Shopping with the Grandkids

As I mentioned in a few previous blog entries, we did a bit of shopping with Lukey and Kenzie while they were staying with us last week.  This will be the blog entry with the photos of us shopping.

Liza was in the hospital giving birth to Sophia and would be tied up with Sophia for a while when they arrived home so we felt it was best to get Lukey and Kenzie some things that they will need in the coming weeks so Liza wouldn't have to do it herself.

Here, below, is the usual shot of us heading up to the Burlington area...

We went to Dick's mostly because Kenzie needed running shoes specifically for running and Lukey needed sneakers.  Of course, we did some looking in some other departments too and, as a result, we found some life preservers for Lukey and Kenzie.  They outgrew their old ones.  

Kenzie, the jumping string bean...  this is usually a pretty good sign that she is happy...

We found some running shoes for Kenzie.  It was time consuming though and we sort of had to settle on a shoe.  The selection of sneakers at Dick's, in general, was abysmal.  Getting help so we could get our size was difficult.  A shoe coming out of the back in the sizes we needed was rare.  We did find some good running shoes for Kenzie though so I guess that is good.  Once we moved on to other stores, however, we were wishing that we held off in purchasing the running shoes at Dick's.  There were far better selections at other stores that we hadn't thought of visiting for running shoes.

We left Dick's with two new adult-sized O'Brien life preservers for Lukey and Kenzie and a pair of running shoes for Kenzie...

Since we couldn't find sneakers for Lukey at Dick's, we headed to REI.  It turns out that the shoe selection was far, far better at REI than at Dick's.  Getting the help we needed to get Lukey fitted with the correct shoe and shoe size was ridiculously simple compared to our experience(s) at Dick's.  Dick's won't be getting any of our shoe sales anymore.

The last couple of times we were at Dick's looking for shoes, Lukey gravitated toward red Air Jordan look-a-likes.  Honestly, I find these sneakers to be hideous and there is no way you could get me to wear them while playing basketball (when I actively played basketball).  They are pieces of cr*p.  We did buy Lukey a pair last year and he literally tore them up within a couple of months.  And red...  ugggg.  I was hoping to find something else for him...  in another color...  and a far better quality that would last longer.  Honestly, I had Merrells in mind for him right from the beginning but I was trying to figure out how to get his mind away from bright red clown sneakers.

When we saw the selection of shoes at REI, I had a feeling that it would be far easier to get Lukey to at least try on a pair of Merrells.  I succeeded in getting him to try a couple of pair!  

The moment he put his foot into the first pair, he wanted them.  He didn't want anything else.  He didn't even want to try on the second pair.  He had a smile on his face and he was walking around in the first pair.  I think he actually wanted to run around the store jumping in them!

Lukey, below, getting fitted for his Merrell hiking sneakers...

Kenzie starts figure skating again in a couple of weeks and her skates from last season are too small.  She needed new skates so we headed to a place that sells used sports equipment.  Finding new figure skates in Vermont is difficult so we went looking for a used pair. 

These skates in her size were filthy, often moldy, nasty looking skates.  Sheila didn't even like the idea of Kenzie putting her foot in any of them!  I noticed up high on the back wall that they had four models of new figure skates so we asked about them and where we could find those skates.  We told the salesman what size Kenzie needed and off he went to retrieve two different pairs of skates.  

Looking through the used figure skates...

Opting to try on a pair of new figure skates instead of filthy, moldy used skates...

Kenzie chose the Jackson Soft Skate 180 figure skates.  They have a nice comfortably padded and fleece-lined boot.  Since they are brand new skates, she'll need to break them in though and that might be a bit painful.  These are pretty nice beginner figure skates though and Kenzie seems very happy with them. 

So, it was a successful day of shopping.  After shopping, we headed to Agave for lunch (which is in another blog entry here.)

After a late lunch, we headed back home to play some Giant Jenga, Dominoes and sit around a fire.  It was a really nice day!