And here we have the Munny, from Kid Robot.  This plain plastic toy begs to be doodled on.  Just try googling “customized Munny,” and you’ll see how much fun people have with these.  You can paint them, glue things to them, draw on them with markers, and even sculpt things and add them to change their appearance.

I love a blank “canvas,” especially a canvas that is functional in some way, that isn’t just pretty to look at.  The fact that this is kind of a toy and can be whatever you want it to is appealing to me.  So I saw a few at our local bookstore, and decided to do one of our daughter.

Our daughter at the time was little and still in cloth diapers, and she still loves a great mess, loves robots and loves her rollerskates.  So I gave her a metal robot suit with rainbow leggings (because Babylegs are awesome).  Little mini pink wheels.  I had planned on maybe gluing buttons on for the wheels, but they wouldn’t stay, and I gave up & just painted them.  Munnys come with plastic accessories, and you never know what you’re going to get.  This one had a cape.  Her name begins with “M” and since I’m a big fan of the ol’ Wonder Woman, I flipped it & made that her cape logo.  Coated in a few coats of gloss varnish, and good to go.

I had so much fun with that one, I did one for my husband.  He chose Boba Fett, and I screwed in a little L-hook into the top of his head to match Boba’s helmet.  It’s way easier to paint a cute little round kid’s face on a rounded head than it is to make it look normal on a full-grown dude.

Next up, I had to do one for myself.  I’m not a big fan of doing self-portraits, but I was really having fun with these!  C-3PO was always my favorite Star Wars droid (I know, I know, he’s the nerdy one…but he was FUNNY!)–and on a side note, C3PO is now my daughter’s favorite (with no coaxing of my own–she was enthralled by him from the moment she saw him).  I had some spraypaint that was sort of a rough textured gold, which gave it a cool, beat-up metal look (and it didn’t hurt that the spray can sort of sputtered on me).  Since Munnys have stumpy legs, I didn’t give myself a silver leg, so don’t give me a hard time about that.  Again, the grown-up face on a rounded Munny is a little rough to work with.

If you’re not that into painting, maybe try what a friend did, and cover a Munny in quotes from one of her favorite books.  Might I suggest a Sharpie?  And also, try Sculpey clay out if you want to really get into customizing (I didn’t).  So I still have one left….what should I do?  There are only three of us, and now that I’m done with us, the options are endless….