The Beach, Part 2

I wrote a blog about 6 weeks ago called The Beach. This is Part 2.

The boys have pretty much always had tie-sneakers. We wanted them to get in the habit of having to have their shoes tied (whether by us or eventually themselves) and not always rely on velcro. Otherwise, it might be harder to break them of the habit later on. However, 1 pair was getting too small, very small and the other child's was falling apart. We had received a pair of sneakers for each from a relative who works in the industry, unfortunately they were too big. Like clown shoes. Even stuffing newspaper in the top would not have helped.

So I had to set out and find sneakers. I got the last 2 pairs of sneakers at Target that were their sizes, but they were velcro. No big deal, I'm sure it'll be fine.

They liked their new sneakers which is good. And the first day they came home from school I ask, like I always do "Did you play outside today"? And they answered how the usually do "yes". I said ok, you know what to do..  This means go sit on the front steps and take off your sneakers and shake them out from all the sand that we all know somehow accumulates in their sneakers (and usually ends up all over the house).

Well, I am then told that they don't have any sand. I said you played outside right? They said yes, so I said well then you have to have sand in there. It's only happened every day since they've been going to school there so why should today be any different.

I don't know what magical properties these velcro sneakers have but wouldn't you know it the little buggers were right.. NO SAND!!! And they haven't had sand in their sneakers 1 day since switching to velcro.

If I had known that velcro sneakers were the secret to not having sand all over my house, I certainly would not have worried about them wearing tie shoes.

Next up though is teaching them how to tie their shoes. However I should not be the one to do this. But that is another blog for another day.

The Beach

No, not that awful movie with Leonardo DiCaprio, the real beach.  You know the one I'm talking about..  No, not that one..  The one that appears inside your children's sneakers from daycare.

I never thought it would be possible to have a pound of sand in each shoe when they didn't really go to the beach. (While I didn't actually weigh it, by the amount that ends up in the dust buster, I can only imagine it's that much). Plus, their shoes aren't even that big! They are wearing sizes 9 and 9.5 in kids! How do they even have room for their feet with so much sand?! Yet, every day when they come home and rip off their sneakers, there they are on the tile in front of the door, piles of sand. It's kind of a running joke between many of the parents because we all know what we're talking about when we say "the beach". "Oh did you go to the beach today?"  "No, the beach came to us!"

The good thing about the winter is the lack of sand in their shoes. However, then there's the snow.  I guess the beach isn't so bad after all.