IT is the blink of an eye since they weren’t big enough for their own bikes. When we went to Center Parcs for holidays when they were little, they had to have seats on the back of our bikes, or ride around like royalty in those little carriages specially designed for franticallypedalling dads to pull behind them along hilly roads through the forest.

Oh, how things have changed.

This time, when we went to Center Parcs on the edge of the Lake District, the man at the bike-hire depot had the audacity to ask us to line up in height order. This was a new request – it had never been necessary before.

“Smallest first, tallest last,” he ordered, as if we were new recruits in the Army.

To her clear annoyance, my wife is now the smallest in the family and was in a right huff by the time she was allocated her bike. It wasn’t a child’s bike but it’s only a question of time and a bit more shrinkage before that becomes necessary.

Our 21-year-old daughter, Hannah, came next in the queue, a few centimetres shorter than our 16-yearold, Max.

And then, disappointingly, shockingly, it was me. I am no longer the tallest in the family – not by a long way. Jack, 19, outpoints me and Christopher, 23, – alias The Big Friendly Giant – positively towers over me.

The bike-hire man nonchalantly declared that I’d need a different model to my two taller sons. And so it became official: I am now in a different bike category to two of the offspring I heroically pulled behind me, up steep inclines, when they were toddlers. Predictably, both of them thought this turn of events was very amusing.

“How funny is that?” sniggered Jack. “Dad needs a shorter person’s bike.”

“I know – brilliant,” replied Christopher, wearing the smug smirk of someone who is 6ft 3in.

Throughout the holiday, I couldn’t help feeling they were rubbing my nose in it, using their height advantage and bigger bikes to surge past me on forest tracks. I couldn’t help wondering if the time would come when I’d be an old man, huddled up in one of those little carriages, having to be towed along by one of my tall sons.

Anyway, towards the end of the holiday, my wife and daughter went off for a day in the spa and us boys decided to go for a game of badminton.

On the way back on our bikes, I was struggling to keep pace with them and the Big Friendly Giant looked back to see where “Shorty” was.

As he did so, his front wheel hit a log at the side of the road and I watched him fly over the handlebars.

It seemed to happen in slowmotion as he crash-landed on his shoulder and bounced off the Tarmac.

He was lucky: nothing broken but some nasty grazes, a horrible, purple bruise and a pricked ego.

The thing is, you see, the bigger you are, the harder you fall.

The things they say

AT Ravensworth Women’s Institute, Audrey Myers remembered the time she was teaching at a school in Doncaster and a little boy called Peter burst into tears at lunchtime.

“What’s the matter, Peter?” he was asked.

“My Mam told me I was on free dinners and I’ve only had one,” he sobbed.

HELEN Kirby told of the time her grand-daughter Katie was eight and dreaming of getting an opentopped car when she grew up.

“Oh, will you take Nanna cruising?” asked Helen.

“Don’t be silly,” replied Katie.

“You’ll be dead.”

VAL Coe recalled a distant Monday morning when she was taking sevenyear- old son James to school.

There was a DJ on the car radio, complaining about having had a boring day out with his girlfriend, window shopping, the day before.

James piped up: “No wonder he was bored – who’s gonna be selling windows on a Sunday?”