The Gro Company Ollie The Owl Gro Anywhere Portable Blackout Blind with Suction Cups,

With the arrival of our daughter we decided that it was probably a good idea to fit blackout blinds, but after some discussion and looking at prices we decided that it was probably a bit expensive at the moment. Then a friend told me about the Gro Anywhere Blackout Blind. For £20 we could get a blackout blind that we could take anwhere? Surely that's too good to be true? It really isn't.The blind works really well. Yes, you do get a bit of light leakage around the edges, but it's so much better than curtains alone. I'm also thinking about modding the curtain a bit with some magnets in the right places on the window frame and sewed into the curtain to hold it in place which should all but eliminate the light leakage. Our frames aren't wide enough to stick the suction pads to, but if you have a wide flat frame you may be able to stick to that and get the same effect.Don't let my magnet idea give you the impression that the suckers aren't up to the job because they are. You may need to give them a lick (or dampen them) to get a really good suction grip, but I have a window that's 8 foot off the ground at the highest point and just over a foot at it's lowest and they hold it fine. I did initially have a couple of times when it came down due to excess material, but if you take the time to work out the best way of folding it (using the integrated Velcro tabs) then it easily holds it's own weight.It'll be great to have something we can take away on trips, and with the bag included this should be very easy. Just fold it up and off you go.The only con I've found is that if you're sticking this to an open window you need to open it first in order to get the best fit and it will have more light leakage than on a closed window, but the magnet adaptation should solve that issue. An open window also means that you're more likely to have it fall down due to wind.Overall though, it's great. Does the job brilliantly and at a reasonable cost. I'm such a fan of a dark room that I think we'll buy a second when my daughter moves into her own room so we can keep this one for ourselves.

Brilliant for anywhere you go. You can adapt size by folding it. Brought for daughter as her curtains were too thin. Had this for 8 years+ and it's still with us but currently standing in for our broken velux blind. We have taken away on holiday packs away neatly and easy to store.

We ordered this to use at home for our baby's nursery. It works perfectly and makes her room very dark. There are a few chinks of light that get in through the folds when the blind is adjusted to fit a smaller window but not enough to cause us any problems. The Velcro system to adjust the size is easy to use and effective. I found it very easy to put up the blind and it stayed up without any difficulty (it helps to breathe on the suction cups before sticking them to the window). It folds down easily in to a small bag and is very light weight, so we will definitely take it with us when travelling. The stars and moon pattern is pretty and the blind doesn't look out of place in the nursery.The one criticism that I have is that for someone like us who wishes to use the blind at home rather than when travelling then it would be helpful to be able to raise the blind during the day without completely removing it from the window each time. The addition of some extra Velcro at the top to allow us to loop it up and still leave the top of the blind attached to the window would have raised the rating to five stars.Overall, an easy to use and effective product that I am sure we will use for many years.

When the days started getting longer/brighter my son started waking up at all sorts of crazy times in the morning...this seemed like a cheaper option than buying new blinds at the moment because they'd need to be specially made for our window. It is quite large, not large enough for our bedroom window but it covered over half and kept out a fair bit of light buying me an extra hour or so in bed :). When we moved my son through to his own room we moved the blind with him, and it fits his window perfectly - actually it's a little big for it which is great because it blocks out all the light perfectly (bearing in mind that even his window still requires curtains that aren't a regular size!).When we first put it up a couple of the suction cups did fall down...a few times, but if you just dampen them slightly they stay put, when it was put up in my son's room we just dampened all of them as a precaution and it hasn't moved since :) so not a problem really.I'm really happy with this product, it does exactly what it promises, I'll be taking it with us whenever we stay away from home. As a parent, if your child wakes up with the sun and has more energy than an energiser bunny (which is to say more energy that you for sure!), I recommend getting this (or any black out blind actually but this can be a cheap temporary option).

Spot on!!As described this is easy to put up, portable so perfect for travelling and totally blacks out any light!We bought this for our stay in a caravan last summer for our then 6month old, it worked perfectly - made the room pitch black at night!Since returning I have used it in my LO's room as the sunrises through his window and although we have a blackout blind they never completely cover the window - and this totally stopped any sunlight getting through!I was very dubious about the suckers and if they would work but they do perfectly and stay stuck they do not fall off. It's also of such a large size that it fits lots of different sized windows.My only downside and this is of no fault of the product, but after long term use and not opening the window in the bedroom over winter mould started to form where moisture had built up behind the blackout blind, I now don't use it all the time as I need to open the window to ventilate and the blind makes it hard to do that.Overall amazing product as always from the Gro company!Please give me a thumbs up if you found this useful!