NEW SHOES

I like to buy Start*rite shoes for Alice - they're classic in style, plain and relatively robust, I don't like the sparkles and embroidery of the other leading UK brand. Unfortunately buying SR shoes means a 50 mile round trip to the shops in either Bristol or Cardiff - yes THAT'S how much I dislike the other brand. Luckily I discovered that I could buy a foot measure online and as I'm (amongst other things!) a qualified children's shoe fitter I knew that Alice needed new shoes.

(Boring stats for me to remember) Alice's left foot is larger, she was an 8 and a half F, now she's a 9 G!

So she now has new black patent Velcro (ugh) Mary Jane's, very plain and simple. I dread shoe shopping, we went to Cribbs Causeway (a regional shopping centre near Bristol), arrived earlish (for a Sunday) and went straight to get an appointment at JLP (45 minute wait, they'd only been open 15 minutes!) before going onto the shoe shop next door where we were the next to be served. I explained my picky preferences and we were presented with 3 choices, tried my favourites first and they fitted beautifully - I know not to push my luck so we bought them and were done within 15 minutes! Huge relief and nice shoes for Christmas!!

We then made the most of being at the shopping centre and bought the presents needed for 3 nursery friends with parties before Christmas, new furry boots for Alice (she's already got some 9s, but I bought the 10s as she's bound to need them fairly soon - she hasn't seemed to slow much in her growth despite supposing to slow after reaching 2!), tight and food from M&S and a dress, then we went for an early lunch (I thought we'd beat the crowds by eating early, I was wrong!) Then as I was walking back (Alice was in the pushchair) we went through JLP's children's department and we ended up with another new dress, jumper and goose top (and some gloves that she doesn't know about)! Alice was very good and fell in love with some fluffy ear muffs, which she's worn ever since!

All that and we were home by 2:30pm!