GB2290468A

GB2290468A - Quilt with a slit opening for user's legs

Info

Publication number: GB2290468A
Application number: GB9410835A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Jeng-Lurn Chen
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 1994-05-31
Filing date: 1994-05-31
Publication date: 1996-01-03
Also published as: GB9410835D0

Abstract

A quilt 10, particularly for children, has a slit opening 20 in the middle section of it for allowing its users legs 51 to pass through from under the top half 13 of the quilt and to rest on the bottom half 14 of the quilt such that the quilt will be incapable of being kicked off by the users turning or tossing during sleeping. Along one of the longer edges of the slit opening is detachably attached a cover layer 19 for optionally covering the user's legs, exposed out of the quilt, to keep them warm. <IMAGE>

Description

TITLE: QUILT WITH A SLIT OPENING BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION When sleeping, a child is usually covered with a quilt, which is commonly shaped rectangularly, for keeping his or her body warm and protecting him or her from catching a cold.

Whereas, as we know, a child may turn or toss in sleeping and kick its quilt off such as to leave his or her body exposed.

In such an instance, there is a great possibility to cause the child to catch a cold, especially when the weather is getting cold or when a child is sleeping in a room with air conditioner during the summer. Therefore, it is necessary for the parents or the nannies to put back the quilt on the sleeping child from time to time, such that they are often unable to make a deep sleep.

In order to avoid the children to catch a cold due to kicking their quilts off, there are no parents who don't intent to seek for ways to solve this problem. For example, many parents have attempted to let their children wear belly bands in ssddition to their sleepwares in order to protect their waists and/or bellies which are regarded as the most important parts of the body for health protection. In practice, because most of thè;belly bands can merely wrap the waist and/or belly of a body, it is uncapable of providing sufficient warmth against cold weather and therefore may not effectively protect a sleeping child from catching a cold.

A gown equipped with belly bands as shown in Fig. 7, is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,769,855 (Sep. 13, 1988), including a front piece 24, a back piece 21, and a left and a right belly band 22 & 23 for maintaining the stable location to provide the baby's belly with more warmth. Although the gown provides protection from shoulders to legs, it can not provide the wearer enough warmth against cold weather.

Besides, the contact portions between the front piece 24 and the belly bands 22 & 23 are limited and loose such that the front piece 24 of the gown will easily deviate from its original position through the baby's turning or tossing during sleeping. That always makes the baby feel uncomfortable and be unable to sleep well.

Another method to solve above-mentioned problem is to use a sleeping bag to wrap a child during sleeping. However, a sleeping bag is designed mainly for use in outdoors and must provide maximum warmth against the cold. Thus, the sleeping bag is not very suitable for indoor use. Besides, for most children, the sleeping bag is too hot, it usually cause the wrapped child to sweat and to be uncomfortable during sleeping, especially when the room temperature is not very low. Also, a sleeping bag is usually constructed as a standard size that does not secure the different children to be wrapped in, especially when the children turn or roll unconsciously.

An attempt to improve a conventional quilt for preventing the quilt from being kicked off is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No.

4,441,223 (Apr. 10, 1984), as shown in Fig. 8 & Fig. 9. The structure of the quilt is to cut a long head hole near one end of it, of the same size and at same location for a user's head to pass through. When the quilt is used, it's head hole will allow a user's head to pass through and then the head can rest and press on the end part of the quilt while the body can be covered by the rest of the quilt. This type of quilt is unable to afford a user greater comfort than a conventional quilt because if the quilt is twisted by the turning movement of the user during sleeping, the head hole may make a fetter to the user's neck. It is unsafe for children to use the quilt. Therefore, the quilt is not an improvement with utility.

From the above described examples, it is obvious that there are still no ways to effectively prevent a child from catching a cold due to kicking his or her quilt off during sleeping. In view of this fact, the inventor endeavored to improve the conventional quilt to solve the problem, and finally created the present invention.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The invention is based on a main object of providing a quilt which can be used on a sleeping child to provide the child's body comfort and warmth and is haedly to be kicked off on matter how the child may turn or toss under the quilt to prevent the child from catching a cold. This object is achieved by the quilt of the present invention which is characterized by having a slit opening in the middle section of the quilt for allowing a child's legs to pass through from under the quilt and to press on the bottom half of it such that the legs will be uncapable of kicking the quilt. In such a manner, the quilt will be unable to be kicked off by the child's movement of turning or tossing and thereby ensuring the child's body to be under the top half of the quilt throughout the sleeping time.The slit opening of the quilt is preferably a rectangule with its both longer edges parallel to the transverse sides of the quilt, and its dimension must be sufficiently broad to allow a child's legs to pass through while not to fetter them so as to make the child feel more comfortable.

Another aspect of the present invention is to provide a cover layer detachably attached onto the quilt as described above for keeping the exposed legs warm.

The cover layer may have a size nearly the same as, or smaller than, one half of the quilt, such that the cover layer can spread on the whole slit opening and the bottom half of the quilt.

Along one of the longer edges of the slit opening and also along one side of the cover layer are provided with connecting elements for joining the cover layer with the quilt. The connecting elements will be extremely practical and easy to couple to and uncouple from each other for allowing the cover layer to be optionally attached to or be removed from the quilt. The connecting elements may be preferably zippers, buttons, loop tape such as those sold under the trademark of VELCRO, adhesive fasteners and the like.

By means of the attachment of the cover layer, the quilt of the present invention can afford the child greater comfort and protection against a cold in changing weather conditions.

Other objects, features and advantages of the invention will become apparent from the following description of the presently preferred embodiments, when read in conjunction with the accompanying figures.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING Fig. 1 is an upper side view of the quilt according to the present invention; Fig. 2 is a lateral view showing the quilt of Fig. 1 in place on a child; Fig. 3 is an upper side view showing the quilt of Fig. 1 to be attached with a cover layer by zippers; Fig. 4 is an upper side view of the quilt as in Fig. 3 with a row of buttons instead of zippers; Fig. 5 is an upper side view of the quilt as in Fig. 3 with VELCRO tapes instead of zippers; Fig. 6 is a lateral view showing the quilt attached with a cover layer according to the present invention in place on a child; Fig. 7 is a top view of the baby's night gown described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,769,855; Fig. 8 is a sectional view of the quilt described in U.S.

Pat. No. 4,441,223; and Fig. 9 is a sectional view showing the quilt of Fig. 8 in practical use.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION In reference to the figures, which are not necessarily drawn to scale, and where like numerals indicate like features throughout.

Referring to Fig. 1, the quilt 10 is an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, having a rectangular slit opening 20 in the middle section of the quilt 10, with its both longer sides 11 parallel to the transverse-sides 12 of the quilt 10.

The slit opening 20 has a width of several inches and a length which is about the same as 1/2 to 2/3 length of a transverse-side 12 of the quilt 10. The slit opening 20 is so dimensioned considering the state in use, different user and the integrate of the quilt 10 such as to make no fetters to the child's body. The four edges of the slit opening 20 can be bound with stripes to prevent the quilt 10 from being easily torn from anywhere of the edges of the slit opening 20 after use. In Fig. 2 is shown the quilt 10 as in Fig. 1 in place on a child 5. When a child 5 is covered with the quilt 10, the slit opening 20 of the quilt 10 will allow the legs 51 of the child 5 to pass through from under the top half 13 of the quilt 10 and press on the bottom half 14 of the quilt 10.

Thus, the quilt 10 will cover the child's upper body 52 up to the neck while leaving the child's legs 51 exposed out of the quilt 10. In such a manner, the quilt 10 will be hardly kicked off by the child 18 turning or tossing during sleeping.

The quilt 10 of Fig. 3 is a further embodiment of the present invention, showing a cover layer 19, with one of its sides 191, to be attached onto a longer edge 21 of the slit opening 20 of the quilt 10 by zippers 60, wherein the first zipper tape 61 is disposed along the longer edge 21 of the slit opening 20 with the zip side up and the second zipper tape 62 disposed along one side 191 of the cover layer 19 with the zip side down. The first and second zipper tapes 61 & 62 are easy to couple to and uncouple from each other such as to allow the cover layer 19 to be attached to or removed from the quilt 10 with respondence to the weather changes.In Fig. 4, the buttons 70 are used instead of the zippers 60, wherein the buttons 70 are disposed at spaced location along the edge 21 of the slit opening 20, and the buttonholes 71 are also disposed at spaced locations corresponding the location of said buttons along one side 191 of the cover layer 19. In Fig. 5, the VELCRO tape 80 is used instead of the zippers 60, wherein the loop tape 81 is disposed along the edge 21 of the slit opening 20 with the snap side up and a hook tape 82 disposed along one side 191 of the cover layer 19 with the snap side down.

It can be seen from Figs. 3 to 5 that when the respective connecting elements are secured together to join the quilt 10 with the cover layer 19, the cover layer 19 will spread on the whole slit opening 20 and the bottom half 14 of the quilt 10.

The quilt 10 attached with a cover layer 19 as shown in Figs.

3 to 5 will provide warmth to the child legs 51 exposed out of the quilt 10 and suitable for use in cold weather. In Fig.

6 is shown the quilt 10 as in Figs. 3 to 5 to be used on a child 5, wherein the child's legs 51 pass through the slit opening20 from under the top half 13 of the quilt 10 and lie between the bottom half 14 of the quilt 10 and the cover layer 19. The cover layer 19 is attached onto the quilt 10 merely with one of its four sides while leaving the rest sides free such as to be able to provide more room for the child's legs 51 to move.

Figs. 7 to 9 show the prior arts which have described in the above text, there is no need to go into detail.

While the embodiments of the invention disclosed herein are presently considered to be. preferred, various modifications and improvements can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. The scope of the invention is indicated in the appended claims, and all changes that come within the meaning and range of equivalency of the claims are intended to be embraced therein.

Claims

WE CLAIM:

1. A quilt of which having a slit opening in middle section for allowing a user's legs to pass through and press on the bottom half of said quilt to prevent said quilt to being kicked off through the user's turning or tossing during sleeping.

2. The quilt of claim 1, further having a cover layer attached onto one of the longer edges of said slit opening by connecting elements disposed therebetween.

3. The quilt of claim 2, wherein said connecting elements are zippers.

4. The quilt of claim 2, wherein said connecting elements are a row of buttons and buttonholes.

5. The quilt of claim 2. wherein said connecting

elements are VELCRO(tapes.