Stuffed Animals

The stuffed, plush, cudddly or soft toys vary from animals like Simba the lion, Yogi the bear and Daisy the cow, to objects like multi colored balls. It cannot be disputed though, that the teddy bear beats every other form hollow! This plush toy has been a favorite with children for ages and is the most popular comfort object. There was a time when the stuffed or plush toy was indeed a small animal stuffed randomly, with the evacuated skins of hunted animals! However, today, modern technology has made it possible to produce the likeness of the animal with colorful, eco-friendly and synthetic material.

The plushy or soft toys are the modern, synthetic stuffed toys. They are marketed within a special market segment that caters to the demands made by the little ones for replicas of popular cartoon characters, animated movie characters and regular animal, bird forms and human figurines. The level of awareness that parents all over the world share today is amazing and hence, these stuffed or plush toys are manufactured only with researched and tested material. The modern materials used to make the plush toys are safe for the little one to hold close, kiss and caress. The comfort toy has well defined features that scream precision of cut, quality material and a very professional finesse.

The first commercial manufacturer of plush or stuffed toys is on record as the famous Steiff company that was founded way back in 1880, in Germany. The Giengen an der Brenz based company gave the world its first commercial sale of plush toys. Among the most popular classic stuffed toys are the teddy bears, human figurines and the sock monkeys. Some of the modern day, popular commercial manufacturers of plsuh toys include Steiff, Disney, Russ Berrie, Build A Bear Workshop and Ty. The plush or soft toys are easy to adopt and very lovable. They make great friends and ensure the little ones a good night’s sleep.

The plush toys or cuddly toys also provide entertainment, even as they are educational. They are known to motivate the little ones to speak their first words, enhance cognitive behavior and encourage the inherent creativity in the child to surface early. The plush toys stimulate and assist in the overall development of the child’s physical and mental skills. This early approach helps the child a lot later on in life. These cuddly friends enhance the early years of a child and fill in for friends, especially when the presence of the real counter parts or siblings is missing. The plush toys are now part of the ‘must-have’ lists of preparatory schools. Read the rest of this entry »

PETA has just launched a new Sea Kitten campaign targeting children, in an effort to change the way they view fish. The group wants to convince people that fish are intelligent, adorable victims of a world that is terrorizing, torturing, and murdering them. So if they can reach out to children at an early age and make them regard fish with the same affection they feel for kittens, then the children will grow up to be vegetarians and leave the poor fish alone.

PETA’s explanation for wanting fish to be thought of as Sea Kittens is that no one would ever consider putting a hook through the head of a kitten and dragging it through the water. They are asking that people contact the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to stop promoting the hunting and killing of sea kittens. According to PETA’s website, sea kittens are the victims of threats to their ways of life, they are just as intelligent as other pets, just as adorable, they feel pain just like all animals feel pain, and no one should be allowed to hurt a sea kitten. PETA harshly criticizes FWS, saying that their mission to “conserve, protect and enhance fish, wildlife and plants and their habitats” is in opposition to their turning a blind eye on people hunting sea kittens.

The most widely publicized fallout from the Sea Kitten campaign came last week when PETA faxed a letter to the principal of Spearfish High School in Spearfish, South Dakota. The letter asked the school administrators to change the name of the school to “Sea Kitten High School.” PETA spokesman Pulin Modi explained, “If children were taught to refer to fish as ‘sea kittens,’ reflecting that fish, like cats and dogs, are individuals that do have friendships, fewer fish might be killed for food or sport. We want people to realize that more fish are killed each year than all animals combined. They don’t have the sympathy of more popular animals like cats and dogs.” Read the rest of this entry »