Shoes

T is change averse. You get the kid on a schedule, you KEEP the schedule, or Houston, there will be a problem. You figure that out...your life will be easy. I, on the other hand, enjoy a bit of variety and schedules make me nauseous.

Every now and again this causes some issues with the kid and me.

One of the great benefits of being change averse though, is that T is relatively simple minded when it comes to fashion. He likes what he likes and you'd just best not go messing with it or it will quickly become a donation to his younger cousins, who would probably dress in monkey suits, if they knew they came from T.

When T was younger, the transition from winter clothes to spring clothes so tormented him that he would insist on wearing long pants and long sleeves until the middle of summer, because as he said, "Me no like my skin."

Thankfully, we've finally gotten past THAT two year hiccup.

There are some great perks to this little aversion, however, and those perks are namely cheap, easy shopping.

During summer there will be gym shorts and t shirts, PLAIN t shirts. You cut the arms off said t-shirt and boy, you are really pushing the envelope. You will only catch that happening when the other boys are doing it too, like simultaneously, with the SAME shirt.

For winter, there are hoodies, gym pants and a t shirt underneath said hoodie. The hoodies may not zip, or they will be tossed to the pile of sweatshirts that can only be worn when all the others are in the dirty laundry pile and mom refuses to do laundry five minutes before school starts.

Believe you me, there will be NO jeans. No collared shirts. Nothing "scratchy, or chokey."

And god help us all, no trendiness, what.so.ever.

This...I can totally deal with! And to this I will also utter a very loud: AMEN!

There ARE, however, SHOES. Lots, and lots of of them, and boy do they smell.

The kid can literally run through the bottom of a pair of shoes in two weeks. Even when his toes begin hurting and his feet begin sticking out the holes, I have to BEG T to puh-lease just wear the swanky new pair I purchased.

Earlier this year, he refused to wear football shoes for half the season because he just knew the others with no tread on the bottom whatsoever were faster. I promised him he'd fall on his butt in the wet grass and he said, "I don't care, let me fall on my butt in the grass."

And that is precisely what he did. And the next day we went and got him some new football shoes (because he FINALLY decided he wanted/needed/HAD to have them) ten minutes before practice, which we could then not get OFF his smelly feet for the remainder of the season.

This here is a picture of just a few of T's shoes from the past three months. There is another pair that is missing (because they were on his feet), and another pair that were at my parent's, and the other half of one of these pairs was in the dog's mouth...and then there are TWO more NEW pairs (one at my house and one at my parent's...) because you never know when the golden moment will arrive and T will decide, indeed, he's ready to take a wack at breaking in these new shoes.

(There are also, of course, the football shoes I mentioned above, and the baseball shoes that we can never seem to find at 5:14 p.m. when he's to be on the other side of town at 5:20 p.m.)

New shoe day?

It will be today.

Yesterday, I threw all these away.

My nostrils and my entry love me for it.