Is irony important to "A Pair of Silk Stockings"?

In the exposition of "A Pair of Silk Stockings" by Kate
Chopin, the main character, Mrs. Sommers, who has come into the sum of fifteen dollars,
ponders for days about whether to invest it or to spend it:  "She did not wish to act
hastily, to do anything she might afterward regret."  During the night, she reaches her
decision:  she will buy things for the children, and she is excited about the idea of
"her brood" looking fresh and dainty and new gives her
hapiness.

The irony, of course, is that Mrs. Sommers does
not, in fact, act prudently at when she goes shopping.  For, after she touches the silk
stockings, the repressed desire to pamper herself a little surfaces.  She purchases the
stockings, changes into them in the ladies' waiting-room, and delights in the feel of
the silk against her skin:  "She was not thinking at all."  Mrs. Sommers succumbs to her
desire to pamper herself and spends the money upon herself in contrast to her
characterization in the exposition of Chopin's story.