‘Crawling’ – A baby’s foot contains no fully formed bones. Instead the shape is mapped out in soft pliable bone, similar to cartilage. As your child grows, their soft bones will ossify, becoming more and more solid. During this time, the bones are protected by a layer of subcutaneous tissue, better known as ‘puppy fat’. Despite this, these little bones can easily be bent out of shape without you noticing and without your child feeling any pain.
‘Cruising’ – As your child starts to stand upright the soft cartilage-like structure in their feet will start to ossify, turning into bone or bony tissue. Gradually the shape of the fully grown foot will start to form. At this stage there are still large gaps between the young bones, so the foot is still prone to being bent out of shape.
‘Walking’ – By the time your little one is walking, there will be 25 bones forming in your child’s foot, still with gaps between them. It’s important that these bones are allowed to grow naturally, otherwise they can become misaligned. The navicular bone – situated where traditional shoes are usually fastened – is yet to form. Instead, there’s a fatty pad on the instep where the arch will slowly develop over the next few years.
This is why it’s so important that our children have shoes that give them the room they need to grow and what makes Moccstars soft, loose fitting moccasins ideal for every child’s developing foot!
Moccstars were made for walking in……..
