Mom Moment #3,974

A while back we received a box of hand-me-downs for my son. We love hand-me-downs in these parts. It's like going shopping without all the pain and hassle of actually having to drive to the store. You sort, you pick your favorites, and if there is an over-abundance you pass the rest on to another deserving family. All is well.

So this box that we received had two identical pair of little black dress shoes. Very cute. I had son stick his foot out; he tried one on and it fit. Since I couldn't imagine why we would need two pair of dressy shoes, I tossed the second pair into the box destined to be passed on to a cousin.

You think you see where this is going, don't ya?

Well we aren't dress-em-up kind of people, so this nice little pair of shoes has been in the shoe basket until two weekends ago when we went to the anniversary celebration of the grandparents. Of course, my son never seems to realize that his feet are hurting until we are well out of the house and without alternatives. When he complained in the middle of church that his feet hurt, I just figured his feet had grown. Kids do that. No problem. We'd pass those shoes on, too.

He rode home barefoot and by evening I'd forgotten there were shoes to be put away. They ended up back in the shoe basket.

Yesterday, he claimed that he couldn't find any shoes to wear to playdate and he pulled out those little black shoes. I said, "Wait a minute, those shoes hurt your feet."

He had one on by that time and he shook his head. "No, I think these are fine," he said. I felt his toe and it seemed okay to me. "Maybe your socks were too thick last time," I said.

An hour later we are walking through the library and I turn to see my son limping. He's obviously in pain. "Mom?" he says. "I think there's a problem with my feet. This shoe feels just fine (he points to the left) and this one feels too tight (he points to the right)." We lined them up and sure enough, one of those shoes was a whole size smaller than the other.

The funny thing is that there is an identical pair of mis-matched shoes on the other side of Kansas.

So tell me, did you think that I'd saved two left shoes?