Morphadoodles were born in West Windsor when Susan Weintraub tried out a party idea for her son Eli’s seventh birthday in February, 2007. “Inspired by the birthday boy’s love of plush toys and his older sister’s drawings of imaginary friends, we invited the party guests to create their own original characters,” she says. “We gave them plain paper and markers and watched and listened as they drew and talked about their ‘guys.’ We kept their drawings and writing, and told them to wait, wish, and wonder.”##M:[more]##
Weintraub had met her future business partner, Debbie Molinelli, when she was her children’s teacher at Princeton Montessori School. Although the children moved on the women kept in touch and Weintraub asked Molinelli if she would be able to sew some plush creatures based on drawings that the children created at the party. “Debbie is an incredibly talented teacher, writer, and artist with an amazing ability to engage young people, and she was excited to give it a try,” says Weintraub.
Four weeks later, Morphadoodles, known as the “guys,” were delivered each with a trading card and a story based on the boy’s ideas. Not only were they holding their creations, but they asked for their stories to be read out loud, they slept with them and even took them out for pizza. “Once we saw the kids’ enthusiastic response to their artwork that had come alive we decided that we wanted to try to turn the concept into a business,” says Weintraub.
“As for the stories — what began as individual pieces has now morphed into a compilation — an online book, The Morphadoodle Chronicles, says Weintraub. “Here, each new character’s picture and tale not only becomes the newest page posted, but presents the readers with another Morphadoodle who can now join future adventures.”
“In one case, when a flash fire in California called for homes to be evacuated, one parent told us she couldn’t leave until she found her son’s guy named Greenny,” says Weintraub. Greeny was one of the original guys created at Eli’s birthday party. The family moved to San Diego but returned to New Jersey after the fire.
Weintraub, was born in Philadelphia and grew up in Wynnewood, a suburb just outside of Philly. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in East Asian Studies with a major in Chinese. She also received her master’s degree from Penn’s Graduate School of Education for teaching English as a second language.
At the Community College of Philadelphia for close to 10 years, she was an assistant professor of English and taught ESL at all levels, advanced writing, and freshman composition.
Her husband, Michael Bramnick, works for NRG Energy in Carnegie Center as deputy general counsel and chief compliance officer. Their daughter, Sophie, 11, is a sixth grader at Grover Middle School. Their son, Eli, now 8, is a third grader at Maurice Hawk. The family moved to West Windsor from Wynnewood, Pennsylvania, in 2000.
One of the early buyers was Melissa Chamberlain, also of West Windsor. She was involved in the experiment last year when she gave a package to her nieces. “I can tell you that the way the project unfolds engages creativity, builds suspense, and then results in something that the child can take such delight in having created from his or her own imagination,” she says. “Susan and Debbie put so much thought and care into each child’s project, and it shows. I have never seen anything else like this. Though FAO Schwarz will create a monster plush toy from a child’s drawing, it is more than twice the cost and ends when the child takes delivery of his character. What impresses me is the whole context that Susan and Debbie have created — which grows out of their shared interest in children’s literature, early childhood writing, art, and creativity — and the amazing care and attention to detail they employ when crafting these characters.”
Make Your Own Morphadoodle ranges from $99.99 to $129.99. Make Your Own Mini Morph costs are $24.99 to $34.99. For more information visit www.laborastory.com.
