Shoe Shopping

Stupid joke of the day: 

Q. What kind of shoes does a chicken wear?

A. Re-bok-bok-bok-bok

My mother-in-law offered to buy the kids some Easter shoes. She had graciously given Madeline a beautiful gown for Easter, complete with a little matching sweater and both Madeline and Aidan were desperately in need of new shoes (to the point that Madeline was complaining that her shoes had grown too small). 

So yesterday, I took the kids to Target to go shoe shopping. We had a few other items to pick up and at each stop Madeline asked, "NOW can we go get shoes?" We took our time, however, in various departments, sometimes stopping only to browse while Madeline got more and more impatient. 

Finally, we arrived at the shoe department. I helped the girls out of the cart so that we could measure their feet. As is often the case when we finally go to buy shoes, Madeline's feet measured a full size bigger than the shoes she currently owns. I apologized that we had waited so long to get her shoes and she immediately went over to brag to Lily: "I'm growing my feet, Lily" before she went up and down each aisle of girl shoes looking for just the right ones. Lily, having gotten excited when she saw Dora the Explorer on a pair of sandals, sat quietly trying to get them on while Madeline proceeded to try on EVERY. LAST. PAIR. OF. SHOES!

"Oh, these kind of hurt," she said, taking off another pair of shoes, which were obviously too big and putting on the next. She followed up with, "Um, I don't think I really like these," as yet another pair came off. "These are pretty but let me try these too in case I don't like those," she went on and on and on....

At this point, Aidan climbed up into the cart, slunk down with his arms crossed and rolled his eyes at me. 

"Yeah, I hear ya, Aidan," I said quietly.  "Madeline, we are not going to try on the entire lot of shoes so please only try on shoes that you really like. How about these?" I suggested, to which I received complete disgust from the eldest and overly-opinionated girl-child. 

At last, we found a pair of shoes that would suffice for both Easter (albeit not as formal as her dress) as well as day to day life. Lily then decided she no longer wanted the Dora sandals that had taken her the entire time to get on and instead wanted the same as Madeline, but in white, not pink. We boxed the two pairs of shoes up and I turned toward Aidan. 

"Do you want to get your shoes now, too?" I asked him, in complete solidarity with the look of exasperation on his face. 

He jumped out of the cart, walked over to the clearance rack, picked up a pair of shoes, put them on and said, "I'll get these." 

And at that moment, heaven tore open, the Spirit of God descended down (more like a chicken than dove) and a voice said, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased!" 

And all God's children (especially those of the mother variety) said: Amen!