[net.kids] Komfy Kids problem

karl@cbrma.UUCP (Karl Kleinpaste) (03/18/86)

My son Todd (two and a half) has a Komfy Kid doll which (whom?) he
dearly loves.  It's one of his favorite cuddle toys for when he goes
to bed.  All the hooha over possibly dangerous materials in the doll
aside, he has loved it since he first set eyes on it, and he's never
had a bit of trouble with it in that respect.

However, Todd woke up screaming this morning, and it was because of
his Komfy Kid doll (Todd named him JJ quite some time back; I have no
idea where he picked up that idea).  It seems that JJ's head came off
some time during the night (Todd cuddles him pretty firmly).  Todd
seems to have woken up to see a decapitated friend lying next to him.
It took quite some doing to calm him down, and while Mommy comforted
him, I fixed JJ.

The design of the doll is such that the body is rather like a
pull-string sack.  The pull-string is around the neck.  The head of
the doll has a deep indentation at the base of the neck, and is held
in place by having the pull-string pulled in tightly inside this
indentation.  What happened was that the string came loose, allowing
the head to fall out.

Fixing it wasn't too tough.  I just had to make sure that I'd undone
the shirt or jumper thing that the doll wears so that I could maneuver
the pull-string, pull it open far enough to let the head be set back
in comfortably, align the pull-string back in the indentation and
tighten it down as well as I could.  I couldn't see how they tied it
down permanently before, which is probably why it came loose.  I
intend to go back and do a better job tonight in order to make sure it
can't come out again; waking up to terrified screams in the next room
is a rough way to start your morning.

If anyone else out there has a Komfy Kid, I strongly suggest that you
take a look at the neck/body connection on it to see if it's still
tight.  If it's not, you would do well to take it apart (when your
child isn't around, of course) and do a little re-design of the
pull-string so that it can't come loose too easily.
-- 
Karl Kleinpaste