to be aghast - yes, aghast - at the huge amount of authoritarian advice people seem to need and expect with regard to children's footwear?

[pointydog]

I had never really given school shoes (and the rest) a huge amount of thought and always assumed I and my children had freewill to choose whichever pair of shoes we wanted.

Too many people are overly-controlling re footwear.

Or else I'm being unreasonable.

I think there is a lot of over controllng in parenting generally.....shoes are shoes, they should keep feet dry/protected and that's about it...and yes i do pass them on from child to child if they're not too knackered.

what only shoes?

Strict rules on footwear at DD's school, but it doesn't bother us - red or black shoes only, sensible shoes only, no sandels or boots. We knew the rules when we chose the school.

DD has some lovely red school shoes.

And then she has lots of pretty or funky footwear for out of school - boots, Crocs, sandals, flip flips, etc.

not sure if it is a nationwide chain but i always go to Johnson's.
They have Clarks, Startrite, Timberland and a bunch of other makes.
They measure the feet then bring out what styles they have in the size. I refuse to "choose" first as it is pointless and DD1 just gets the hump as they won't have "the one". Then i choose whichever one fits best with advice from the shop assistant.

DDs love buying shoes ...

and my mum made us wear Clarks up to about age 14 and now i have brilliant feet that fits any shoe so am v grateful.

LOL fio - best check DD more carefully before she goes to school in future, just in case!

I don't have a problem with Clarkes fitting service. I use it as a starting point and try different sizes until we get one that fits. It's fairly obvious when they do and don't isn't it?

However I do agree with regard to the choice. We do use an outlet store so it's not so surprising maybe but I do get hacked off with bloody pink (DD refused to wear it at all) and hideous clumpy black boys shoes once the get past the age of about 4 - so dismal

evenhope my flippers are wide too and very high instep so shoes often fall off. but i don't go to some soviet shoe shop to be told i only have a choice of two hideous styles, i go to a variety of shops and try them on. fair enough i do own rather a lot of cloggy type things but that is my own choice.

and never ever next their shoes are for people with bird feet.

And I think that it's important that schools can guide parents re shoes. I hate to see LOs in heels and impractical shoes. Loads of little girls in our school last winter were wearing inadequate pretty little pump type shoes that got soaked as soon as it rained.

Shoe shopping was my (and my mother's) idea of hell between the ages of about 10 and 15. I wanted court shoes with little heels (like everyone else). I had wide feet that couldn't fit into courts. My mother wanted me to wear sensible shoes that actually fitted.... She won (had the chequebook). I sulked. It was horrible. And what is worse I now realise she was right and I will probably have to go through the same thing with my DD! Oh joy

I agree with everyone about only being able to buy pink shoes in Clarkes - but I find that with clothes generally - unless you spent a fortune its hard to get away from pink (with 'born to shop' or 'little princess' slogans, but that's a whole other thread!)

As a person with slightly longer than average feet also I find that Evans do a good range for us-flippered folk. I am one of those people whose idea of hell is shopping for new shoes for me as my feet blister up at the sight of a pair of new shoes (I try not to plan shopping expeditions out loud but rather creep up on the sale racks undectected so my size do not go and hide themselves ).

My mum suffered (and still does) as she was obliged to cram her tootsies into a size smaller shoe as a teenager so she made darned sure that our feet were cosseted by our shoes and that meant new pairs per child. Even my ballet shoes were new .