If the Shoe Fits...

I just don't get it.  When I was growing up, we had 4 pairs of shoes:  sneakers (you know, the blue ones with the 2 white stripes down the side), flip-flops (thick foam soles and wide nylon straps, usually in rainbow colors), winter black 'pretty shoes' for church and summer sandals or jellies for church.  That's it.  We got up in the morning, pulled our tube socks up over our calves, shoved our feet in our sneakers where they stayed til it was bath time.  The only time we removed our shoes during the day was after church when we went up to our rooms, took off our pretty shoes, put them in the closet and replaced them with our sneaks.

I do remember that when we were older, we would sometimes go around the house barefoot, but never ever in the winter (we would get sick, or so we were told), and we never ever ever wore socks with no shoes...or shoes with no socks, for that matter.  We were pretty severely chastised if we were found wandering the house with just socks on because we would wear out our socks.  It just wasn't done!

So what changed?  When did it suddenly become all the rage to take your shoes off...every time you enter the house and everywhere you go????  I see kids take off their shoes at church and wander around in their socks!  I don't remember being told repeatedly to put my shoes on or to go find them because they were always always on my feet!  I mean, I understand if you run a household where you take your shoes off when you enter the house because then the shoes (supposedly) stay at the door and are there when you need them.  But that is not the case in our house.  We have hardwood floors through most of the house, and because of all the entering and exiting of both children and pets, the floors just aren't that clean (although Baby B and Jesse do and nice job of mopping them frequently with their pj's as they scoot across the floor...)


The thing is that it's not like I really care whether they wear their shoes in the house or not, although I stick with my dad's rule of no socks without shoes, so we have supplied all the walking people in the house with either slippers or sock-feet (that's what we call the socks that have the leather on the bottom.  They are awesome).

But the problem is that if there are no shoes on their feet while they are in the house, it takes that much longer to get ready to go anywhere!  Holy cow!  It must add at least 15 minutes to the get-out-the-door process!  First you have to find the shoes, preferably a matching pair, and then you have to apply both socks and shoes to twitchy little feet!

Add to that the diapers that need to be changed before we head out and it can take up to 30 minutes to get everyone clean, diapered, shoed, buckled into the appropriate car seats and down the road.  We have cubbies and shelves where the shoes are supposed to go, but they inevitably end up dumped on the floor where Jesse will pick one up to chew on the irresistible rubber sole, and when the shoe is removed from his mouth, it is usually tossed on top of the guinea pig cage in an effort to effectively keep it out of his reach.

I am seriously considering super glue.  I figure that it will wear off by the time they grow out of their shoes, so it could work out to be perfect timing!