Personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories

Abstract

Personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories for a child's imaginative play prepared from personal photographic images of a child, parents, siblings, grandparents, friends, pets, personal toys, clothing, accessories, houses, rooms within houses, furniture, vacation trip images and other items from a child's familiar surroundings applied to the adhesive surface of a magnetic sheet material, cutting out the images with the magnetic backing for placement on a metallic surface such as a refrigerator or other appliances, or on the wall of a room painted with magnetic paint. The method of creating the paper dolls and accessories allows for the participation of children with parents and other family members providing hours of quality time together. The personal paper dolls and accessories created from personal photographic images can be preserved as a family keepsake of styles and trends that can be passed on through generations.

Description

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates generally to paper dolls and accessories suited for a child's imaginative play. More particularly, the invention relates to personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories prepared from photographic images captured from actual everyday family life for the child's imaginative play.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

For centuries children, especially little girls have been playing with paper dolls made of paper, cardboard, fabric pasted to cardboard, plywood, and other materials. Generally, these dolls have had and most continue to have generic faces, figures, and accessories, and are mass produced using machines with pre-fabricated molds. In recent years, the generic faces and figures of paper dolls and other dolls in general have been replaced by the images of teen idols, super heroes, heroines and the like. There is a need in the art for paper dolls that depict everyday people that a child can relate to such as a father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, brother, sister, relatives, friends, neighbors, pets, personal toys, etc., as well as accessories and furniture in a child's familiar surroundings, re-living vacations, visits to grandparents etc. using photographic images from those trips. Such personal paper dolls, accessories, and memorabilia add a personal dimension to a child's imaginative play time. A child can for instance use a grandmother or grandfather paper doll and pretend that they are talking to them or use cut out images of the rooms in a grandparent's home and pretend that they are visiting the grandparents who are perhaps in another city, state or country and who the child rarely gets to see. This type of imaginative play using personal paper dolls, accessories, and other items in the familiar surroundings of a child's world creates a sense of comfort and well being in the mind of a child and helps bring children and adults in a family closer together.

The use of magnets to attach clothing and accessories to paper dolls is well known in the art. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 2,363,914 discloses vertically spaced magnets embedded on the front face of a paper doll cut out from cardboard, plywood or like material to which clothing, bearing metallic plates corresponding to the magnets can be attached. U.S. Pat. No. 6,790,117 relates to a composition toy with a body template embedded with magnetic elements on which clothing embedded with magnet attraction elements can be placed. U.S. Pat. No. 6,945,841 discloses customizable dolls of different shapes and sizes constructed of materials like cloth, plastic or rubber with interchangeable faces constructed of fabric, paper, cardboard etc., having likeness to persons or animals known to the child. The removable face members are connected to the face of the doll through the placement of magnets located behind or under the face portion and within the doll body. In the above mentioned patents, the use of magnets is predominantly through the strategic placement of magnets within or on the surface of the paper dolls and accessories in order to hold parts of the doll or its accessories together. U.S. Pat. No. 5,178,573 describes a doll set with a ferromagnetic backing panel with a human figure either applied by printing to paper lying over the front of a ferromagnetic backing panel or cut from magnetic material, to be magnetically adhered to the steel sheet and with clothing and accessories cut out from semi-flexible, ceramic magnetic material capable of being interchangeably placed over the figure. This concept just like the others depicts an impersonal, generic paper doll and accessories.

The present invention specifically relates to personal paper dolls and accessories created from actual photographic images of a child, parents, siblings, grandparents, relatives, pets, toys, accessories and living surroundings that a child experiences in day to day life, thereby changing the setting for a child's imaginative play from fictional to real life and personal. It eliminates the need for construction of molded generic doll faces and figures from various materials in order for the child to experience make-believe play. Cut outs of color and black and white photographs of family members, pets, personal toys, friends and the like and accessories including familiar furniture used by the child or parents or grandparents applied to magnetic sheets with adhesive surface provide hours of imaginative play when mounted on a refrigerator door or wall coated with magnetic paint. U.S. Pat. No. 5,666,712 describes the creation of two and three dimensional designs on metallic or magnetic painted surfaces and U.S. Pat. No. 4,952,153 discloses a magnetic toy having various shaped magnetic pieces that can be retained on metallic surfaces such as the refrigerator and dishwasher doors in the kitchen. Neither of these patents envisions the use of personalized paper dolls and accessories that can be mounted on the refrigerator door or other metallic and magnetic paint applied surfaces like the present invention does.

A more specific objective of the present invention is for the children themselves to participate in creating personalized paper dolls and accessories with their parents, promoting hours of quality time together as a family. The paper dolls and accessories thus created can become family keepsakes and memorialize styles and trends of particular generations that can be passed on to future generations. The child can store these prepared personal paper dolls and accessories in a craft box when not engaged in imaginative play and create new sets of paper dolls and accessories using updated photographs of family, new house, new pet, new toy and the like.

These and other features and advantages of the present invention will become obvious to one skilled in the art through the summary of the invention and the claims that follow.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories that can be used in a child's imaginative play. The object of the invention is to provide a personal alternative to the generic paper dolls and accessories that are commonly used in a child's imaginative play. More specifically, the invention allows the child to participate in creating personalized paper dolls and accessories of people and objects in a child's familiar surroundings thereby giving parents and children hours of quality time together. It is another object of the present invention to preserve the personalized paper dolls and accessories as family keepsakes of styles and trends that can be passed on through generations.

Personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories in the present invention are created by applying photographic images of the child, parents, siblings, grandparents, relatives, friends, pets, personal toys, accessories, child's room, rooms in the family house, grandparents house and rooms within houses, vacation scenes and the like to magnetic sheets with adhesive surfaces. Specific images are then cut out from these magnetic-backed photographs with a pair of scissors or other sharp instrument. These cut-out personal paper dolls and accessories can then be stored in a metallic carrying case or other craft box and carried by the child from room to room or taken on a trip. In the preferred embodiment of the invention, the carrying case is made of metal so that the inside and outside surfaces can also be used as play areas.

In a preferred embodiment of the invention the child uses the refrigerator door, dishwasher door or other appliances with metallic surfaces or on the wall of a room painted with magnetic paint to display the magnetized paper dolls and accessories and engages in imaginative play. A child could for instance use the cut-outs of the grandparent's house or specific rooms within the house and paper dolls of the grandparents themselves to pretend visiting them and their house or for the grandparents to be visiting the child's house. This helps in adding a personal dimension to the child's imaginative play especially if the grandparents live in another city, state or country.

In another embodiment of the invention an entire house whether that of the child's own or grandparent's house or another house with which the child is familiar, perhaps a friend's or relative's house can be created as a paper doll house using photographs of the rooms and furniture within the rooms of the respective houses and assembling them on a refrigerator door, or other metallic door, or on a wall painted with magnetic paint.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The ensuing drawings of the present invention are for illustrative purposes only and should not be construed to limit the scope of the invention.

FIG. 1 illustrates the process of applying the photographic image of a child to the adhesive side of the magnetic sheet.

FIG. 2 illustrates the process of preparing the cut-out of the paper doll from the photograph image attached to the magnetic sheet.

FIG. 3 illustrates the paper doll cut outs and accessories along with the carrying case for transporting them.

FIG. 4 illustrates the concept for the refrigerator doll house compiled from the photographic images of the rooms of the child's or grandparents or other house.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provides for the use of personalized paper dolls and accessories in a child's imaginative play setting. The use of personalized paper dolls and accessories makes for a more realistic imaginative playtime for children in their formative years and helps to create a more harmonious and closer bond with their parents, siblings, grandparents, relatives, friends, and pets and in the use of their toys, accessories and surroundings.

FIG. 1 illustrates the process of applying a personal photographic image 10 of a child to the adhesive surface 16 of a magnetic sheet 12 of the type known commercially as Adhes-A-Mag (1 ft×2 ft sheet manufactured by Magnetic Specialty, LLC.). A protective sheet of paper 14 overlaying the adhesive surface 16 is first removed before the photographic image 10 is placed on the adhesive surface 16 of the magnetic sheet 12. Alternatively, a printable magnetic sheet manufactured by Avery Dennison Corporation may be used to print the photographic image directly on the sheet, but the former method is preferable as the print quality of the image printed directly on the magnetic sheet is not as good. Other photographic images of dolls, accessories, furniture, rooms, pets, toys and the like mentioned previously in the embodiment of the present invention can be applied to the adhesive surface 16 of the magnetic sheet 12 in a similar manner.

FIG. 2 illustrates preparing the cut-out of photographic image 10 after applying the image to the adhesive surface of the magnetic sheet. Cut-outs of other photographic images depicting parents, siblings, grandparents, pets, toys, clothing, accessories and the like mentioned previously in the embodiment of the present invention are also prepared in a similar manner.

FIG. 3 illustrates the prepared cut-outs of the dolls and accessories along with the carrying case 18. In an exemplary embodiment of the invention, the carrying case is metallic. Craft boxes made of other materials as well are contemplated in this embodiment to the invention. The invention contemplates the easy replacement of the personal paper dolls and accessories if damaged or the addition of new dolls and accessories as people and surroundings in a child's personal life change over a period of time.

FIG. 4 illustrates the concept of the refrigerator doll house 19 composed of the room, furniture and accessories in a child's or grandparents or other house. The doll house can be taken apart and assembled on another metallic or magnetic painted surface. For instance, if the parent wishes to keep an eye on the child while she/he is in the kitchen preparing food, the child may assemble the doll house on the refrigerator door and engage in imaginative play.

The principle objective of the present invention is in not just physically assembling and creating the personal paper dolls and accessories, but a means for parents and children to spend quality time together by allowing the children to participate in the creation of the personal paper dolls and accessories for their imaginative play.

The foregoing description of the invention with the preferred embodiments should not be construed to limit the scope of the invention. It should be understood and obvious to one skilled in the art that the embodiments of the invention thus described may be further modified without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as set forth in the claims that follow.

Claims

1. Personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories comprising:

a plurality of personal paper dolls and accessories;

said plurality of personal paper dolls and accessories prepared from cut-outs of personal photographic images;

said cut-outs of personal photographic images prepared by applying said personal photographic images to adhesive surface of magnetic sheet material;

said cut-outs of personal paper dolls and accessories prepared with magnetic sheet material capable of attaching to at least one metallic surface.

2. The personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories of claim 1, wherein the cut-outs of photographic images are of the child, siblings, parents, grandparents, relatives, friends, pets, personal toys, clothing, family, grandparent, relative, friend's houses and rooms within houses, vacation trips, and the like.

3. The personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories of claim 1, wherein the magnetic sheet material is a commercial product.

4. The personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories of claim 1, wherein the metallic surface is a refrigerator door, dishwasher door, washing machine door or other metallic surface in the kitchen or other rooms in the house.

5. The personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories of claim 1, wherein the metallic surface is a wall painted with magnetic paint.

6. A method of using personal photographic images for the construction of magnetic paper dolls and accessories for use in a child's imaginative play, said method comprising the steps of:

taking photographic images of the child in clothing, child's clothes, accessories, child's personal toys, pets, parents, siblings, grandparents, relatives, friends, family house, grandparent house, rooms, vacation trips;

printing said photographic images;

applying said printed photographic images to magnetic sheets with an adhesive surface;

cutting out the child's and other images from the photographic image background to create personal paper dolls and accessories;

storing the personal paper dolls and accessories in a carrying case that the child can carry from room to room or take on a trip.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the carrying case for storing the cut-outs of the personal magnetic paper dolls and accessories is made of metal.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein the carrying case for storing the cut-outs of the personal paper dolls and accessories is a type of craft box.

9. The method of claim 6, wherein children can participate along with parents and other family members in creating the personal paper dolls and accessories providing hours of quality time together.

10. A system of preserving personal photographic images in the form of personal paper dolls and accessories as a family keepsake of styles and trends that can be passed on through generations.