To have bought this child school shoes?

No one who can afford shoes lets a small child go about with wet feet. The mother might be embarrassed, but she’s not in a huff about shoe shopping. The OP has said they live in a grotty one bed with small kids - they are skint.

If the OP lacked empathy she’d have hardly bought the kid shoes would she? She did a kind thing, and she handled a tricky situation reasonably well. In the end a child with wet feet has to be prioritised over an embarrassed mum.

toe curling

You sound less likeable with every post

Clearly choosing shoes isn't a big deal or she wouldn't let her daughter go round in falling apart shoes. Anyway she can still buy her daughter more shoes if she wants.

This is a close friend not a random person. And the family are very poor.

It's a bit odd that you didn't just phone her mum and explain her feet were wet and confirm that you could take her now for new shoes if she wanted you to.

Your post also talks about YOUR joy at buying her shoes which shouldn't even come into it at all.

Practicalities first, you're not her parent and should have discussed with one of her parents first.

They could easily have had new shoes at home that Sophie refused to wear, unless she got the ones SHE wanted which you then went and bought for her.

Lots of innocent situations here as to why a child is wearing broken shoes. But you had assumed parental neglect or irresponsibility and took it on yourself to correct.

Just because someone's open and honest about their financial situation doesn't mean they wouldn't be embarrassed by something like this

You weren't wrong to buy the shoes but empathy goes a long way. I would have pretended they where a spare pare of my dcs. Just because you aren't embarrassed doesn't mean others aren't.

Don’t overthink it.

She will be grateful but perhaps a bit embarrassed - so don’t pick at that scab by texting or in anyway continuing the conversation - it isn’t kind.

The only thing you could have done better is not taking the extra gift to her birthday, you’d already bought the shoes so it was OTT.

You did a good thing, now leave it be.

Rigging a prize draw is illegal. Definitely don't do that.

The best way to help people is anonymously or in a way that respects them.

Mail them £100 cash.

Rig a prize draw (pta etc).

Make donations via school and help ensure there are pots of support available there

Fundraise for a trip or opportunity to be funded for all kids.

Encourage community swap events for things like uniform/kids clothes/toys

Give vouchers/cash as birthday gifts.

Buy a service from them - ask them to babysit & pay, if they bake a nice cake ask if you could buy one for a birthday etc. Offer flexible work like ironing or cleaning.

southwing you seem to be a very kind person, pls do not stop helping ppl based on the miserable bunch of posters here. Most ppl are responsive to a helping hand. When my dc were little, I’d have been most grateful to someone doing this for one of my little ones.

Really weird responses on this thread. Surely their first concern should be their child.

To be honest if their child's shoes have fallen apart and she has cold wet feet and they prefer to leave their child like that than accept a kind gift from a friend, they are putting their own pride before their child's welfare.

I mean obviously it's up to a parent to sort their kids shoes but they have failed to do so for whatever reason be it time or money. Next time maybe they will ensure their daughter has decent shoes, if they are really that embarrassed.

If someone did this for me I'd be really grateful. I imagine I'd have to be pretty desperate to send my child to school in broken shoes - certainly not able to afford a new pair, otherwise I'd have bought them already

Echo @Upinthenightagain some wains just love the old ones! OP, it's not about you and from your posts here you don't seem interested in trying to understand it from the other mum's perspective, hopefully in a few days...

@southwing

Some mad posts on here.

it might have embarassed her a bit, but she'll get over it. Sophie will have the school shoes she needed and dry feet 😊

she'll appreciate not having to replace Sophie's school shoes.

I have to admit your posts are coming across as very self centred. Surely you can see why this women feels the way she does and why the tone of the friendship has changed.

Hmmm tricky one. My DD’s trainers are nearly down to the sole. I’ve bought her two other pairs but she loves the old ones so keeps putting them on. I would be mortified in this mum’s situation tbh.

Ok so you sounded lovely but now I'm unsure after your latest post. You shouldn't have bought any shoes at all, why did you need to? Where you going somewhere after school or did you just pick her up and take her back to your home?

Just because YOU may not have felt embarrassed in this situation means nothing, surely you can see you are in a minority, and in fact this would make a lot of parents feel this way.

@Guavafish1 massive over reaction

I'd have lied tbh. Wouldn't have bought a pair that day, but if I wanted to discretely help I might have got a pair a size up from the old ones, and offered them over saying I'd grabbed them super cheap at an outlet/in the sale but they'd not fit my DC and I was wanting rid of them.

A lady I know once managed to rig a pta competition to ensure a struggling single mum won a full set of new uniform (they'd had the local uniform shop donate it as a prize).

If a friend had bought a pair of shoes for my dc when they needed a pair, I’d have been v grateful even if embarrassed. But the gratefulness would exceed the embarrassment factor.

And you clearly do expect something in return. You want both parents to acknowledge your 'generous gift'. You've then come to MN to complain that you weren't fawned over suitably by both parents for a 'gift' they didn't ask for and possibly want or need. Don't you see that?