Whether your kid has lazy eye or wants to be a pirate, this DIY eye patch is rad

Guest post by Krissy Sherman Bonning
#How-To & DIY#big kids#diy#lil kids#medical conditions
All photos by B. Inspired Mama.

One of the unfortunate things that my oldest kids have inherited from both their father and I is poor vision. Amblyopia, or lazy eye, to be exact. While Sawyer has been wearing glasses since he was 18 months old, his amblyopia has just now progressed to the point where he needs to wear an eye patch. He needs to wear a patch over his stronger eye for two hours per day to give his weaker eye some practice and exercise.

I remember HATING my black plastic eye when I was his age. My mom would put it on me before putting me on the bus in the morning. And I would take it off as soon as she was out of sight! (Could be why my amblyopia is so terrible now.) So I set out on a mission to make a patch that Sawyer wouldn’t mind wearing quite so much. And this is what I came up with and how you can make your own!

What you need

  • Paper and marker for making the template
  • Fabric of your child’s choice (with a small print)
  • Felt
  • Thread
  • Sewing machine or needle for hand-sewing

Want to know how to make your own? Head over to Krissy’s blog to get all the details!

Guest Post By: Krissy Sherman Bonning

Krissy Sherman Bonning is a former art teacher turned full time mama of three. She blogs at B.Inspired Mama where she shares simple ideas for fun arts and crafts, easy kids recipes, preschool learning, and creative parenting.

Comments on Whether your kid has lazy eye or wants to be a pirate, this DIY eye patch is rad

  1. I just bookmarked this page. My son has Ptosis (droopy eyelid). Our ped. eye doctor thinks an eye patch is in our sons near future. Thanks for the great tutorial.

  2. I don’t have a medical use for this but reading this, I thought “what a kick-ass mom!!” Great imagination, and so so awesome.

  4. This is awesome! I had a lazy eye as a kid and had to wear my patch to school in the first grade and I HATED it!. It was also a very easy way for the other kids to see me as different and to tease me about it. I love the idea that your little guy is wearing his patch as a rockin’ fashion statement. Good for you both!!

  6. My son was telling me the other day that he wants to poke out his eye so he can wear an eyepatch. I ought to make him this.

    On a side note, when I was a kid, my mom once dated a guy with an eye patch. She said it was hot, that it made him look “swarthy”. Unfortunately for him, he only was wearing it for an injury that eventually healed. When he no longer needed it, my mom lost interest and dumped him! Lol! But to all the people who wear eye patches or who’s kids do, remember, some people think eye patches are hot!

  7. I had to wear an eye patch as well, and it was an actual brown ugly bandaid they would put over my eye so I wouldn’t take it off. It was traumatic for a little girl to have people literally follow me around the playground yelling “ugly pirate” etc. And yes, our sadist doctor said I had to wear them at school, at recess because that is when my eye would get “the most training”. On the upside to this, I don’t even have to wear glasses anymore! I think this glasses cover eyepatch would have been a sweet alternative!

  8. If I remember correctly I didn’t mind wearing it all that much (I had a lame flesh-coloured oval band-aid too, instead of a piratey one that covers an eyeglass, but I got to choose one of these rub-on kind of stickers to put on it every day, so that wasn’t too bad), but I did get very tired and cranky after a couple of hours.
    The first time I wore it to school a girl asked: “do you have a broken eye?”, hahahaa; this is one of my very first memories!

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