Oregon Museum of Science and Industry

 

Games and movement coalesce and captivate in just the first few feet of OMSI. The "Team Zane " Crew were no exception to the spectacle. Our crew and their protective security detail made a movie about the young stars while they thought and laughed.

Most asked for a longer bike ride.

Little did they know, a long ride was certainly the plan, but just not today. 

First we had to train their team mates, captains, elders, and  mothers. All one in the same person, of course. That pack of racers and chaperones was leaving as soon as the children's bikes were locked up.

The route, pacelines, and the pain. It all needed to be learned by the parents first, at least on this team, that's the rule.

 

Grace and New Seasons

PIZZA

Anticipation for the bicycle ride from Seven Corners to OMSI, varied across the team.

Some dreaded the cold and the rain, while others awoke at the break of day, wide eyed and ready to go.

  

Standing alert at front the door was the smiling store assistant manager Aime, "Hello, welcome to New Seasons," she said to the children as the approached.

"Come this way," she said and waived as she turned.

As the children approached the back corner of the store, lo and behold a dining room was waiting for them. And it was filled with

pizza. All sorts of pizza! 

Thanks to the well healed gift card loaded by New Seasons Community Impact Manager, Karen.

"We are happy to support your ride!" she said.

What a spot it was for an inner city cycling team to meet up and roll out. Carefully positioning their bikes out of the way, the children were a spectacle drawing smiles from grocery shoppers making Saturday buys.

Everyone was so kind. 

Aimee was everywhere at just the right time. Always helpful, even the pizza chefs were sweet and kind. - urging the children to have any flavor of pizza they might want. 

What a perfect start for a Saturday ride to Oregon Museum of Science and Industry.

Rispa's Difference

Helping saves hearts and minds.

Casual effort at the fingertips of the talented scholar catalyzes growth in the gentle mind, body and spirit of the junior.  

Our junior hungry and worried about signals of academic, and emotional starvation at the early mileposts of grade school accomplishment, sees the scholar appear on the horizon, and is relieved.

Her protection preservation begins behind the scenes and blossoms forward to appear at a meal, then in your front driveway.

Ordering tickets, making reservations, calling for everyone to line up. She reminds us "we are late," so we pick up the speed.

When the chess champion is mentioned, she claps emphatically.

The plan is solidified with her editing eye.The proposal is submitted with  her administrative perfection.

Every Tuesday and Thursday afternoon Rispa arrives at the Ford house to take Elante to SYLVAN Reading Academy.

Before they go in to the after-school program, she buys Elante a savory cheesy croissant, and a healthy fruit smoothy.

Rispa's work as development director often morphs into soccer coach, and school teacher at the helm on a field trip.

Her pen is the mightiest tool she wilds seeking scraps of funding for the trips her students enjoy.

Bicycles Trips give a moment of American entitlement to every kid. Cycling is the vehicle with which to sprint after all sorts of goals. If literacy is your destination, then "good racing."

b.i.k.e. uses the city to strengthen resiliency and bridge all gaps. With tools like Portland Art Museum, Oregon Museum of Science & Industry, Portland Parks Department, and Multnomah Public Library, discovery and excitement simply ensue.

Contact us at: kidsofbike.org

Hats off to Knott Street Boxing Gym, New Seasons Market, and River City Bicycles.

Investing in Champions

Stretch to feel the Joy

Seeing the good in one 

another, 

and then helping them reach for glory 

is one of life's great endeavors.

.

    When investing time, and talent, quality grows. Money pays for the class, but talent brings the quality. 

Sarah Joy swims so much that she knows just what moves to make before getting into the water. 

Fire up
!

Sarah Joy knows a 3 millimeter swim suit is ideal for her pals standing in waste-deep luke warm water listening to their instructor's instructions for a half hour on a cold January morning. 

So Sarah Joy made sure Mikiah and Elante had those clothes in a black ARENA swim bag on day one.

They both have swim goggles, and Mikiah even has a swimmer's hoodie, because Mikiah likes hoodies.

Nurturing Growth

Bicycles and Ideas for Kids' Empowerment 

as an organization, keep an eye out for the 

athletes missing from the sport of cycling, then

recruits them to a team, then supports their trajectory toward college, and Championship.

Whether a racer needs a rain coat, clip-in pedals, a faster bicycle, 

or help learning to read, b.i.k.e. provide's support.

In every case b.i.k.e. also serves food, every time.

We try to dress beginners up, sharp! Thanks to gifts from the local bicycle racing community, the kids of b.i.k.e. wear long sleave skin suits and wear haute couture leg warmers just TO PRACTICE!

Process provides a lifestyle of benevolence, good form, simplicity and team. Fun and hard work go hand in hand when the goal is leg speed and power.

Giving a young athlete what they need might be about more than food, it might be about reading, or running, or connections to the city. At Bicycles and Ideas for Kids' Empowerment, we strive to help families thrive.

"Poor kids, through no fault of their own, are less prepared by their families, their schools, and their communities to develop their God-given talents as fully as rich kids".

                                                                      

   Robert Putnam Our Kids:The American Dream in Crisis

Art in the 503

Portland Art Museum, was a smash hit! 

Not the pedestrian incident kind. Everyone made it safe.

We ate Vietnamese, cruised the PSU campus, and were well received by a full compliment of Portland Art Museum staff. Our Portland Art Museum Docent, Gail stood at the front door looking through the huge glass wall. Shaking with vibrant joy when she saw us.

We are called Bicycles and Ideas for Kids' Empowerment. Everyone from Catering, to Security, knew it was us as we approached.

chess champion imitates art

What does perfect programming look like? 

Seeing the rain wait while cycling youth and their parents depart down hill at the top of Campus, only to arrive to many, many welcoming eyes and hands at the glass front facade of the new Portland Art Museum,  that's pretty good.

After a Vietnamese supper at PHO 503, the ride down through Portland State University on the Park Blocks was thrilling. Rush hour car traffic boiled all around us, but we glided among the elms, perpendicular to the gridlock.

Short waits at cross walks already populated with radical college students, were easy for big eyed little girls on training wheels.

Fast rolling older boys led by CYCLISME cycling veteran junior girl and superior rider,  Mikiah Richey,  led a strict game of follow the leader down the hill.  

On a whole other level, was recent college grad and new b.i.k.e. Development Officer, Rispa Vranka Wafula who ran ahead on foot, protecting, and directing, she was always ready to block children back from falling into the traffic.

Mikiah however, never let anyone get even close. She circled every work of art in the South Park Blocks, sweeping her transfixed followers back up the hill again and again before they rolled near the street.

Meanwhile, a big man in a wheelchair and three parent's on bikes, with two more parents on foot chased and sometimes blocked, Clay and Jefferson Streets in a natural way.

Eating out together, building our team dream together, then rolling out to our beautiful destination, where we were warmly received, 

had us shifting focus from challenges to opportunities. We practiced authenticity, transparency, and empathy, and adopted personalized approaches on the fly.

Please help b.i.k.e. continue to offer this 

"Museum Strategy" visiting more museums around Oregon and Washington,

as a way of building up our resiliency with developmental assets (see here), and bridging the growing opportunity gap (please see here) in modern America this Giving Season , 

by 

DONATING 

to our 501c3 

BICYCLES and IDEAS for KID'S EMPOWERMENT 

Elante loves his new skull cap
given to him
by RCB

(please see here)

Train in the rain.

" Up hill is
Standing Practice.

Downhill is Legspeed Camp."

Such were the words blaring from the radio.

On the road, the cyclists rode in two columns around the fairly flat neighborhoods of Cully and Concordia, but as they trained, in the cold torrential rain, it seemed the land had increasingly more hill to it. Inclines began to require standing, or shifting down. The downhill invited everyone to spin!

Eventually, the team pulled off into THE PARK (see here) to ride at an individual self regulated speed for a while. Then moms got a chance to ride at an adult even tempo for a bit. Practicing the draft.

Soon it was time to form up and roll out onto the street again.

Once out there on the streets of Cully again, the intensity increased. Usually Elante and Cynthia set tempo at the front when the team was traveling in two columns, but others like Matrim and Mattie would come to lead the team through fast downhill lefts or right hand turns.

In the rain, this long sustained focus and tempo demanded it's due price from these intrepid athletes. In the end, they groaned with fatigue, but sprinted full speed down the last straight.