This is part two of our story. If you missed how it all started, read that first here.

So, I want to be totally honest up front. I was NEVER interested in electric scooters before 2025. In fact, I didn’t even know they were popular until the beginning of the year. I’ve seen all the neighborhood kids riding around on them, annoying people like crazy. I just didn’t think they were a good idea. Then, I took an online training course that assigned me electric scooters as my assignment for creating an affiliate website. The course provides you with information and you basically learn how to implement the affiliate part. The articles that were created for me were drab and honestly, confusing. They didn’t teach me anything about electric scooters or how to use the topic for affiliate marketing. So, I let that website go.

Then, in July, my youngest son came into my room and announced (rather loudly), “Parental units! I have decided what I want for Christmas. I want an electric scooter!” Yes, that was in JULY. When I asked him if he thought it was a little early to be thinking about Christmas, he scoffed and said “Mom, I start thinking about Christmas the day after Christmas. How else can I keep up with all the cool things out there?”

Well, like any good parents, we ignored him. In fact, I PURPOSELY blocked out what he had said because I had no interest in electric scooters. However, as it inched closer to Halloween, he made sure to remind us that he wanted an electric scooter. In fact, he brought in his mobile device and showed us different scooters that he was interested in getting! Yes, he was doing his own research! Well, sort of.

Months of Research

I can honestly say that once he repeated that he wanted an electric scooter, I started to take him seriously. My kids have a way of getting what they want… not from ME. But my husband also loves toys, so they kind of take advantage of that. “Dad, it’s super cool! We can go out together!” Plus, the added bonus of them wanting to go outside for something. Yes! Get off of the electronics and go play outside! Right? Well, that depends on the parent, I guess. Personally, I would put them in bubbles if I could. Apparently, that’s embarrassing.

So, I started researching all kinds of things. I cannot tell you how many people told me “Don’t worry” about safety equipment. “We didn’t grow up with it and we turned out fine.” I honestly don’t know if that statement could be further from the truth! I have known plenty of people growing up that didn’t use safety equipment and ended up…. not fine. So, I researched types of helmets, elbow pads, knee pads, etc. If you can think of it, I researched it. I mean… this is my BABY. (I might be referred to as a helicopter Mom a bit as a FYI.)

My husband was in charge of finding a great electric scooter. One that was reliable and not too dangerous. Something that he might be willing to try out with our son. We’ll talk about the scooter itself later, but I think he picked out a decent one.

We did everything we could think of as far as researching and getting as much information as possible. We spent a LOT of money on him. I have a rule in the house that we spend evenly on our kids for birthdays and Christmas. However, when it comes to safety, more money is allowed to be spent and not counted as “gift” money if the parents are requiring it. My absolute number one requirement for riding an electric scooter is a helmet. Other padding items are good, too, but the helmet was non-negotiable.

The First Time on the Electric Scooter

Of course, the first time on the electric scooter for my son was on Christmas. December 25, 2025, my son begged to be able to go out and ride the scooter. The entire family went out and participated. We had cousins, a couple Aunts and Uncles, Grandma and Grandpa, etc. It was probably a little nerve-racking for him. He had never actually been on one before, so he was having to learn.

I honestly cannot remember what helmet he had on his head at the time because I think we were not totally prepared for him being able to ride. We had taken the scooter over to his uncle’s house because all of the kids were opening gifts there. We totally forgot about the safety gear because of the chaos! It was, after all, Christmas Day. In our area, it’s a 50/50 chance of snow. On how early it got cold, we all expected there to be some kind of precipitation by Christmas. It snowed… for about 5 minutes! So, it was hard to say no. Somebody had a helmet that he could borrow to try it out.

I should pause here and say that my kids are not really sports types of kids. They don’t run much unless they are chasing each other for some reason. We live in a very cramped neighborhood, so going outside is not the safest with the neighbors racing around on motorcycles and cars that whip around the corner. We do not have a large yard, so their exercise is limited at home. They also do not exactly push exercise at the local schools, either. So, I knew what was going to happen when my son finally got to try the electric scooter for the first time.

He was going to tire out quite fast! You have to move with the electric scooter to get started on it and those muscles are specific types of muscles. It might not seem like a lot of exercise using an electric scooter, but it can actually be good exercise depending on the type you get. So, after a little while of him trying and the cousins trying, we gave up for a bit. The best part was that my son got some pointers on how to use it, some safety tips, and what I thought was some reinforced good safety behavior.

We Did Everything Right!

I said this one before… but we really thought we had done everything right. I told horror stories of things like crazy to try to scare my son into using his protective gear. My son is a very respectful person, so if you give him the information to do the right thing, he usually does the right thing. However, what I forget about is the ability for peer-pressure to prevail.

Maybe 2 weeks after Christmas, a friend of my son’s decided he wanted to use the electric scooter. However, he said he didn’t have to wear his helmet. His mom didn’t care if he didn’t want to wear it, either. My son decided to let the friend use the electric scooter anyway. Seeing this friend ride around the block a few times and nothing bad happen, my son decided that he didn’t need to wear his helmet, either.

Luckily, nothing happened to him that day. I saw him ride up without the helmet and I just about lost it. Yes, I was the bad mom who yelled at their son for disobeying a rule. It scared me. I’m not going to lie. The thought of my son dying because he thinks he knows better terrifies me. I think many parents would be the same way. My son’s friend and the other Mom may not fear the consequences of not using a helmet, but I could not imagine a life without my children. They are my entire world, so I screamed at him. Then, I threatened him. If I EVER caught him not using a helmet, I would take that electric scooter he was so proud of and either throw it away, donate it, or at minimum I would sell it. He said I couldn’t do that because it was his gift for Christmas, so he owned it and could do what he wanted…..

I think a better parent than me would have come up with a better response, but I was so upset that my normally wonderfully behaved child was acting like that… it kind of slipped out. “As long as you live under my roof, you will follow my rules or there will be consequences!” Yes… it happened to me. Everyone’s second worst nightmare. I turned into my parents.

So, I might not have done everything in the best way, but I felt like we had done everything right at this point. My son had apologized to me for not listening to me and I can tell you he never got on that electric scooter again without wearing a helmet… which ended up being the most important thing in our entire lives. I thought everything was going great and all lessons had been learned…. but then… we realized that the electric scooter had so many more lessons to teach us. We were about to learn them in the worst possible way.