The Katie Chronicles, Tradition Edition

Shoes have been a big topic of discussion lately in our house. One of Katie's friends gave her two pairs of shoes with 1 inch (ish) heels on them. Jerome and I are pretty old school about clothing for our kids so this wasn't a popular gift. After much discussion of "But YOU get to wear high heels!" and how good people sometimes make different decisions than other good people about what kids can wear, I finally agreed to let her wear the shoes at certain times, like to church or around the house. Dad's not happy with this compromise and we agreed to let the heels die a natural death by not replacing them when she outgrows them. So fast forward to tonight. Katie needs another pair of summer shoes, so I took her shoe shopping at a local mall. She asked if we could please look for a pair of "appwopwiate heels" for her to wear, since she was growing out of the others. I said no, but she was happy anyway...because after the shoe purchase, I introduced her to one of the coolest things my mom ever did, ice cream for dinner.

When I was in second grade, my parents got divorced. My siblings, who are much older, were already out of the house, so it was just my mom and me. She was a working mom and was utterly depleted by the end of her 26 year marriage, which she had worked hard to preserve. And she didn't like to cook. So occasionally -- I suspect it was when she needed some extra cheering up -- she would announce that we were going to get Braum's Ice Cream for dinner. Their crinkle fries are divine, but no hamburgers or fries were on the menu for us. It was wall-to-wall ice cream for dinner. She always got a banana split and we would have a chance to talk about our day or whatever we were thinking about. My mother always talked to me like I was an adult, so these were serious conversations, at least to me. It doesn't get much better than ice cream for dinner and one-on-one Mom time when you're 8. So tonight, Katie got sensible, "age-appwopwiate" sandals, along with an introduction to a family tradition, mother-daughter ice cream dinner. My mom is smiling somewhere, I just know it.