Recently at our neighborhood park, I noticed a little girl wearing adorable sandals emanating tiny “eek, eek, eek” noises as she walked. At first, I thought I was hearing things – who wants their child to sound like a rubber duck being squeezed? It turns out the girl was wearing Wee Squeaks, shoes designed to help a child learn to walk properly. The idea is that toddlers will be motivated by trying to make the shoe squeak, and in order to do that, they have to walk heel-to-toe instead of on their tiptoes. A cushion in the heel forces air through a nozzle, making a squeak. At the Wee Squeaks web site, you can hear the squeak by clicking on the button in the bottom right-hand corner of the page. The company claims one advantage of this function is that “parents love the safety feature of knowing where their child is at all times” (because a toddler’s ordinary propensity to talk non-stop all day long is apparently not enough to let you know where they are). If you can overlook the possibility that the sound might drive you crazy, Wee Squeaks come in a variety of attractive designs – glossy sandals, snap sandals, pink tennis shoes, brown tennis shoes and camouflage tennis shoes. Best of all, the squeaker can be removed from the shoe by an adult. The hot pink crystal sandals (pictured) are $28.95; other styles are similarly priced. If sound isn’t enough, you can also find children’s shoes that glow in the dark. Skechers.com has a boys’ shoe called the Luminator Frontier-Reflectors, with laces and designs on the side that glow green in darkness ($45). Skechers also carries girls’ shoes with built-in blinking lights, such as the S Lights Bikers-Saucy in white or turquoise ($42). Speaking of shoes that light up, one longtime standard at Stride Rite has been the Fire Engine toddler boys’ shoe, featuring a fire engine surrounded with red lights that blink with each step. Thankfully, they do not come with a built-in siren ($40).