Soda Pop Girls: give a doll and her pet a colorful hometown

Give each pair a place in the town

The pets have their own visual details: floppy ears, pointed ears, little clothes and bright collars. A doll’s outfit and a pet’s look can suggest a shared destination. Perhaps the pair in green visits a garden kiosk, while the red-clad pair stops at a shop with a checked awning. Those places and personalities are yours to invent.

MGA introduced the Soda Pop Girls as part of Yummi-Land in 2006. The original presentation paired a doll with a pet in bottle-themed packaging, and the launch also described a Pet Shop and a Soda Pop Shop. That combination of companions and small destinations offers a useful starting point for a paper town.

Try a pet postcard route

Fold a sheet into two shopfronts, or draw two places side by side. Choose a doll-and-pet pair to make the first visit. Drawn characters work just as well.

1. Name the first stop. Try the Gingham Garden Shop or the Sunny Window Café. Draw a sign using a color or pattern from the pair’s clothes.
2. Write from the pet’s point of view. On a small paper postcard, finish two sentences: “Today I saw…” and “Next time, please bring…” Make the request something imagined, such as a song or a story.
3. Add a second address. Give another shop a contrasting pattern. A striped bookstore might be next door to a spotted pet portrait studio.
4. Deliver a reply. Let another pet carry an answer between the shops. Read both postcards aloud and tell what the two visitors decide to do together.

Draw any pretend drinks or treats on the shop signs. The town’s colors, messages and outings supply the play; keep vintage cosmetic accessories as display details.

Let the pets choose the next outing

Turn the finished postcards over and draw a route on their backs. Perhaps the next walk ends at a portrait booth where everyone poses, or at a tiny bandstand where one pet announces the afternoon song. Give the town a name and save the cards as its first pieces of mail.