“ You know, they didn’t have a toy that that looked like them. And a couple of things that we’ve found that have made this work so rewarding is that the moms of two of the kids immediately took the toy from helping the child understand their own experience to taking this to school to help their peers understand what’s going on.”
For children with medical conditions that require complex medical devices, it can be hard to feel like they fit in.
Kay Newman created KiddoDitto to fix that and with her beautifully designed replicas that mirror each child and their medical needs, she’s helping them have a loving experience they all deserve.
Additional Links
KiddoDitto (Website): https://www.kiddoditto.org/
It Matters To Me (Instagram): https://www.instagram.com/itmatterstomepodcast
It Matters To Me (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/@itmatterstomepodcast
Transcript
Adam Casey: All right. Kay. Welcome to the show. How are you doing today?
Kay Newman: I’m good.
Adam Casey: Before every interview, there’s always that the downtime where you get to talk to the person I’m interviewing and get to chit chat a little bit. And I think the first thing that I wanted to say was, I’m so glad we’re actually able to do this because we had some scheduling difficulties, all my fault, .
Kay Newman: no, I think I was, it was half me.
Adam Casey: well, either way, I’m, I am really glad that we’re getting to do this. So you’re the founder of a nonprofit and an organization that has a really cool mission called Kiddo Ditto. If you could just to start out, could you explain what Kiddo Ditto is?
Kay Newman: Well, yeah, it’s, uh, uh, we do is we make miniature replicas of the medical devices that kids have and, um, put them on a cell phone. of their choosing so that they can have a toy that matches their experience. So it could be glasses or, uh, leg braces, uh, G tubes, um, um, uh, uh, guide canes. Those are some of the things we’ve done we’ve done so far.
Adam Casey: And so, How did you get into this?
Kay Newman: Well, yeah. So, um, I do some work for, um, a home care agency that that serves a lot of, um, it’s all pediatrics and a lot of these kids have really complicated medical situations. uh, I was writing some blog posts for them about communication and especially referring to play as the best way to, for any kind of therapy and also just like using everyday objects. To, um, you know, to, to help kids talk about their world. And I, that’s where I, when I think I noticed that their daily life is really just not reflected in their play and in their toys. So, um, yeah, so that’s how the, how the idea kind of came about.
Adam Casey: And is it appropriate to call them dolls?
Kay Newman: Well, um, they’re usually, I mean, we started with the idea of, um, of like stuffed animals and we’re, we’re, now we’re just kind of like the last two have been like a Mario and, uh, And a Mickey Mouse. So I guess plush toys is what they are.
Adam Casey: So are the plush toys anything that you’ve like had personal experience with? Cause you said you, you were writing a blog post. Why were you writing a blog post?
Kay Newman: as an employee for, or a contractor for this, um, home care agency. And, so, um, a lot of what I would be kind of trying to help communicate to the parents is if you, you know, if you’re If, if, um, if your speech therapist is trying to encourage your child to talk more, they’re going to be referring to all of the really daily objects in a kid’s life, you know, cups and baths and, you know, and their dog and things like that.
Kay Newman: So it was, that was the, my window onto the, onto that, those families.
Adam Casey: Okay. So there wasn’t any, knock on wood, unfortunate situation where you grew up with, without having access or having this type of communication device for someone to explain a medical issue was just happenstance through work.
Kay Newman: Yeah, yeah,
Adam Casey: Okay.
Adam Casey: Okay. Well, that’s a silver lining. I guess it’s better than, the path that I was going down. But how did you take that idea from your writing a blog post into actual reality? what was the first plush toy that you created?
Kay Newman: Yeah.
Kay Newman: Well, that’s kind of funny because the writing of a blog post is really kind of off, I’m not really my career. I just ended up doing that kind of thing, but I’m a, I’m a, um, I’m a designer. I’ve. I’ve, I’ve, uh, got a background in both, uh, user experience design, which is more like, you know, uh, computer, uh, Um, you know, uh, smartphones and websites and things like that.
Kay Newman: But I also have, um, a background in industrial design, which is, is, they probably should have called it product design, but, um, so that’s like where my, you know, that’s really my background. So I think that my brain is always kind of thinking about, you know, what, what’s missing in the world. Um, for people to have, you know, what would make a better experience for them?
Kay Newman: What’s making life hard or irritating or people feel left out? You know, that’s just kind of the lens I see the world through.
Adam Casey: What was missing out? You, you touched on it a little bit about all these children with all these different I would say medical ailments or just medical issues that are hard to communicate, but what was still missing in that space that you felt like this was the missing puzzle piece?
Kay Newman: Well, yeah, it’s really interesting that you ask the question that way too, because really, I mean, I kept finding, I kept finding that, like, I was surprised that other, a lot of other people weren’t doing this kind of thing, because it just kind of seemed obvious that, um, that, you know, they didn’t have, You know, they didn’t have a toy that, that a simple thing like glasses or, you know, or if they were being fed with a gew tube, know, they didn’t have a toy that was, was, that looked like them. And, and I think that it. That has so many kind of ripple effects and and a couple of things that we’ve found that have just been so like made this this work so rewarding is that the the the moms of two of the kids actually really immediately Took the toy from helping the child understand their own experience to, Hey, I’m taking this to school to help their peers understand what’s going on because these kids are in classrooms and, you know, and things like being fed by with a G tube means that these things are happening. their peers are seeing it, but their peers aren’t really understanding what’s going on. the, and the G tube, um, one of the things that just really made me feel like we were on the right path is just kind of thinking about that the G tube peg is actually like a little button in the child’s abdomen. So if, if the kids in their class are like looking at that, you know, and trying to figure out what’s happening, that’s just way too. Personal, you know, so putting that, that peg on a stuffed animal and then having a little toy G tube to show that this is like, this is how they eat it just, you know, it, it, it, it makes them, it makes everyone in that classroom more connected.
Adam Casey: It’s amazing how impactful being able to visualize something is there’s a reason why adult coloring books are probably really popular. And we’re visual species and, you know, for someone like me who has a hard enough time with words being able to express something through a physical object is, is always helpful.
Kay Newman: Yeah, and also because I think what, you know, the other kids are going to be looking and trying to figure out what’s going on. So it’s not like, it’s not like without the, you know, without the toy there, a total neutral ground. You know, there’s, you know, a kind of attention that may be very, Unwanted and not, you know, not creating connection. So I think it’s, you know, I think it’s true as, and especially with kids, they, they watch what everybody else is doing to figure out what, you know, what’s happening.
Adam Casey: does it help the parents at all as well? have you noticed that the parents are able to kind of, understand any of the issues that their child might be having through one of these plush toys.
Kay Newman: know, I don’t know about that. I know one of the families that’s just so interesting is the, um, the, the child who has the G tube and, and a few other devices has, is, is, I think he’s seven and he has a four year old sister. And so the four year old sister has really. She’s really gained tool for kind of navigating world she lives in because the world she lives in has like her brother interacting with all these medical devices that she’s not interacting with. So the, the mom told me that one of the things that happened immediately is that when the mom is feeding the seven year old with the G tube, that the four year old takes the Mickey And so I think it probably helps the parents in the sense of like being able to um, you know, help with all the children in the family.
Adam Casey: Yeah this is a feel good podcast. It’s not supposed to be a downer at all But let’s state the obvious kids can be mean sometimes.
Kay Newman: Yeah.
Adam Casey: remember when I was a kid getting made fun of for all sorts of things. Does this help Serve as a shield against some of that teasing because they just don’t understand it?
Adam Casey: Yeah.
Kay Newman: Well, no, I haven’t heard anything specifically about that with teasing, but I do know that. One of the, one of, you know, one of the goals and one, you know, one thing that we, we hope can happen is that it gives the other kids permission to talk about a situation that can just feel very taboo. And when I think that, I think that some of that, that. know, I don’t know if some of the teasing comes from not being able to actually understand what’s going on or actually even talk about a situation like that. But I do think that gives it gives the the parent. So, in 1 circumstance. Um, what the parent did is take the Mickey to school and then just kind of like had kind of a, a letter that she wanted to read to the rest of her, to the, to the, her son’s peers and explain the whole situation because, um, you know, what they would be seeing, but also some other things like, you know, that, um, you know, not to move too quickly near him or present him.
Kay Newman: You know, that bumping into him could be a real problem, that kind of thing, but she, you know, she felt that by, she could into that discussion with his peers kind of on her own terms and use the terminology that they wanted used, and so it gave them a lot more control over that discussion.
Adam Casey: And what’s the manufacturing process like for this? What’s from start to finish, how do you go from identifying a child to then giving them one of these plush toys?
Kay Newman: Well, well, I hope that maybe in two or three years we’ll talk again and I’ll have a process that really sounds impressive. But right now we’re, we’re working, we’re working specifically with the kids from this one home care. Um, agency. Uh, and so I, I work at, I work with the therapists in that home care agency and, and they helped me pick a, a family that, that, that is interested in this process.
Kay Newman: And, um, also, you know, it’s, it’s a new, everything’s new that we’re doing. And so we wanted families who were willing to sign on to kind of a. You know, here’s a prototype and you know, what do you think we could do to to fix it or make it better anything like that? So we get the we get we may connect we connect with the family through the therapist and then I have a big Kind of a Google form that’s kind of an intake form and it asks about the devices that the child uses what their favorite Stuffed animal or plush toy would be so that we can pick one that that can fit all of the medical devices. And then I also ask about their interests, though, because one of the things I really want to do is, is add, you know, an interest in music and interest in. Volcanoes, we put a, we put a volcano on a t shirt for, for one of the kids because we don’t, I really want to present more than the medical side. I want to present their interests as well. So we take all of that information and, and mostly it’s, it’s me, but I, that I, but I have a lot of like people in my life who are helping with this. So just. I, I, I just make lists of what, you know, what the devices are and how we might. um, translate those into something a little more toy like, but also somewhat accurate, kind of trying to strike a balance between, um, making, making say like the G tube, we want it to look like enough like a G tube so that people know that that’s what it’s doing, but we also want to add some kind of like toy like features to it. So, um, I have been just, you know, using my design background to, um, sketch and model the, uh, these devices and it’s been very interesting because one of the biggest challenges is that the, the, uh, proportions of the stuffed animals are really nothing like the proportions of humans. So, um, so, like, we’re working with a Mario right now.
Kay Newman: And. Making a wheelchair that matches the child’s wheelchair for his Mario, and it’s just really funny because Mario’s Mario’s butt is actually very wide and, but not very deep, you know, so it’s like, like, we take what the wheelchair looks like, but then we have to make it so that, you know, this particular stuffed animal can actually sit in it. So, so then I’ve just, you know, I’m, I, I make a model out of, um, cardboard or something like that, just to kind of get the idea out of my head and then model it in, um, 3D. Printing software, which I really don’t know much about so I’m always walking around the makerspace asking people to help me figure it out And then and then just print it on the 3d printer if that’s if that’s what we’re doing been a little bit of sewing and I use my Cricut is kind of a laser or a little vinyl cutting device so Uh, so it’s, you know, a combination of those tools that kind of get us to the finish line.
Adam Casey: And I’ll point out the maker space that we’re both talking about, it’s just this really cool space that serves as a community for people to come together to create stuff.
Adam Casey: And that’s actually, and that’s how we met, but, what does having access to something like the Makerspace do for you? Obviously, you talked about the 3D printing but what have you been able to do because of the tools and the people that are at the Makerspace?
Kay Newman: It’s really kind of hard to come up with a whole list of it because it’s just been so surprising to me. Of course, the first thing that I thought of was, oh, I won’t have to have a 3D printer at home if I join the makerspace. You know, that was kind of the most obvious piece. And I had used a 3D printer at the Denver Public Library’s, um, They call their makerspace like the idea lab or something and people were very helpful That was a really great way for me to get started But it’s it the the 3d printing there is really it’s limited to like two hours a week and you can’t You can’t choose the color of your filament or anything like that.
Kay Newman: So the filament means like you can’t control what color anything turns out to be, which is pretty big. So, um, that was the thing that, that caught my attention. But what’s been amazing about this is that the maker space, it’s in Wheat Ridge, Colorado, and it’s associated with Um, a non profit called Local Works that promotes all things Wheat Ridge. So they have some really cool programs that, that helped me out. What, um, I got a little, uh, 250 grant to help me pay for, materials. Uh, they wrote an article about Kiddo Ditto, that article read to it led to, uh, a story on our local news. So I really I’ve I’ve gotten a lot of A lot of connections out of the makerspace that I had no, had no idea that that all of that would flow from, from what I thought was just getting a 3D printer.
Adam Casey: It really is a special place. and I would love to probably spend the whole episode talking about that major space, But what are some of the challenges beyond like anatomically, you know, having a giant Mario figurine, not resembling a human body, but, I’m thinking of.
Adam Casey: You know, kids that might have diseases that are not visible, maybe mental health issues, do you know, have you had any requests for anything like that, or how you would maybe go about handling it?
Kay Newman: no we haven’t really had Request for for that. Um, except except that we are.
Kay Newman: We have one on the horizon that, um, you know, kids now and I think it’s really awesome. They can if they’re uncomfortable in their classrooms because of know, neurodiversity that they, they can do a, you know, they can do a lot of things about it. They can, they can wear noise canceling headphones. They can have little fidget toys.
Kay Newman: They can have a special, uh, little rubber thing on their seat so that they can wiggle around, you know. So, We, I think we will get to those things. Um, but the, you know, some of that unseen, unseen aspects, I don’t really, I hope we can get to that, to that point. Um, it hasn’t been a request so far. Um, we are kind of, you know, Um, first of all, we want to get good at doing this, but, but in the long run, there we’ve, we’ve, um, we’ve batted around some ideas that I have kind of like a little inspiration team, you know, people who will get together with me. A lot of them are, you know, my family members and just talk about, you know, where we could take this and how we can best serve the families. And one idea that, that keeps coming up is maybe having some kind of a. A book or story that goes along with this, um, and, and that would kind of flesh out the, the lives of some of these kids and maybe be able to, um, focus a little bit more on some of their interests and, um, you know, get a little, a little further than just what can be, you know, attached to the, to the stuffed animal.
Adam Casey: I love that the idea of maybe like a little comic book to go along with each plush toy do you think you could do something where it was like telling the story of the kid or telling the story of the plush toy and, and their road to recovery or their path along being sick or being injured or whatever led them to here what would a comic book like that look like?
Kay Newman: I mean, I kind of, um, I kind of like the idea of it being like they maybe hang out together, you know?
Adam Casey: Oh, yeah. So, like a Dora The Explorer, with our little sidekick Going back to the whole being an adult I’m about to be 39. I don’t know what this says about me, but I’m drawn to any sort of story that can be told through pictures.
Adam Casey: So when it comes to expanding this work, do you have any goals in that? cause I would imagine this is a pretty labor intensive process from start to finish?
Kay Newman: that is really, I mean, that really is something that I would like to improve on. I mean, it’s, it’s at least three months and, um, you know, everything is, everything is custom and it’s different each time. So like I made glasses for, a wolf pup and that, you know, then Mario’s head was not the same size.
Kay Newman: So I had to, you know, re, redesign those to fit on him. you know, it is very, it’s incredibly custom. And I want to keep doing that for families, um, for. long as I can. One of my heroes is Ava Zeitzel and she was a designer who, um, designed every day, um, until she passed away at age 103. And that’s kind of my plan.
Kay Newman: So, but I really, I really like the, the one on one with the parent, um, and the family. And. Some of that is actually kind of like a very selfish design You know, like this is the ideal design environment because I’ve got one customer and I’m making things exactly for them and, and I get to talk to them.
Kay Newman: So I, I hear things that I wouldn’t, you know, that I wouldn’t. Here. So like one example is I had, I thought that would be such a great idea because this kid really loves music and he actually carries around like a little eighth note. Um, you know, it’s kind of, uh, Uh, laminated thing and it’s an eighth note and he just he loves music and he loves his eighth note.
Kay Newman: So I was like, oh, you know, it’d be really fun. I’ll put an eighth note on the, the, the leg braces of his Mickey and then, and then make, make an eighth note for his. leg braces. And I was so proud of myself. I thought it was such a great idea. And then I talked to the mom and she said, well, the problem with that is he loves them.
Kay Newman: He, he’ll love that so much. keep taking the braces off. So, so it’s a really, you know, so it’s a, it’s a real luxury as a designer to have that much contact with someone you’re making something for. On the other hand, though, you know, there’s so many kids who would benefit from, you know, from having the outcome. So what we’re, what we’re, my little, my inspiration team and I have coming up, come up with is that, um, throughout the year, I will take a couple of, of, of times off and, Try to move the individual objects into some higher volume production. you know, like the glasses and the guide cane and things like that, that people would be able to buy those from something like an Etsy shop or something to put them, you know, to put them on a, on a stuffed animal, or we might. Come up with a more standardized animal, like a, like a teddy bear or something, you know, and be, and put the, put the devices on that. So, we’ll we’re, we’re trying to come up with a, a solution to be, you know, to have more reach.
Adam Casey: What’s it like to deliver one of these to a kid or to the family? What’s their reaction what’s that do for you?
Kay Newman: Well, it’s, it’s, it’s really funny because like, especially with the first one, you know, I was just so focused on like, you know, nothing was good enough yet. And I actually even brought it, I thought I was just meeting with the mom.
Kay Newman: I didn’t know I was going to be meeting with the child too. And I, my intention was like, here’s a prototype and I’m going to go make everything better. that’s not what happened at all. The kid was there. And once he saw it, he named it, he said, he said, I love you, Arfie. And then he just started feeding him and feeding him. With the, with the G tube and that was, you know, that was the end of it. I didn’t, I didn’t, um, I, I was very focused on what I focus on as a designer. Sometimes too much is like, I been able to make all of the improvements that I would like to make? So I was very surprised that it was, you know, You know, that it just, it just did the trick, even though it was imperfect.
Adam Casey: Yeah, I can imagine that it’s the, the red dot on the sweater kind of situation where you may see one imperfection that’s completely hidden and no one else can see it, but because you can see it, you want it to be perfect.
Kay Newman: Yeah. Yeah. And it is something that, you know, my, my team helps me with and I, and I don’t think of it as, a perfectionism because it’s really just, to me, it’s just my brain can’t, um, can’t stop. improvements. So, so I’m not, I’m not, I’m not, I don’t need it to be perfect in the sense of like, Um, you know, um, impressing anyone or being, I don’t know, I mean, there’s some aspects of perfectionism that I, that I, that I don’t have, but the, but the biggest thing is, is like, one of the fun parts about having this brain that I have is that it’s always like, additional opportunities to make something a little bit better. And they’re, and they always sound really fun, you know, like, Oh, you know, this, these two pieces did fit together that well, maybe if I designed it differently and printed them all as one piece, that would be better. So it’s, that’s the, what’s going on with me when I’m I need to make it better and better. so, um, my team does help me with that.
Adam Casey: which is important because I’m assuming this is not your full time work and I, I’d be surprised if you were pulling any money from this. But that’s not what matters. What matters is that you’re doing something that above all helps you help other people and, it keeps it fun for you.
Adam Casey: This isn’t supposed to be work because at that point, when it stops being fun for you, then it probably stops being fun for these kids and these families to receive these things.
Adam Casey: And you don’t ever want to lose sight of that. So. I’m glad your brain is the way that it is is about way of saying that.
Adam Casey: Well, this is just been such a fun conversation. If people wanted to learn more themselves.
Adam Casey: Where would you like to direct them?
Kay Newman: I am on Instagram, and, I have a website, 3kiddoditto.org,
Kay Newman: Okay.
Kay Newman: it right now.
Adam Casey: Well, that’s, Hey, trust me.
Kay Newman: media is a little, is a, um, is a, is a, is a wild world these days. So it’s, I’m, I’m trying to, I’m trying to, um, figure out how to share the process and, and, um, keep people, you know. interested in the story without necessarily being on some of the platforms that are out there.
Adam Casey: well, here’s the thing. And I’m about to get on a little bit of a soapbox. Social media is overrated. It’s one of those things where you’ve got good product and people are going to find it. You don’t need to have all these channels.
Adam Casey: If you’ve got something that is good quality. And that brings a benefit to people’s lives in a positive way that website and that one social media account is going to be more than enough
Kay Newman: Oh,
Adam Casey: At the end of the day the return on investment in, in doing that is not worth just investing in what you’re doing as a whole and delivering something that is just so special for these families and kids.
Adam Casey: So don’t worry about any of that.
Kay Newman: Thanks.
Adam Casey: regardless, I will include links in the show notes for
Adam Casey: anybody that wants to learn more about you and learn more about this work and hopefully support this work it’ll be in the show notes.
Adam Casey: But again, Kay, this has been such a fun conversation and I can’t wait to watch KiddoDitto grow. And, if you ever need someone to throw some really bad ideas at you, you’ll let me know. And I will, and I’ll be happy to do that. Thank you so much. Kay. We’ll, we’ll talk soon.
Kay Newman: Bye
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