I Can Tie My Shoes - Just like Lil' Bill

We don't watch much TV in our house because we don't pay for cable. One of Joel's cousins gave us a Nickelodeon DVD with one episode from a variety of their shows - 1 Dora, 1 Blue's Clues, 1 Backyardagains, etc. We have one episode of Lil' Bill (Bill Cosby when he was little) where he does not know how to tie his shoes. He tries and tries and lots of people try to help him but he does not learn how to tie his shoes until his dad teaches him a little rhyme.
Sophia watched that episode over and over again for the last month. I should have known that something was up but I just thought that she was tired of the one Dora episode on the DVD. Well, she decided that she could try to tie her shoes. She would just say the rhyme and she would have it. So about two weeks ago she started working on it. The problem is that Sophia has some of her mother's perfectionist tendencies so you have to get it right the first time. It was not working for her. She would try, get mad, throw the shoe, stomp around the house, throw a temper tantrum. I would try to tell her that Lil Bill was in kindergarten. He had not just turned 4 when he learned how to tie his shoes. That I was in kindergarten when I learned. really, 4 year olds did not need to tie their shoes. This did not deter her. She was supposed to get it right NOW.
Well things came to a head on Tuesday. She tried and tried but could not get her shoe tied. Over the weekend Aunt Gretchen had taught her a new way and she thought she had figured it out but still could not do it when she came home. So she got so upset we could not go anywhere all day. Any time we would try to leave the house she needed her shoes on and that meant she had to tie them. She missed going to the reading at the library, going to the park, etc. It was quite a day and I was exhausted. Finally, by the end of the day we needed to go shopping so I took away her shoes and told her she could try that night and every night but not when we needed to go anywhere during the day. So we tried again that night and she got it. I could not believe it.
I bet she is the only kid in her class that can tie her shoes. She told me one other girl tried but couldn't. (Not that she really knows who can and can't tie their shoes). Wow, it sure took a lot of fits to get there. (I think that I may have had those "fits" all through my school and even college years so we have a long way to go.) I do have to say that I was impressed how persistent she was through it all. Not quietly persistent but at least persistent.