Faithful readers may remember the Great Toe Incidents of last fall (mentioned here, and here). While the toe has been completely healed since before Christmas, to Petra it was still her "hurt toe", and she refused to look at it, would not go barefoot, and needed a bag on her foot so she wouldn't see it while in the tub, even though, after a while, she didn't remember which foot was supposed to be the afflicted one.
Fast forward to our recent parent-teacher conference in mid-March. One of the topics discussed was The Toe: one week, her creative movement teacher wanted all the kids to take their socks and shoes off to prevent slipping during class. Petra refused; her teachers tried to convince her to take her socks off, but she firmly and tearfully refused. We were concerned because we were leaving for Mexico soon; it's harder to enjoy the pool and the beach if you need socks and/or plastic bags on your feet! So, we made a plan with her teachers, and were ready to pull in the center director as backup (she had helped Petra during the Second Toe Incident, and every time she saw her, Petra would tell her that her toe "still hurt"). That night, Dada was getting Petra ready for her bath, and used a combination of distraction and bribery (flowery flip-flops!) to divert her when she would normally ask for a bag on her foot. Lo and behold, she went the whole bath with her feet uncovered, and later, we heard a sound we hadn't heard for months: the slap of Petra's bare feet on the floor. What a lovely sound!
She happily went barefoot as often as possible during our recent trip to Mexico (more on that soon, I promise! For now, you can see pictures on Flickr), and now all we have to do is to keep cameras, toy frying pans, and baseballs away from her toes. Piece of cake!
