This shoe is PERFECT!  They are hard for your baby to take off, protect and keep your baby's feet warm AND they allow your baby to still use their foot muscles when walking!  My son is just over 1 and has been walking for about a month now and we've had these shoes for about 4 month.  They took some getting used to for him because, lets face it, what baby doesn't prefer to be bare footed?  But, after a while, he doesn't even notice them!  Now that my son is walking everywhere, I tried some harder soled shoes, thinking he would like them ok, but he never let go of the wall and then proceeded to sit down and whine.  I realized he couldn't walk well in the harder soled shoes.  These soft shoes allow your kid to walk as nature intended (using toes to grip), and they like that!

These shoes get an A+ in my book.

Oh, FYI, my son is a bit of a chubster and the elastic will leave small red marks around his ankles, but he doesn't seem to mind and they don't restict his movement at all.