Angry feet

This morning started out like any other morning. I woke up the older kids* then dragged Max out of bed.
Max is not a morning person (a trait he inherited from me) and I stood him up on the floor, holding on to him until his eyes opened a bit, and he stopped swaying.

"I'm awake mom" he croaked, then stumbled off to the bathroom.

I went back downstairs to wake up the other kids again (apparently they aren't morning people either) and when I came upstairs, Max was sitting on his bedroom floor, staring into space.

"Are you playing with your blocks instead of getting dressed?" I asked.

"No!" he growled, jumping up and grabbing his school pants.

Ten minutes later, I went back into his room to check on his progress.
He was now wearing pants, and holding a shirt.

Progress!

When I came back ten minutes later, his shirt was on and he was holding one of his tennis shoes.

"I can't find the other shoe!"

I helped him look all over his floor, behind his door (a favorite hiding place for his shoes) and under the blankets on his bed. (9 times out of 10 this is where we find his shoes) (seriously)

We couldn't find his other shoe.

I sent him to the kitchen to start eating his freshly toasted frozen waffle, and I continued to look for his other shoe.

Logically, I thought that it would probably be somewhere near the place where he found the other shoe, I looked under all of his block piles, behind the door again, in between all of his stuffed animals.......
I even looked under his pillow (remembering that time when I was Max's age and didn't want to go to school, so I hid my shoes under my pillow)

The shoe was nowhere to be found!

The time was getting late, so I grabbed his church shoes and brought them out to the kitchen.

"Sorry Max, I couldn't find your other shoe, you'll have to wear these."

"BUT NONE OF THE OTHER KIDS WEAR THEIR CHURCH SHOES TO SCHOOL!!"

The shoes are brown, and perfectly acceptable to wear to school. I pointed this out to him as I removed his one tennis shoe.

I looked up to see his arms folded across his chest in defiance, and he was wearing his angry eyes.

He refused to put the shoes on, so I put them on his feet for him. He spread his toes as wide as he could, just to make it as difficult as possible.

Fortunately, after raising his older brother, I knew how to deal with the uncooperative toes and still managed to get the shoes on, with Max giving me the evil eye the entire time.

"Oh yeah!" he growled "well then I just won't eat!" and he refused to eat any more of the waffle.

I guess he showed me.

And then I put his jacket on him, handed him his backpack, and he walked to the car...........very slowly........

Because, apparently, church shoes are incapable of moving as fast as tennis shoes.


When he gets home, I'm going to tell him that Naughty Bird ate his shoe.



* OK, CJ woke me up first so I could take him to school at 7:00, otherwise I would probably still be sleeping.....