Stuffed Animal With Attached Blanket

Abstract

A stuffed animal and an attached blanket that is stored within the body cavity of the stuffed animal. A liner is permanently attached within the body cavity to allow the blanket to be attached to it either by being permanently sewn-in or by fabric hook-and-loop fasteners. The torso of the stuffed animal is larger in proportion to the rest of the body parts and an aperture is located on the front of the torso by fabric hook-and-loop fasteners which will allow for easy access and storage of the blanket.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE

Priority is claimed from the U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/277,089 filed on Sep. 21, 2009, the entirety of which is hereby incorporated by reference.

DESCRIPTION OF RELATED ART

The present application relates to stuffed animal, and more particularly to a stuffed animal with an attached blanket which can provide comfort and security to the owner.

Note that the points discussed below may reflect the hindsight gained from the disclosed inventions, and are not necessarily admitted to be prior art.

Small children usually feel more secure and comfortable with their familiar objects. Among toddlers, a comfort object may take the form of a blanket, a stuffed animal, or a favorite toy, and may be referred to by the terms blankey and lovey.

A number of attempts have been made to provide a combined design of a stuffed animal and a blanket. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,427,267 describes a design with a stuffed animal's head affixed to one end of the blanket, and the arms and/or legs affixed to the other end of the blanket. Both the blanket and the stuffed animal look cumbersome and time consuming for cleaning and storage.

Another example, U.S. Patent Application No. 2004/0199998, provides a convertible blanket that includes a zip fastener around its edge to convert the blanket into a sleeping bag. The pocket on the blanket may be of a shape of a stuffed animal. This design, however, does not provide a small child the security and comfort of both a blanket and a stuffed animal at the same time.

In U.S. Patent Application No. 2007/0037474, a stuffed animal having a pocket to contain a heartbeat simulating transducer is described. This design, too, does not provide a small child the security and comfort of both a blanket and a stuffed animal at the same time.

SUMMARY

The present application discloses a novel design for providing small children the comfort of both a stuffed animal and a blanket at the same time.

In one aspect of an embodiment, a stuffed animal has a large torso that is hollow. An aperture is configured on the torso for easy access and operation. Inside the torso, attaches a blanket. The blanket can be made of a soft fabric, for example, cotton, polyester, or satin.

Through the aperture, the blanket can be easily dragged out for small children to play with. The blanket is also detachable for cleaning or other use. Blanket can be located on the front torso by fabric hook-and-loop fasteners.

In one aspect of an embodiment, when the blanket is fully exposed, it is attached to the liner that is permanently attached within the torso of the stuffed animal. The blanket is attached to the liner either by being permanently sewn-in or by fabric hook-and-loop fasteners so that it can be detached from the liner if desired.

This design has a unique 3-in-1 concept in which it can be utilized either as a stuffed animal, a blanket or both at the same time with quick blanket accessibility and storage. The affixability and detachable blanket avoids being misplaced.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The disclosed inventions will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings, which show important sample embodiments of the invention and which are incorporated in the specification hereof by reference, wherein:

FIG. 1 shows a frontal view of an example stuffed animal with an aperture located on the front of the torso in accordance with this application.

FIG. 2 shows a perspective view of an example stuffed animal and the attached blanket being out of the body cavity in accordance with this application.

FIG. 3 shows a perspective view of an example exposed attached blanket being accessed or stored within the body cavity of a stuffed animal in accordance with this application.

FIG. 4 shows a perspective view of an example liner that is permanently attached within the body cavity of the stuffed animal in accordance with this application.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF SAMPLE EMBODIMENTS

The numerous innovative teachings of the present application will be described with particular reference to presently preferred embodiments (by way of example, and not of limitation). The present application describes several inventions, and none of the statements below should be taken as limiting the claims generally.

For simplicity and clarity of illustration, the drawing figures illustrate the general manner of construction, and the description and details of well-known features and techniques may be omitted to avoid unnecessarily obscuring the invention. Additionally, elements in the drawing figures are not necessarily drawn to scale, some areas or elements may be expanded to help improve understanding of embodiments of the invention.

The terms “first,” “second,” “third,” “fourth,” and the like in the description and the claims, if any, may be used for distinguishing between similar elements and not necessarily for describing a particular sequential or chronological order. It is to be understood that the terms used are interchangeable. Furthermore, the terms “comprise,” “include,” “have,” and any variations thereof, are intended to cover non-exclusive inclusions, such that a process, method, article, apparatus, or composition that comprises a list of elements is not necessarily limited to those elements, but may include other elements not expressly listed or inherent to such process, method, article, apparatus, or composition.

It is contemplated and intended that the described examples and concepts apply to different kinds of stuffed animals; for clarity reason, the examples are given based on a stuffed teddy bear, but an ordinary person in the art would know the variations to modify the design for other stuffed animals.

In reference to FIG. 1, stuffed teddy bear 100 has a larger than usual torso 101, which should be sufficiently big to be able to store a small blanket. This may mean the torso size is generally bigger than those of the currently commercially available teddy bears. On the front side of the torso, a fasten aperture 103 is configured to be the entry to access the space inside the torso. Unlike a current commercial teddy bear, Teddy bear 100′s torso is not firmly stuffed with filling materials like wool, silk, rayon, nylon, polyester or other synthetics, or combinations of fibers, but is stuffed with a blanket for small children. The blanket material may be made of wool, silk, rayon, nylon, or other synthetics, or combinations of fibers. The size of the blanket is matchable to those of the currently commercially available blankets for toddlers. Torso 101 is of the size that can be firmly filled with a small blanket and some amount of filling material, to produce a stuffed bear feel.

Aperture 103 is fastened either by zipper, button, or hook and loop fastener. The size of aperture 103 is sufficient for easily dragging out the blanket stuffed inside the torso. It can be placed either on the front side or on the back side, or under the arms, of the torso.

In reference to FIG. 2, the stuffing blanket 201 can be fully dragged out through aperture 205 from the bear torso and be completely spread open while attaching point 203 is attached either permanently or removably to the inside of the bear torso. The fixation of blanket 201 to the inside of the bear torso may be to a point 401 on the back side as shown in FIG. 4. The fixation can also be just inside the aperture 205, through sewn-in, buttoning on, zippers or hook-and-loop fasteners. Attaching point 203 of blanket may be located in the middle, at the corners, or the edges of the blanket.

In reference to FIG. 3, exposed blanket 305 can be put back into the torso to make a firmly stuffed bear again. Blanket 305 may be folded or rolled and pushed into aperture 301, and aperture 301 is then fastened with zipper 303, or buttoned up, or hook and loop fastener.

As will be recognized by those skilled in the art, the innovative concepts described in the present application can be modified and varied over a tremendous range of applications, and accordingly the scope of patented subject matter is not limited by any of the specific exemplary teachings given. It is intended to embrace all such alternatives, modifications and variations that fall within the spirit and broad scope of the appended claims.

Additional general background, which helps to show variations and implementations, may be found in the following publications, such as, U.S. Pat. No. 6,427,267, U.S. Patent Application No. 2004/0199998, U.S. Patent Application No. 2007/0037474; all of which are hereby incorporated by reference herein for all purposes.

None of the description in the present application should be read as implying that any particular element, step, or function is an essential element which must be included in the claim scope: THE SCOPE OF PATENTED SUBJECT MATTER IS DEFINED ONLY BY THE ALLOWED CLAIMS.

Moreover, none of these claims are intended to invoke paragraph six of 35 USC section 112 unless the exact words “means for” are followed by a participle.

The claims as filed are intended to be as comprehensive as possible, and NO subject matter is intentionally relinquished, dedicated, or abandoned.

Claims

1. A stuffed animal, comprising:

a stuffed animal having a torso enclosure of sufficient size, wherein an aperture is configured on the torso; and

at least one toddler blanket stuffed and attached inside said torso enclosure, being draggable out of said torso through the aperture, and spreading into a full blanket.

2. The stuffed animal of claim 1, wherein the aperture is fastened.

3. The stuffed animal of claim 1, wherein said blanket is fastened inside the torso enclosure.

4. The stuffed animal of claim 1, wherein the torso enclosure has a front side, a back side, and under am areas, and the aperture is configured on the front side.

5. The stuffed animal of claim 4, wherein the aperture is configured in the under arm areas.

6. The stuffed animal of claim 4, wherein the aperture is configured on the back side.

7. The stuffed animal of claim 4, wherein the blanket is attached to the inside of the front side.

8. The stuffed animal of claim 4, wherein the blanket is attached to the inside of the back side.

9. The stuffed animal of claim 1, wherein the blanket is attached to the torso enclosure through a fabric hook-and-loop fastener.

10. The stuffed animal of claim 1, wherein plurality of blankets are stuffed inside the torso enclosure to adjust the look and feel of the stuffed animal.