Such a shame this cuteness won't last...

I mean, she'll have to grow up sometime, right? I just have to remember that right now, Katie is the cutest little, ahem, BIG girl in the entire world. We've been up at the lake this weekend and mom and I made a quick run to Walmart. I can't just run in and out so we took a peek at the kids shoes and I found some cute ones. The price was good (I can't spend too much on a pair of shoes she'll either wear out or outgrow quickly) so I bought them along with a cute pair of boots for next year. I pulled them out and showed Katie when we got home and she really liked them. She put them on and didn't want to take them off. She wobbled over to grandpa so he could cut the string that connected them together. Then it was time to show her the cute purple boots I bought for next year. She opened the box and looked at them... and that was it. She wasn't jumping for joy or looking at me with the wide eyed WOW look she gives me when she's super excited. I took them out so she could try them on but she set them back in the box and put the cover back on. I asked if she liked them and she said she did but I guess the lure of her shoes was too great. She walked around in them for a lot of the night and I caught her walking with a lot of bounce in her step every so often.

About a half hour later, I got up from my chair and Katie came over to me and said, "Thank you mama" and then "Why you buy me these shoes mama?" I told her that we (mommy and daddy) knew she would need a new pair of shoes and these were very pretty so we bought them for her. She hugged my legs and asked again (in a quiet, kind of shocked voice) "Mama, why you buy them for me?" and I crouched down to her level and told her the same thing, we wanted her to have new shoes. She said thank you again as I got a big hug. Then she was off, running around in her new shoes.

Why do they have to grow up? There will come a time, I'm sure, when she will not want anything to do with her mommy... but I guess that's when I'll know that I've done my job right and been a mommy first, friend second. Bummer.