Madeleine and the too-tight boot

Both Julia and Madeleine seem to have gone through growth spurts recently, and have found their shoes to be a little too tight for comfort. I've been particularly baffled by the fact that Madeleine's boots, a full size up from the current size she has been wearing, actually seemed to be tighter on her feet than any other shoes she wears. Because they have been so difficult to get on, I usually just throw her sneakers on instead, even if the weather is snowy, for the sake of time. Yesterday, however, we were heading out to pick Julia up from school in the middle of a snowstorm, and I decided to give the boots another try, thinking I probably just wasn't pushing the tongue up and heel back enough. I managed to get the left boot on without too much trouble, but again, in putting the right boot on, I experienced resistance. Madeleine screamed and wailed as I persisted in trying to shove her foot in, completely unable to accept the fact that size 4 boots would not fit my daughter's size 3 foot. When I finally got her foot in, the screaming didn't abate; in fact, it got worse. No degree of distraction seemed to work, no degree of comfort would soothe her. She had a few attempts at "Atzat?" before breaking back into a high-pitched wail. I was at a total loss, not understanding what was so terrible about wearing these boots, and incredibly confused as to why they seemed so tight. Racking my brain to figure out what the problem could be, I came up with the following possibilities:

-Her right foot is slightly larger than her left foot, making the boot uncomfortably tight on that foot
-The boot size was mislabeled and they were really size 3
-Madeleine was coming down with something and was falling apart at the drop of a hat
-The fall she took on Monday, giving herself a black eye, was worse than I thought and she was suddenly showing signs of a concussion (after all, the dr did tell me to look for inconsolable crying about 24-48 hours after the incident.)
-Madeleine did not want to have anything on her feet and was having an incredible tantrum about it

Here is the possibility I did not consider:

-There was a chocolate chip cookie stuffed into the toe of the right boot, making it cramped and painful to have her foot shoved in there.

What finally tipped me off was an attempt to feel her toes inside the boots; the left side had plenty of room between toes and top of shoe, while the right side felt hard as a rock. I took her boot off, expecting to find a toy in there, or maybe a tissue, but after reaching in and encountering something stale and rock hard, and pulling my hand out to find it covered in chocolate stains, I realized our situation. The last time we had all gone sledding, Julia had requested we make chocolate chip cookies and have hot cocoa upon returning home. Apparently Madeleine didn't gobble up her cookie as I'd thought. So for two weeks that cookie has been sitting in the toe of her boot, and for two weeks I've attempted to shove that boot on her little foot, wondering what on earth was the problem. Never in a million years would I have guessed correctly. After jabbing a fork into the toe of the boot over and over to break the cookie into rock-hard crumbs, I was able to free up the space and get the boot back on; not surprisingly, this time it elicited no tears, and we were on our merry way.