Super Sonic   +  trip

Obsessive Compulsive Pork Chop

It's offical. I mentioned in my last entry that I thought ds was dreaming about ice cream- and last night confirmed it. I woke up to the little darling crying out "More, more". ran into to find him still very much asleep, but distressed. "More what, baby?" I ask. "Ish cream, more ish cream!!", with ds poitning his finger in his mouth. Ooookay then. I gently reassured him there was no ice cream to be had and I toddled off back to bed. Strange child.

And he is a funny one, my ds (aka The PorkChop, Mr Chop, Chop-a-lop, Headley, The Headley Thing and Augustus Gloomp- poor kid has a lot of nicknames, no wonder he gets confused). Among his other obsessions, he has a thing for shoes. Not all shoes, just one particular pair at a time.

It started with a tiny pair of Nikes we bought him we started walking at 15 months. He loved them, happily wore them, but refused to wear any others. The problem with that was that while he continued to grow, the shoes,of course, did not. And besides that, the weather was beginning to heat up and his feet were getting very stinky, so sandals or thongs really were the order of the day. And so began the Shoe Wars.

Round One. We go on a special excursion to Big W, specifically to purchase ds some sandals. Spiderman sandals? "no". Thomas sandals? "no". Bob the Builder sandals? Ds's eyes light up, and I realise I have spoken too soon. They don't have Bob in his size. Somewhat desperate by this stage, I spy a pair of Bob thongs in a size 5. it's only when we get home and ds consents to actually wearing them (and I've hidden the Nikes) that i remember how much I hated thongs as a kid- that bit between my toes... turns out ds feels the same. Mum doesn't have the heart to make him wear them. Round One Winner- Ds.

Round Two. Another special excursion to Big W and praise the Lord, they have Bob sandals in ds's size. Sold!! I also sneakily grab a new pair of sneakers for Santa to bring- maybe if Santa brings them, ds will be into them. For the moment, he's happy with his "Bob's", as they are hence forth affectionately known. Round Two Winner- Mum.

Round Three. Santa brings ds his new shoes. Ds is not impressed. After much convincing (and temporary hiding of the Bob's), he agrees to try them on. And they are too small. Turns out the little pork chop has had a growth spurt. After inspection of his feet, it's found he has blisters from his Bob's, and he hasn't complained once, poor kid. Round Three- There are no winners here. But points detracted from mum for not noticing her kid was wearing shoes a size too small.

Round Four- A trip to Paul's Warehouse the day after Boxing Day, at the height of sales insanity, in a desperate effort to replace the original Nikes. Failure. Spot some shoes with Elmo on them- surely that will be a winner? Wrong. None in his size. Finally, sick of battling with crowds high on discount Converse and Billabong merchandise, I grab an unbelivably 'spensive pair of Etnies, which seem to be the only shoes available in kids size six. It's not till later i realise what a smart move this is- they have a inner sole system that pulls out and they go up half a size. So Round Four Winner- Mum. And Round Five Winner- Mum by default. It will be a while before the Etnies need to be added to the secret growing pile of hidden shoes in the desk drawer (I really need to throw them out, but I just can't bear to do it...)

Oh, and the Bonus Round- a pair of Cotton On Crocs, embellished with those little Croc plug things. Apparentley, they are only good for throwing around the lounge room and accidently-on-purpose hitting his sister in the head with. But at least these are made of foam and don't weigh too much, unlike the tin spinning top she copped in the head the other day. But's that a whole other blog entry, for a whole other day