the frugal girl's best friend?

'Whasis for, Nana?' asks my two and a half year old grandson. He's sitting on the floor of our closet, and has just found a shoe tree.
'I'll show you,' I say, and root around for its mate.
Although I have a pair or two of plastic ones, these are old-fashioned, the business-end wooden and painted silver. So I demonstrate by sliding them into my one pair of closed summer shoes, and I start thinking how much I owe to this simple device. Or rather, how much they've saved my shoes over the years.
For instance, I have a pair of high-heeled (3 inches at a guess) brown leather boots. Made in Brazil, I believe. These are now more than a dozen winters old and I still get compliments when I wear them. But they'd probably have been in worse rather than goodish shape, maybe even long cast out, if it hadn't been for my shoe trees.
I don't have any of the fashionable extremely high-heeled shoes, especially as I'm sure I'd never be able to walk in them. Still, years ago I had a pair of 6 inch heels. They were Italian -- Amalfi I think. My mother passed them on to me because they were just that bit too big for her. Also they were white. No, don't shudder, rather trust me when I say they looked good. Anyhow, those shoes were amazingly comfortable and easy to walk in, even when I was pounding London city pavements.
These days of course you'll mostly find me in 'haus shuhe' in winter and sandals in summer. My one pair of closed shoes for rainy days are waiting patiently, having a rest while improving their shape for whenever. Thank you, shoe trees!