glasses to fit toddler

[bulby]

My 21 month old daughter has been wearing glasses for about the last 6 months. Although she hasn't got a large head the infant glasses dug in a bit and therefore she has to wear childrens glasses which have been cut down to fit (well sort of fit). Looking at photos they actually look bloody ridiculous as the frames are huge on her face. Many of the high street opticians don't even stock glasses for toddlers so we've kind of accepted this situation but surely this must be a problem for more people than us.......we genuinely thought we weren't going to get frames at all until vision express helped us out by chopping down the kiddie frames. Any body any suggestions for when we have to search for the next pair?

Hi Bulby, ds1 has worn glasses since he was 6 months, the first pair were a disaster, too big and slipped down all the time, but the second pair we have had for over a year and they are great. I think they are called como baby or baby vista, they come in blue, pink and white and are made from really soft plastic with no metal bits or hinges and as far as I can tell are indestructible. The optician moulds them to the child's face and you can re-mould it at home if they go out of shape. You might need to replace the strap they give you with your own elastic, we did that but I can't remember why now. If you are in London I think they stock them (plus lots of other ones) at Roger Pope www.rogerpope.co.uk (go to eyewear page and then children) but you could probably get another optician to order them in for you if you show them the web page? Hope this helps, I found it really difficult to find information online when ds1 first got his prescription, good luck x

Has your local hospital got a glasses shop in their eye department?

My dd has been wearing glasses since she was around 18 months old, and we have always managed to get some to fit from there... the "baby" wrap around the ear style never fitted her. Ours doesn't just do nasty looking NHS plastic frames, in fact, dd's glasses have always drawn compliments.

Thanks a lot folks. Not in London but will look at website..........Perhaps the problem is that our hospital is not an eye hub or major city hospital.

go to an independent opticians - Zeiss do a range of tiny frames for tinies. they are not expensive - we did them for just a few pounds on top of the voucher.

no one will stock them but a good independent should be able to order them in for you to look at and try without obligation.

I've just been looking for glasses for my 9 month old and went round as many opticians I could find. I found that Asda opticians actually had the best range (jelly beanz www.atlanticoptical.co.uk - go to catalogue and then jelly beanz) and Boots were the most helpful at trying to find something that fitted properly. So, it might be worth trying these. The only place that did the wraparound soft plastic was an independent opticians and they said that I would have to pay towards them as the NHS voucher didn't cover it all. Hope that helps!

Jo, my dd3 had those plastic ones too! Yep, totally indestructable! The elastic that comes on them is crap and they can pull the end and ping themselves with it or it goes loose and the glasses fall off.

We have a branch of Collisons at our eye unit, they are fab and have always given us a choice of suitable frames. I've googled them but they haven't got their own site, they have branches all over the place that are all listed separately on t'internet, maybe there is one near you.

the nhs voucher has always covered the cost of dd3s glasses, so far any way!