loved one fondly we always take advantage of it. We remind Danielle that her Grandma loved her and gave her this tricycle as a special gift. We tell stories about the fun times they had. Spending time like this with Danielle can become an opportunity for her to experience God’s love in her family and in her cherished relationships.

Today was a beautiful sunny day.

Copyright 2015 David and Mercedes Rizzo
Photo copyright 2015 David and Mercedes Rizzo. All rights reserved.