My husband and I attended the New York Toy Fair this year and had a chance to see all the latest and greatest toys coming out on the market this year. One  toy that we felt by far was the coolest is the 3Doodler.  This award winning toy is the world’s first kid-friendly 3D printing pen. For this weeks Homemade Monday I will share a little about the pen, how it works and what you can do with the 3Doodler. The kids loved it so much they sang praises about what a cool mom I am for getting them one… 3Doodler for the win!

WHAT IS A 3-D PRINT PEN?

A 3-D pen is a great toy for those kids who love exploring STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math.) From building structures to crafting, the sky is the limits with what this nifty tool can create.  Basically a 3D pen is a  pen that makes 3 dimensional shapes. It can be hard to imagine it, if you haven’t seen one before.  The best way to explain it  is imagining a pen that functions much like a glue gun, only with colored glue sticks and a tinier tip.  Rather than gluing stuff together, the colored plastic that pours out is used to draw 3 dimensional artwork.

The pen functions much like a hot glue. The pen works by heating up enough to melt plastic. With the push of a bottom it squeezes out the nozzle. The artist moves the pen around to make their own creations.  The plastic dries and hardens quite quickly, making permanent shapes.  The best part about the 3Doodler is that it is completely safe for kids. If you touch the nozzle you will not get burnt. Also, the plastic used is environmental friendly! The plastic is 100% recyclable.

WHO INVENTED THE FIRST 3-D PEN?

In 2003, WobbleWorks Co-Founders Maxwell Bogue and Peter Dilworth invented the 3D printing pen. This invention was pure accidental genius!  While working on creating a 3D printer Inspiration struck during a minor mishap. It was an honor to meet the makers at Toy Fair 2019 and I’m thankful they were able to send a sample kit, so that we could test it out and share it’s wonder with our friends and fans.

WHAT TO MAKE?

What took me so long to write this article, was the dilemma of what to make first. I can’t tell you how excited I am to start projects with the kids using our 3-D print pen. I’m both a crafter, a artist and educational activity goo roo….so having this tool in our home is going to be amazing! I decided the first thing we would do is just take the doodler out and start having fun goofing around to get used to the new tool. I also thought it would be fun to play around decorating eggs.  I would love to decorate our hex bugs in the future to see if adding legs or decoration changes the little robots speed or direction pattern.

WHERE CAN YOU PURCHASE A 3DOODLER?

The 3Doodler is sold at Michaels and Target. However, can be purcahsed online at The 3Doodler Store. Please be sure to check out their website and Facebook page.