Eye patch tutorial

My daughter is the unfortunate owner of very poor eyesight and also a squint, both are corrected by wearing glasses, which she has done, with very little complaining, since the age of 18 months old (proud Mummy moment!).  In addition to all this, we are exercising her weaker eye (the left one), with 2 hours of patching a day.  The sticky patches the hospital gave us were, to be honest, useless, and kept peeling off, but why use something like that, when Mum can make one of these... a cute, pink eye patch, out of felt.

I decided to post this as a full tutorial, so many craft bloggers have children, I figured there will be others out there who may find this useful.

You will need - light pink felt, dark pink felt, yellow felt, black felt, a button, embroidery thread, pins, a needle, and a pair of scissors, and of course, ...some glasses!

Print out the templates so that the basic eye patch shape is roughly 7 x 10 cm, and the flower is 5 cm wide.

Cut the patch template, making the 3 slits as indicated.  Fold over, as below, and sew (I have done this on the machine, but you could stitch it by hand)

Pin together the 2 edges of the center slit, trapping the folded over arm holder loop in between, and sew.

Trim off any excess felt from the inner seams and turn the patch the right way round.  Try it on the glasses for size, and also trim the outside edges if needed (probably a good idea at this stage to get the person who will be wearing the patch to try it on to check the fit)

Pin the lense sleeve into position,

and sew.

Repeat the basic patch shape in black felt, remember to sew it the reverse way round this time, as the 2 need to fit together with all seams on the inside.  Trim any excess off the black and blanket stitch both pieces together, all the way round the edge.

Attach the flower decoration using the button by sewing onto the lense sleeve. Place the patch on the glasses, and using some sharp scissors, poke a small hole through the whole patch, for the nose pad to slot through.

The patch can be used on either the left or the right side of the glasses simply by turning it upside down, Lucy's goes on the right, covering up her good eye, so she is forced to use her left one.  This is the girly version, you could easily make a boy's version by using red and blue felt, and decorate it with a star sheriff's badge, or a bug shape.

No doubt, in the future, I will be making more of these as Luke also has a slight squint, and it's best to catch these things early, that's when patching has the most effect.