Saturday was no different from any other weekend now that the kids are back at school and activities are in full swing.

We had a two hour parent orientation meeting while two girls swam, which landed us 30 minutes late for birthday party number one for Ellie but just enough time to scarf back a dusty bunny and get Chloe to birthday party number two.

Greg then retrieved Ellie from birthday party number one with our apologies for the late delivery and drove to soccer game number one with Hanna.

We reconvened at home to snack, iron our delicates and get back out for soccer game number two.

Any given Saturday.

I took on the parent meeting while Greg and Chloe had some father-daughter bonding time. Saturday’s adventure: shoe shopping with Chloe.

I’ve mentioned Chloe’s foot odour problem so rather than tackle it head on, we decided to completely ignore it and just throw away the shoes in question and start from scratch.

I raced home with one or two of our kids in the minivan to make it to our next activity (details are sketchy) and Greg, doing a happy-Dad dance in the kitchen said, “Guess what? Chloe and I went shoe shopping. We think you’ll be very happy Mommy.”

Except I wasn’t happy when they flashed me the exact same pair of princess shoes I just bought for Chloe to wear as indoor shoes just a couple of days ago.

Those of you familiar with the concept of indoor and outdoor shoes will understand, there’s really only one rule with having a pair of shoes assigned to mud and grass clippings and one assigned to story time on a colourful carpet. They must not be identical or the child will never know which pair he/she should wear outside at recess and to come home at the end of the day.

I really thought that was just universally understood.

“But you said, ‘Buy anything. Let Chloe pick.’ I believe your exact words were, ‘I don’t care, just throw out the smelly ones.’”

I couldn’t believe the busiest day of the season was going to end with me being caught on a technicality.