Friday, March 6, 2009

Xtracycle shopping

True confession time: I have no right to be writing this post right now. Between illness and bike problems, it's been far too long since I've done a good shopping trip on a bike. In fact, thanks to the generosity of our friends, I've borrowed a car for several in the past couple of months. Yes, we're going to change the name of this blog from "Car Free with Kids" to "At Least We Aren't Driving a Minivan with Kids." With my shame out of the way, I want to share with you a trip from the glory days of last December.

My usual grocery shopping trip consists of a short bike ride (~2 miles) from our place to Market Basket. These days I buy two weeks worth of groceries at once, but at end of last December I was just doing a large weekly shopping trip. The trip usually takes about two hours all together, unless something tragic happens like I forget that I'm shopping on Superbowl Sunday in which case I may never get home.

On this day in December I pulled up back home in a timely fashion, with the bags loaded. I also filled the kid seats with groceries and use a couple of bungees over the top.

Here's all of our food, in its full glory. This trip cost us $101.02, thanks to Market Basket being the cheapest grocery store around.

7 comments:

David said...

I am SO down with your xtra-deck, or seat-deck, or whatever you want to call it. I'm getting ready to build one for my toodle. Any suggestions?

Dorea said...

David-- We can't claim credit for the great seat construction, but we are responsible for the paint job.

Here
is the scoop on the seat, custom built for us by Rob Hanson. You can contact him via that post. It is a great seat.

Here
is more about our bike setup itself.

To compare notes with other DIY seat builders, consider joining the rootsradicals yahoo group if you haven't already. That's how we found Rob.

David said...

Thanks for the tips. I used to follow rootsradics, but there wasn't much going on there. Sounds like things have changed for the better... btw, it was the paintjob that grabbed me.

Unknown said...

I love the bike! I just wrote a post about our bike bags and all the attention the bring upon us.

Biking to the store is so much fun. Living in CA makes it really easy. We don't have to worry about snow, ice, etc. So don't be too hard on yourself for borrowing a car. :)

Sincerely,
Tammy
http://rowdykittens.com/

CarFree Stupidity said...

That is one overloaded bike, cool setup. Have no shame, everyone slips up every once in awhile when trying to stick to something difficult that takes lots of will power. Do you every just dream of cruising down a country road in a convertible with the air streaming through your hair? Now I'm just teasing you.

Angela V-C said...

Thanks for the great comments. I try not to be too hard on myself, but I always keep thinking I could be tougher! And thanks for the bike complements -- it really is a joy to ride.

And occasionally I do find myself cruising down the road with the wind in my hair -- then I realize "oh shoot! I forgot my helmet!" ;)

Lauren Hefferon. AKA Bici Pazza said...

Hello
I loved your post! I hope to see you out there! I love the HONK parade too

We have lots of mutual friends!

http://www.laurenhefferon.com/

Lauren