soryr i KNOW i am boring on it I KNOW but shoe shopping for kids drives me NUTS

[FluffyMummy123]

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If ds had a car in his heel he would just play with it all day long. He smuggled cars into Nursery for 18 mths so now this gimmick is making his smuggling legit. [Head in hands].

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I want to get ds (5 yo in october) some Geox shoes which look like trainers but just don't wear out ever. I do like the smarter ones but he's a runner not a walker and they would be ruined I think.

Crimped stitching, right will make a note not to buy those.

Have never brought proper boys shoes before, and not liking any of them doesn't help lol.

we dont have trainer ones we have smart ones because I am a nasty mom and it says no trainers on the uniform list so i wont have shoes that look like them

god I'm a bitch ds1 wears shirt and tie to unless its hot

Where do you get Geox from ?? do they still have their feet measured for those ?

Any good independent shoe shop will do Geox and they come in 2 foot widths so you need to be measured.

Ahh right ok, ta will have a look at those too.

Dear Cod, does my shoe shopping method meet your strict criteria?
Drop DC off at Grandma's and take them to buy shoes one by one at lovely independent shoes shop up the road. If there is a queue i will return another time. A £2 playmobil special will be wielded as a bribe if necessary to avoid the toy in heel (thanks for the idea peanut!). One pair of black school shoes each and a pair of black pumps. Drop old shoes off at charity shop on way home. Repeat three times.

Then sneak back on my own and buy me a pair of boots, because i've earned them

chippy - I like the go back on my own and buy a pair of boots idea very much thanks for the tip

Oh I'll add that to my tip list

Second time for me with a dd with size 3 feet. I'm sure it used to be teenagers who had size 3, now it isn't, so why don't Clarks make size threes suitable for 10 year olds and not Prisoner Cell Block H wannabes? And why do they go through the measuring thing, not have the size they came up with in stock, and tell me that 'this one is narrow fitting'? And why do they only have 'lights' in that size. I hate school shoe shopping, I hated school shoes and Back to School when it was my turn.

LOL @ 'do you not like Gershwin then?'

I can't bear it. For me it's an in and out as quickly as possible, and a 'you can either have those or those' (one choice, that's it) and then a lot of 'No keep your blardy socks ON, it's your turn next'.

ALSO you really have not even considered the hell which is girl's shoe shopping - oh my is complex. Cars in the heel? Easy. Patent/butterfiles/acceptable diamond cluster on top = HELL.

Now I think of it ds1 had his photograph taken when buying his first pair of shoes - we were in Derby for reasons I can't remember - and we were given a cardboard photo frame. Oh the shame.

1. We were always 3 adults taking 4 kids shoe shopping. (see note 4). At Clarks village in Street with the rest of the UK population.

2. Not agonising over the look but whether it actually fits?

3. Taking forever- try shopping for H fitting shoes to fit a wide foot with high instep and narrow ankles. Times 4.

4. Kid is tantrumming because there is only one pair that fits and it's the style he had last time. And the time before. And the time before that. We have driven 250 miles to this shop because we can't afford 4 x full price shoes so we have to go while we are staying at grandmas (see note 1). We are not leaving without a pair of shoes, tantrum or no tantrum.

5. Never buy slippers- yuck.

This year, ds1 AND ds2 have had a huge growth spurt.

Ds1 (aged 6) for SCHOOL is required to have:

• trainers for sports
• pumps for PE
• wellies for forest school
• normal school shoes

These have to be kept in school so no doubling up possible with home stuff (well, apart from normal school shoes he wears of course)

he's also grown out of:

• home shoes (i.e. trainers or whatever he wants to wear at weekends)
• home wellies (which we used quite a bit this year thanks to the weather...)
• sandals (can probably be delayed until next year)

fortunately he hasn't grown out of his football boots.

ds2 also needs shoes, wellies and sandals (sandals will have to wait until next easter I reckon).

So by my count that's 8 pairs of footwear I need to go shop for tomorrow. Shall I take out the second mortgage now?

buying a balaclava and a bit of bank robbing may pay off in your case 8 pairs thats scary as well as time consuming

Wellies, trainers and pumps are going to be cheepo woolworths ones I think. Especially the trainers - he's going to be in them for 30mins a week max if that. Hardly going to do his foot major damage. How much do you think that'll be - £50 ish?

School and home shoes I'll buy Startrite, so that'll be about £90.

Oh and I need to buy ds2 a lunchbox for nursery ...

Cod, I take your paltry D fitting and raise to a C. I am still traumatised by my own childhood shoe shopping hell. They always had to order my shoes in, so why did my mother bother schlepping round half a dozen shops and making me try on another half dozen bloody shoes that didn't bloody well fit?

Ds is MUCH easier, nice independent shoe shop five minutes walk away with lovely assistants who know exactly how to keep small boys entertained and have G width fittings in stock. Bliss. Can highly recommend to anyone who lives in NE Herts or wants to come here.

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those black pumps for PE you can get for like £1.50 or £2 in the cheapy shops - if you get the velcro fastening ones, they'll fit any width of foot

I can't understand people who go in there like they want to spend the whole afternoon doing it - it's like it's an outing, like going to the bloody zoo.

You need a plan - in, out, pay, no faffing and then off. None of this 'oooh what do you think of that' aaaaaarrrghhh.

"you get there and while oyu wait you say to the kid - go and choose what you woudl LIKE if it fits you"

Noooo, you tell the assistant to bring out whatever they have in your child's size that meet your criteria. Especially if both children are H fitting which means they inevitably don't have the style your child has chosen and set their heart one.

We get there at opening time and are done and dusted in around 15 minutes.

Spent yesterday in an independent shoe shop waiting for my number to be called.

When we went in they were at number 44. I went to pull my ticket out & it was nukber 52! So 8 families had to be fitted before it was my turn.

There was one woman beside me with 3 small boys & she was a ROYAL pain in the ass! "Oh look Jakey... the lovely shoe fitting girl is bringing you 6 pairs to choose from, isn't that great?" "Oh, do you have any in a size larger for Quentin? I like them to all have the same" Then she continued at the top of her voice how she was glad she hadn't left it until they came back from the Seychelles as all the good shoes would have been gone. God she was just so loud & obnoxious. She kept looking at herself in the mirror & shaking her head out... she had her mother with her.

We chose dd's whilst we waited, then told the girl to bring her size She came with 4 different ones! DD chose the only buckle ones, even though velcro would have been easier! The buckle ones had 5 hearts across the straps ya see!