Children’s feet take up to 18 years to develop and wearing suitable footwear is crucial to their growth and development. Feet grow very quickly in the early years, an average of 2 sizes a year. It is advisable to get them checked every 3 months or so, although they are unlikley to need new shoes each time, it’s easy to get caught out by a sudden growth spurt.
About Sole Adventurer
My obsession with feet comes from a combination of factors including; training in Reflexology, a career in health care and disability analysis. I am passionate about simple everyday holistic health care, the benefits of healthy exercise and illness prevention. I believe that by developing awareness of ensuring children’s feet are properly looked after in their early years, will benefit them from fewer problems affecting their growth and development in later life.
Happy Feet = Smiling Faces
When my children were smaller I struggled to get their feet properly fitted or to buy shoes that I liked, and would travel miles to specialist children’s shoe shops outside of East Sussex.
Sole Adventurer is the result of years of fantasizing about opening a business and being able to share my passion for feet and shoes with a wider audience.
Being a member of the Society of Shoe Fitters, who provided comprehensive training and on-going advise to the industry, is your guarentee that your child’s feet are in good hands.
Why Fitting Matters
………………and why I don’t sell on-line
Feet are unique
No two feet are the same and there is no such thing as a standard size. Measuring your child’s foot length is just the starting point to getting a shoe which will fit their unique shape perfectly. Badly fitting shoes can cause damage in a child’s formative years that can affect them in later life.
Love your feet
Feet are one of the hardest working components of the body, and unfortunately too often ignored.
The footwear you choose for your child has a direct impact on their foot development and damage to bone structure and muscle development in these crucial years can have a life long detrimental impact on future lifestyle choices and leading to long term pain conditions affecting multiple parts of the muscular skeletal system.
There is no substitute for hands-on fitting.
On-line shopping may appear to provide an easy solution, especially in these recent times, but how often is it that when the package arrives it’s not quite right, the fit isn’t comfortable, the quality not what was expected or the colour doesn’t match what you thought you were getting?
A trained shoe fitter will not only measure your child’s feet, but assess the way they move, consider growing room, and advise on the best shoe for their unique needs. No two shoes fit the same even if they show the same size on the box and a shoe fitter may try different sizes of different brands to get it right! Measuring length is usually not enough, and an assessment of the whole shape is required, considering length of toes or high and low instep.
Young children will know straight away when a shoe fits perfectly and they can hop and skip with bountiful energy. However, they are less able to express when it is not quite right, how when they start running the shoe is slipping or just doesn’t mould with their foot to a comfortable fit.
This is why buying off the peg or on-line is just no substitute for the hands-on fitting expertise, which in the long run will be less expensive than frequently having to return those “not quite right” items or simply buying shoes a child won’t wear.