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Manchester Evening News
Manchester Evening News
National
Kieran Isgin

Mum-of-five's 'life-changing' hack to buy kids their back-to-school shoes - without dragging them to shops

A mum-of-five has divulged her secret life-changing hack to buying her children's school shoes without dragging them to the shops.

Terry Wheatley, 33, says her kids - all under the age of 10 - hate going shoe shopping and treat it as a nightmare. She added that taking them to the shops is an incredibly taxing task where she would have to take each individual kid on their own trip across five days, causing her to spend a fortune on petrol.

However, Terry has figured out her own way around this by making stencils of each of her children's feet. Harry, 10, Eloise, eight, Edith, six, Noah, four, and five-month-old Tommy all stood on a piece of cardboard which was then drawn around to get the accurate size and shape of their feet.

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She would then take the cardboard cut-outs to Tesco and buy all her children's shoes in one quick trip. Terry, from Wotton-under-Edge, Gloucestershire, said: "Shoe shopping is one of the most stressful activities with five kids, so I thought I’d make my life easier.

Terry would take the cardboard cutouts to the shop to make purchasing shoes a breeze (Terry Wheatley / SWNS)

“I know what style of shoes they all like so it was quite easy once I went into the shop. They have worn the shoes around the house and all of them fit like a glove.

“I made sure to make the stencils out of cardboard not paper so I could put each of them in the shoes to check the fit.”

The genius mum shared her hack on TikTok where she discovered many other parents had been using the trick to avoid painful shopping trips. Terry also developed other useful life hacks with her husband, Matthew Wheatley, 36.

Terry Wheatley and husband Matthew Wheatley (Terry Wheatley / SWNS)

Some of their other family tips include batch cooking meals and freezing individual portions to make dinner time much easier. She also has daily clothes drawers for each day of the week.

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