Yet another inconvenient development.

For the entire course of my child's life, I have enjoyed complete control over his wardrobe. I love to shop for him. I love to dress him. Dan seems to sense my obsession with this task and leaves me happily to my own devices. I take great pride (probably a disproportionate amount of pride) in my child looking sort of cool most of the time. He's stylin' dangit!

But my complete reign over all undersized textiles has come to a bitter end.

Payne has discovered the joy of shoe selection. First, it was the Croc obsession, to which I was largely amenable, since Crocs can be "styled" in a cute way. Now, however, he MUST pick out his shoes every day. He has a mental inventory of all of the toddler sized footwear in the house and will insist LOUDLY on a certain pair until they are located and he is satisfactorily shorn.

This KILLS me, because Payne is gifted with the complete open mind of a toddler. There are no preconceived notions of that silly concept of "matching". There is no understanding of how dorky it looks to wear socks with sandals. I've chosen to allow him this little bit of freedom, because I know he is at an age of a growing sense of independence, and I want to allow him to exercise that in a harmless way (instead of, say, running into traffic in a misguided bid at freedom). But as silly as it is, I'm genuinely embarrassed when my kid is dressed in a socially appropriate way from the ankles up, but looks, um, culturally uninhibited in the foot region.

I'm shallow. I'll admit it.

BUT REALLY, look at this!


Yes, he insisted on the socks, and those are indeed "mossy oak" camo Crocs. (heavy sigh)

But how can I deny him when it makes him this happy?



I guess this is a fine example of how raising a child is often more of an exercise in growing as an adult. Heh heh.