Yesterday was a pretty good “Special Day” with Daniel. In my perennial struggle to spend quality and quantity time with my children, I’ve re-instituted Special Days (yet again). Joshua and I are thick as thieves inventing our Path of Ziba Bible game (this will probably not be the final name of the game, but it gives us a chuckle) — it will, hopefully, appear on a future blog post. Rachel and I recently spent time working on her fledgling website, which may absorb our collective energies for a while. But I didn’t have a good idea as to what to do with Daniel for his Special Day.

Then it came to me. A few weeks back, as we began to plan our attendance at Kathy’s brother’s wedding, Daniel expressed a desire to wear some ‘cool clothes’. In this age of alternative attire, I groaned as my mind immediately conjured up a picture:

baggy, moth-eaten pants slung low across the hips
a T-shirt with some sort of obscene or shocking statement emblazoned across it
a baseball cap worn backwards

A little questioning, however, revealed a different definition of ‘cool’: Daniel wanted to wear a suit.

Daniel usually dresses for action, not to make a statement.

We’ve come a long way, when the best way to shake your fist at authority and swim against the stream of culturally-appropriate attire is to wear a suit and tie. Here in the Seattle area, it is rare to see anyone is ‘business formal’ (or even dressed toward the nicer end of ‘business casual’) unless they are visiting sales or marketing types, trying to foist some multi-million-dollar software or hardware product upon the unsuspecting latte-drinkers.

Daniel’s motivations are, no doubt, much less sinister – I think he just wanted to ‘look nice’ at the wedding for Kathy’s family, or maybe when attending church locally. It is interesting to see my children become more self-aware and begin to concern themselves with how they are perceived by those outside the immediate family.

So I got online and checked into the price of a new sport jacket for a boy Daniel’s size. He’d seen a suit (or at least a blazer) at Target for about $50 a month or two ago – it seemed evident that this was on the lower end of what was available, at least compared to other offerings.

As I thought of Daniel’s string-bean figure and rapid growth, I despaired of the idea of spending $100-$200 on a suit, only to see him outgrow it in a matter of weeks. Then a happy idea occurred to me – the local Thrift Store!

These shoes just didn’t seem quite right for his new look.

We jumped in our Honda and rushed over to Value Village, finding there (after some diligent search) a dark charcoal suit that seemed perfectly tailored for Daniel’s body (thank You, God!). After much deliberation, we chose a couple of shirts, but decided to also swing by Target to see what they had to offer, especially in the short-sleeve variety. Finding a versatile shirt there, we finished at the local GoodWill Thrift Store, where we discovered some brand-new black shoes in Daniel’s size that seemed sturdy enough for his 10-year-old lifestyle.

As we acquired each part of the outfit, Daniel became more and more excited. Rushing home to change before Kathy and the kids returned from Costco, Daniel and I paced nervously in the driveway, waiting to show off his new duds.

I would definitely buy a multi-million-dollar software product from this boy.

We spent a total of $29 for a suit jacket, matching pants, three shirts and a pair of shoes (we’re still in the market for a belt and a kid’s clip-on tie). Considering the fun he has already enjoyed from the clothes, it was a bargain. He borrowed one of my ties to complete the ensemble.

Now if I can just get him to wear the outfit a couple of times before he grows two inches and the pants become high-waters.

Daniel salutes his beloved father …

Tim
Project 365 — Day 157

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