No Costume is Complete without the Shoes!

Ryder is imaginative. I have mentioned that. Since he has been two and a half years old he has spent the majority of his free time in costume. First, it was costumes of Halloween's Past but it quickly evolved into a much more serious and committed quest for becoming a character. It began with Benny from the movie Sandlot which had him insisting he needed a pair of black Chuck Taylors to complete the outfit. Then he moved on to the Peter Parker/Spiderman combination. When we bought him both the red and the black Spidey costumes I hadn't realized that even though I bought the gloves, as a separarte purchase, I was still giving him an incomplete gift. "Where are the boots Mommy? Spiderman has boots?" As a result I was out buying red socks every time I saw an apple-y pair. He said, "they will do!"
In the recent past he has moved on to Spiderman/Clark Kent giving him an extra excuse (not that he needs one) to wear his shirt, tie, and vest regularly!

 
We got him a Superman costume (which he wore last Halloween) and it once again came boot free!

Why o Why can't they sell all parts of the costume together?

Anyway, the same red socks he wore for Spidey worked for the Man of Steel, "I guess they will do" but he never stopped wanting the Superman boots.
Until one day he got them!
I got the boys Keen sandals for camp. Ryder got red for the third year in a row. Chase wanted green for the same number of years. When they didn't have green he almost got a turquoise color that would have people certainly questioning his future manliness. I was able to talk him out of this "gender neutral" color with the promise of ordering him the green he wanted when we got home.

So I did. From Zappo's.

I was quite impressed when the shoes showed up the very next day! Inside each of the shoes was a cardboard foot. I didn't think twice about these perfectly-sized pieces of cardboard and was about to throw them out when Ryder's eyes popped out of his head and rolled across the floor. "My boots!" He shouted and scooped the shoe insides right from my hands and ran off to be sneaky as he does.
I followed him, intrigued by his excitement.

"Whacha doing, Ry?"
Excitedly, so much so, his words were running into one, he responded, "thesecanbemybootsmommy! Ijusthavetocutthisoffhere," pointing to the back, "thenpaintthemred!".
I understood what he was saying despite his forgetting to breathe.
He grabbed the scissors and cut out around the ankle. Then ran to get his paints. He painted them red.
I watched in amazement as he created his boots from his own mind.
When they were done drying he placed them over his foot, happily. Until he noticed they wouldn't stay in place.
A lightbulb went off in his little head.
"Mommy, we need tape. If we put tape across the bottom and across the back they will stay in place. Where's the tape?"
Continuing to be amazed by his thought process I offered my first piece of consultation on his project.
"What if, instead of tape, we use elastic so that you can re-use them again and again?"
He looked at me. "What's elastic?"
I told him, showed him, in fact, by the band on his shorts.
"YES! " He shouted with a Tiger Woods type fist pump. "Do we have any?". We didn't but Mom-Mom Joan, thrilled by his creativity, was able to provide us with some within 24 hours.
And so, Ryder now has Superman boots of his very own. Created for him, by him. Because they are cardboard, they won't last nearly as long as the passionate boys love for the world's greatest superhero but maybe he is on to something.

Painting the shoes

Letting them dry

Side view

He cut out the back

Since all of the Power Rangers costumes he wants are out of stock maybe he will create his own?
And, if you need a pair of Red or Green Keen hand me downs sized in US9, 10, or 11, we got them!!!