shoe question

bh2720

how many pairs of shoes does your DS have? (not asking about girls, b/c girls typically have more).

we only have one pair of real shoes for Warner. they are the sneakers that he wears to DC everyday. we do have a pair of cheap sandals for him, but he pretty much only wears them to the pool. He has to wear size wide shoes and the only place I can reliably find those is Stride Rite and the last pair I bought for him were $45 (on sale!). even buying them with reasonable growing room, he is outgrowing his shoes about every 2.5 months.

the reason I am asking is because a friend of mine with a son Warner's age was saying something about her son having a bunch of shoes and how it's a pain to keep them organized and asked if I had that problem. and I was all ...uh, no, I can keep his one pair of shoes organized just fine.

I mean, he doesn't need dress shoes right now because we don't really take him anywhere fancy. is there some good reason why he shouldn't wear the same shoes everyday? (and i know this is kind of a dumb question, but I hadn't really thought about the fact that he only has one pair of shoes, and i have like 50 so it made me feel kind of bad...)

Hey Jellisy

I have a girl but we are shoe minimalists.  She has stride rite sneakers, crocs (these were hand me downs), and a pair of dress sandals from Target. I just don't see her needing more than that at this point in her life. 

With re. to Stride Rite and their ridiculous prices, have you been to the Outlet to get his shoes, they are about half price there. 

victoria1212

DD only has a pair of stride rite sandals and a pair of crocs. She got some jelly sandals from a friend and she hates them so I don't count those.

AgrippaRidesAgain

In non-sandals weather, DS has one pair of shoes at a time.  We get them at the Stride Rite outlet, so they're typically $20-25 instead of $45.  In the summer, he has a pair of sandals and a pair of close-toed shoes.

HikerBride07

We're minimalist too w/DD.  She has one main pair of Stride Rite shoes she wears pretty much every day.  She has a white pair of sandals she wears when we are going out somewhere where I want her to look nice.  Oh, and she has a pair of jellies (clearance) she loves because they make clicking noises on the hardwood (like tap dancing) be she rarely wears those out of the house.

Definitely check out the Stride Rite outlet for deals.  They often have buy one, get one half off and their prices are about half of the retail cost.

SoonToBeMrsDTS

DS has 3 pairs of shoes: sneakers, sandals and church shoes. He pretty much lives in his sandals except for on Sunday mornings. DD on the other hand has 3 older girl cousins and the shoe situation is out of control!! 

I get Stride Rites at the outlet at Potomac Mills. I don't know where you are located but it's worth the trip if you are in VA. I typically pay $25 a pair.  

smacb

I always have 2 pairs in his current size.  He has a habit of dancing in mud puddles or engaging in other activities that make shoes temporarily unwearable!  I've found we always need a backup.

MrsTiara

Um, your friend is insane.  We have two pairs of shoes: good Stride Rite ones (only $20 at the outlet, but I have to buy another pair next weekend since he's finally outgrown them) for outdoors and cheap, Robeez knockoffs from Target for indoors if it's too cold to be barefoot.  Since this is as big as the indoor shoes get, we'll probably just have slippers when he outgrows them for indoors.

I was like, eight or so before I had more than one or two pairs of shoes (probably mainly because I had orthopedic shoes from Stride Rite that cost an arm and a leg until then).  But I couldn't tell you how many pairs have now  !

bh2720

thanks, everyone :-)

I guess I've just had bad luck at the outlet, I've been to the one at Leesburg twice now and the first time the only pair of sneakers in his size that had velcro fasteners, were $40. (I don't want to have to deal with tying his shoes all the time...it's hard enough to get him to sit still for the velcro). and the next time I went it was crazy busy and took over 30 minutes to get someone to measure his feet and then they didn't have any sneakers in his size. I guess I could try potomac mills, but I'm pretty proud of my record of not having been to that clusterf*ck in 3 years :-)

lilibet

A good friend of mine has a 2 year old with wide, flat feet, and she says See Kai Run shoes are the only ones she's found that fit him. Just yesterday, I saw a couple pairs of those (and a couple Stride Rite pairs) for decent prices ($27? for the See Kai Run ones) at the big sale going on at Nordstrom (this was at Tysons Corner, but I'm thinking other Nordstrom stores should be similar), if you're looking for the next size or something.

Artslvr

I know what you mean about Potomac Mills.  When we go, it's exclusively to go the Stride Rite outlet.  I actually really like that store, the same folks seems to be there everytime we go.  There is an older man who is particularly sweet.  One time when I brought shoes to the cash register certain they were $19.99, they rang up as $24.99 and I was considering putting them back, but he gave me the $19.99 price.  I was so pleased with actual customer service in this world.

For the record my girls have three pairs of shoes each - sneakers (those are their everyday shoes for daycare/preschool), pool shoes (crocs for older DD, little net things with rubber soles for younger DD), and sandals for when they wear dresses.

kbird

Just adding that my son is 16 months and also has super wide feet.  Only Stride Rites seem to work for us, and therefore he has one pair at a time.  And we never get to the outlet so it pains me to pay 50 bucks for my toddlers shoes.  Everytime I'm in Target, I try their shoes on both my kids (dd has very wide feet too) - hoping that something will seem to fit.  So far no luck.  We need a Stride Rite savings acct. 

Temp614258375007293

My girlfriend just taught me a great trick.  She goes to stores for her DD, ex. Gymboree, and asks if they can pull out items from last season in the back; that way, she buys nice new items at 80% off, just from the 2009 collection instead of 2010!  Not sure if Stride Rite specifically does that, but it's sure worth asking!

mek10976

We have 2 pairs for DS right now - sandals that he has basically outgrown and a pair of sneakers.  Both are Stride Right because he wears extra wide and I think they are the only line I have found with them.  I hate spending so much on shoes he wears for a blink of a second, but I did find his sneakers at Nordstrom Rack for $25.  They didn't have XW, but I squeezed him into the wide ones.