Paper Dolls for Boys

My 5 year old son likes to watch me when I am making something.  When I made a set of Betsy McCall paper dolls to mail to my niece in Florida, he was fascinated with them.  And then he asked me to make him some, but with just the boys.



I assumed it would be fairly simple to find a set of knights or something similar, so I easily agreed.  It was not easy, in fact I only found one.  Bobby Bobbs was drawn by Orpha Kliner as part of a family series of paper dolls and published July 1925.  It is now in the public domain, but the only image I found was on flickr and the user had disabled downloading and printing.  I made a screen shot, tweaked the image in photoshop, and printed the page out.  (Not an infringement of rights since the image is in the public domain.)

I laminated the page and cut the boy and his outfits out.  Then I made a "Paper Adventure" book with appropriate backgrounds to go with the outfits.  I laminated the few pages of the book, and bound it.  I put removable adhesive on the back off all the clothes, and J has had a wonderful time changing the outfits and sending the little boy off on adventures.  The outfits are: an aviation suit, a fishing outfit, a baseball uniform, radio operator pajamas, and a "best suit" with fourth of July accessories; there is also a dog and some other accessories like a radio and some fish.

This is a great activity to throw in your purse - its small (5.5" x8.5") and the pieces all stick to the pages so they won't get lost.  It can be played with quietly, and is a nice change from the coloring books that I usually give J when he has to sit quietly for an hour.  If you have girls there are a bazillion cute little paper dolls that would be easy to make a book with.  You could also print onto magnet sheets and have a magnetic play scene instead.

The dog house image I used was not in the public domain - as soon as I get a chance I will find a free image and upload the book I made.