Small Favors......................

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Sometimes God grants small favors to mothers of small children. Favors that no one but mothers of small children would need or notice. Maybe it's just his little way of saying, "Thanks for hanging in there and listening to your one-year-old's incessant and constant whining now in its fifth hour without ripping your ears off the side of your head."

Grayson has had shoes on his feet once in his 12 months of life. That single shoe wearing episode lasted about 45 minutes ... long enough to have Pumpkin Patch photos taken. They were the cutest robeez I had ever seen and not the knock offs, either. His Nana and I fell in love with them on our "girl's trip" to Hot Springs during my 8th month of pregnancy. I was all hot and hormonal and just had to have them! Well, the dang things ended up scratching his little foot all to pieces and even caused blisters. Blisters on a 3 month old! I felt so bad....I threw the little suckers in the top of his closet and promised "never again, son".

I lied.


But really, what purpose do shoes serve on a 3 month old anyway? Perhaps to keep the feet warm, but socks, proper clothing and blankets can serve the same role. And none of the three confine little toes. Let them wiggle, I say.

The only problem with this philosophy is that when said little one reaches the walking phase and decides walking needs to be done anywhere other than the floors in your home, shoes are a must. This is where the struggle begins.

Little feet that haven't been shoved into shoes for longer than 45 minutes of the 564,000 minutes they've been kicking don't always take kindly to the idea of pushing the curled little piggies into anything other than a sock (even that's not ideal some days). There's an "adjustment" period involved.

An adjustment period of a couple weeks when you slowly introduce shoe wearing and allow them time to learn to walk wearing something other than a sock. Usually it starts with them dragging one foot against the other trying to get the things off. After they realize those babies are staying on, they then try to take some steps sporting the new look.

Those first few steps appear as if there are cement blocks on each foot. Exaggerated in every aspect of the motion. The first foot slowly pulls up, the foot awkwardly goes down. The other foot goes up and clumsily gets placed down. It takes a bit to get used to this new feel, this new way.

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A couple of weeks ago I attempted to put shoes on Grayson's feet. I took him to Stride Rite and they measured him.

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He has a 5 1/2 XTRA wide foot. I bought two really cute pairs...an every day shoe and a cute sandal-y pair. Expecting the above scenario to play out and to have a little walker ready for the world in a week or two. By his birthday. Not so.

Screaming. From the time the velcro was velcroed until the time I pulled the shoes off he screamed at the top of his lungs. "Okay, it's nap time, we'll try again later when you're in better spirits," I reasoned with myself.

Skip ahead to that evening when dad's at home and decides to take a crack. Shoes go on, screaming starts. Shoes come off, screaming stops. We get it, you don't like the shoes. This kid's graduating and getting married barefoot.

Expecting the same result, we tried again the other day before leaving for church. He's seriously the ONLY child in his class that has bare feet and I just think we've only got a couple more years to get him sold on the idea if he's going to preschool, after all.

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Put one shoe on, quiet. Put the other shoe on, quiet. Stand him up and he walks. Right across the living room, on out into the kitchen, to the front door, he walked. A change of heart? Perhaps. Or maybe it's one of those small favors God grants to mothers of small children.

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