Another winter and another "do as Mommy says, not as Mommy does" moment with my youngest son. Have I mentioned that stubbornness is a trait for all of the boys? Perhaps determined is more appropriate. And I have no idea where they get it from, really.
Xander and I have been battling recently over wearing socks in the house. I would prefer to not have another winter of constant sniffling and coughing (you know, not really sick but just enough to be annoying to them and, in turn, to me). He needs socks, because our laminate wood floors over a crawl space are cold. He refuses. He kicks in the morning when you try to put them on, will concede only long enough to get himself downstairs into some corner, where he proceeds to stand on the toe of one sock with the other foot and deliberately pull each sock off. I find them stuffed between couch cushions and under furniture, buried in the toy box, and sometimes left in plain sight in the middle of the floor. He will only leave them on if there are also shoes, which he oddly enough, loves to wear.
But, as for the socks, he knows at this point that Mommy has given up. Putting socks on a wiggling little boy who takes them off in less than five minutes EVERY single time is just not worth it. There are too many other things to do and worry about - like keeping Sawyer out of the freezer and Connor from running up and down the stairs doing who knows what (yes, he can open the gate and does so at will these days). The thermostat is set on 72, so really, it's not that cold in here.
Besides, clearly it's okay since Mommy doesn't wear them either! It doesn't matter how cold it is, I am always barefoot. Even quick trips out to the mailbox in the snow are done barefoot with flip flops that we keep by the door. If I am leaving the house, I'll put on socks and shoes, if I must, but I simply won't walk around the house in socks. I despise them. I also have poor circulation apparently, because even if I wear the things I so loathe, my toes are still freezing, so what is the point, exactly? And yes, I have actually tried it, in one of my better "Mommy" moments, to set a good example. It hasn't worked, so the "slipper socks" have gone back in the drawer never again to see the light of day (at least until we battle again next winter).
Why do I have a feeling this is only the first of many that I'm going to lose with him?
