Chorevia

Day 310 of 365 · Week 42

Shoes, when it's time

Last reviewed · 4 min read · 9 sources · Plain-text version

No shoes until your baby walks outside. Then closed-toe, flexible, nonskid, with room to grow; no wedges or special arches; a pair lasts 2 to 3 months, so check the fit monthly. The shoe fit check.

A Latino father sitting on a front step in the sun with his ten-month-old standing between his knees, barefoot on the mat, one small sneaker in the father's hand, the mother on the step above.

The box of tiny shoes has probably arrived already, from someone who loves you. Today is when shoes are for, what the AAP says to look for when it's time, and a fit check that takes a thumb and a minute.

Heart

Your baby doesn't need shoes until they start walking outside, and special "supportive" shoes have no proven benefit (AAP). Your baby is 10 months old; walking alone starts anywhere from 8.2 to 17.6 months (WHO Multicentre Growth Reference Study Group, 2006), and a few steps alone is a 15-month milestone (CDC). So for most babies, shoes are weeks or months away, and indoors the answer stays bare feet or socks with grips. The shoes in the box can wait in the box.

Head

When it is time: choose closed-toe, comfortable, flexible shoes with nonskid soles and room to grow; sneakers are a great choice. Skip wedges, inserts, high backs, and special arches: they have no proven benefit for most children and may make walking harder. A first pair usually lasts 2 to 3 months, so check the fit monthly (AAP). That's the whole list. The expensive pair with the molded sole isn't on it; the cheap flexible sneaker is. The guide's question is Does my baby need shoes to learn to walk?.

Body

Until then, the floor. Cruising and the first steps are learned by practice, thousands of steps and dozens of falls an hour once walking starts (Adolph et al., 2012), and bare feet feel the floor in a way a sole can't. Keep the practice space the kind where a fall is a thump on a diaper: gates at the top and bottom of stairs, mounted firmly to the wall studs (AAP). Walkers stay out of the house (AAP).

Try today

  1. Close on the father's thumb pressing the toe of a small soft sneaker on the baby's foot, the baby sitting on the mother's lap looking down at it, a second shoe on the step.

    The shoe fit check

    Time: 1 minute, if shoes have started; otherwise none · Does my baby need shoes to learn to walk? in the guide

    1. If your baby isn't walking outside yet, today's check is the box: close it, write the date on the lid, and leave it. Bare feet indoors (AAP).

    2. If shoes have started, put one on with the baby standing on your lap or the floor, and press the toe end: you want room to grow, about a thumb's width between the longest toe and the end.

    3. Bend the sole in your hand. It should fold easily at the ball of the foot; a stiff sole, a wedge, or a built-up arch goes back in the box (AAP).

    4. Write today's date inside the tongue. A first pair usually lasts 2 to 3 months; check again in a month (AAP).

    Make it work:

    Socks with grips on a slippery floor indoors; shoes are for outside.

Watch for

  • Normal

    feet that turn out or in, and toes that curl on a cold floor.

    Talk with your pediatrician

    if your baby uses one arm or leg much more than the other (AAP).

  • Normal

    a shoe pulled off and chewed within a minute of going on.

    Call 911

    if your baby is struggling for each breath or can barely cry (AAP).

  • Normal

    a drooly, off-their-food day with a new tooth.

    Call your pediatrician right away

    for signs of dehydration: no urine in more than 8 hours, dark urine, a very dry mouth, and no tears (AAP).

  • Normal

    knowing which thump means tears and which means nothing, from the next room.

    Call anyway

    if your baby just doesn't seem right to you. Trust your instincts; three hundred and ten days have built them (Lurie Children's).

For you

The mother's own feet in worn flat sneakers on a sidewalk beside the stroller's front wheel, the baby's bare feet dangling from the seat above, dappled afternoon shade.

Your own shoes. You've carried a baby who now weighs what a small suitcase weighs, up and down stairs, for ten months, in whatever was by the door. The AAP's list for the baby is a decent list for you too: comfortable, flexible, nonskid, room to move (AAP). And one line that isn't about shoes: severe swelling, redness, or pain of a leg or arm is on the CDC's list of urgent maternal warning signs for the full year after birth, so a leg that hurts or swells isn't a shoe problem, it's a call, and the person you call needs to know you were pregnant within the last year (CDC).

If you're the partner: the box of tiny shoes is the gift. Thank the giver, write the date on the lid, and buy her a pair of the flat, comfortable, nonskid kind instead, this week, in her size.

Sources

This guide is general education that summarizes published research and guidance from groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics, the CDC, and the WHO. It isn’t medical advice, and every child develops on their own timeline. Your pediatrician knows your child; if something feels wrong, call them. In an emergency, call 911.

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