Shoes can't just look good, they have to fit good, too.

I've decided that Emma is half girly-girl, half tom-boy. She likes to wear lip gloss and put on high heel shoes and then go jump in the mud (not that I've ever let the mud thing happen). One of the constants around here is that Emma can be found wearing other people's shoes. I've given her an old pair of black patent leather high heels (2 inches) and she loves to wear them around the house. It's most noticeable when she ventures into the kitchen where the flooring is no longer carpet and you can no longer hear anything except the clanking of her shoes on the hard floor. I hate it when she does that. And she refuses to take the shoes off before entering the kitchen. We've had that conversation too many times.

So yesterday I went into our local Dollar General store looking for something very specific. I didn't find it, but in the pursuit of a possible good deal, I decided to roam a few aisles. Emma roamed, too, and found the toy aisle. This time of year, the toy aisle has ballooned to about 3 aisles. She was in heaven.

Because I am the best mom in the world (and you can ask my kids -- I make them call me that), I gave in and bought Emma a prize -- a little token of my love -- a pair of kid-sized dress-up shoes, complete with frilly bows and everything. She had her regular shoes off the second we got into the van. I opened the pretty box and Emma embraced her new footwear like they were the answer to her prayers. She wore them all evening, tried to wear them to her brother's Boy Scout court of honor (I wouldn't let her), and laughed about wearing them to bed. Needless to say, I was feeling pretty good about the $1 shoes from Dollar General.

This morning she woke up, slipped on her new shoes and met me in my bedroom. I knew it was going to be another day of her wearing her beloved new shoes. Sometime later in the day, I was sitting at the kitchen table and she came in the kitchen, went over to the trash can and declared, "I threw my shoes in the trash."
"What?"
"I threw my shoes in the trash."
"Your new shoes I just bought you?"
"Ya, they were hurting my feet."

And that was it. She was done with them. No amount of "they are hurting your feet because you wear them too much" was going to convince her to retrieve them out of the trash. So they are gone. I'm really glad this happened now, though. It gives me a pretty good insight into Emma's fickle nature. I'm definitely going to remember this experience when I go Christmas shopping for her.