Happy Little Soles

In the search of some toddler shoes for Emmeline, I stumbled upon an online shop that looks both fun and appealing in it’s colourful design, is easy to use and fully laden with high quality children’s shoes from various brands. Happy Little Soles is a family store run by a fantastic lady and barefoot enthusiast, Kate! I think finding the right shoes for a child is massively important and have always advocated that being barefoot as much as possible is ideal for the ever expanding tootsies and developing postures of our little ones.

 

When Jude was younger, he wore orthotics inside his shoes that strapped round his ankles (and for a short while went part the way up his lower leg) but after couple of years of watching him struggle to walk and sweating away in the summer with his clumpy shoes, I read up on foot structure and decided to ditch the orthotics and let him go au natural. I was always told that his orthotics were meant to help develop his muscles, but to me I really struggled to understand how something holding his foot rigidly in place would do anything other than decrease muscle tone because his muscles weren’t being used! Now I’m not saying everyone can do this, but for us it was clearly the best option ever. No more frustrating orthotic appointments with Jude having to sit with plaster on his feet to make moulds…he was FREE to move naturally and most importantly, work his ankle and foot muscles. Thankfully, it worked and slowly Jude’s massively in-turned feet (he would literally walk on the insides of his feet) flattened and now he walks almost entirely flat on his soles.

 

So you can see why I adore the whole bare foot notion!

 

And as Happy Soles state on their website:

Happy Little Soles is committed to making the best barefoot shoes available in the UK and to offering a variety of different brands so you can be sure to find something to suit your child’s feet. We personally select every pair of shoes on our website, making sure they meet our strict criteria to be as close to barefoot as possible.”

 

And BOY do they do that. Not only did I find some beautiful barefoot inspired shoes for Emmeline, they have a VEGAN range too!!!!  So after Elsa’s revelation that she no longer wants to wear leather, I know where we will be going to order her some beautiful, ethical shoes for both school and home.

 

It’s a really simple process to find out your child’s perfect size and Kate even gave me tips for measuring a fidgety toddlers feet via our very regular email contact. I stood Emmeline on a bit of paper and folded it in front of her toes and behind her heel and then measured between the marks. Perfecto! Kate also asked for photos of her feet from each angle which was kind of embarrassing as on one foot, Emmeline has a black toenail and on the other she had a big scratch down her big toe. “A great barefooter!” Kate exclaimed…phew…

 

SO a day after ordering them, Emmeline’s Livie and Luca “Hayes” shoes arrived and they are simply beautiful, well structured and fit her amazingly…here is our experience in pictures.

 

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And the recipients reaction…

 

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Finally testing them out for comfort and speed…

 

 

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As you can see within the first wear, Emmeline the nutty toddler was loving her new shoes (yes she is running through the alcohol section of a supermarket). I’m going to speak to Kate this week about buying some shoes for the other two this week because a) Jude has skinny feet and we’ve alway struggled to find him a perfect fit and Elsa needs some decent quality non-leather school shoes 🙂 I’ll report back…

 

But for now, I’m so excited to have found Happy Little Soles and would really recommend them to anyone looking for something a bit more personal than the usual high street chain shoe shops.

 

 

Sparkles & Stretchmarks Sunday Best

8 Comments

  1. Kat Eat.Love.Live 20/09/2016
  2. Kim Carberry 20/09/2016
    • admin 20/09/2016
  3. Emma Plus Three 20/09/2016
    • admin 20/09/2016
  4. Hayley Mclean 24/09/2016

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