Beautiful Art For A Difficult Time
The death of a pet can be emotionally difficult. Sadness and tears are to be expected, even from the most stoic of adults. To keep the sadness from turning into emptiness, however, pet owners should consider planning ahead. Mental health and pet care experts offer many ideas for how to deal with the emotional strain of simply leaving a pet behind for, say, a family vacation. And we have adapted some of these ideas to help those struggling with the death of a pet. In general, the ideas are for ways to create celebrations of a pet’s life. The experts aim is for travelers who sometimes find them selves feeling blue because their pet is not nearby to have a way to almost instantly celebrate their pet’s life either privately or, perhaps, with their fellow travelers. This same overall approach works well as a pet memorial for those whose pets have passed away.
But, that said, the approach does require some planning and foresight. One of the suggestions, for example, is to create a simple photo album with touching photos of your pet. One expert tells of a case in which a man who secretly prepared an album of photos of his wife’s beloved dog, and he presented the book to her on the morning her two-month business trip began. The photos in the book ranged from the time in which the dog was a cute, cuddly puppy up to the family’s most recent journey to the beach with the dog, just a few days before the woman’s trip. The woman was, most certainly, very sad to be leaving her special friend behind for two months, but the photo album, she reports, made the parting much easier than it had been for previous trips.With attention to planning and a devoting to updating, photo books like the one the man made for his wife can make excellent pet memorials, experts say. The catch is that, to be most effective, those who make the albums must be a bit of a shutterbug, always snapping new pictures of the pet and always preparing them for the album. This can be a fun experience for the life of the pet, however, and, certainly, it will result in a fitting, beautiful memorial after the pet has died. Photo books and albums are just the start of the kinds of pet memorials that can be created from the very beginning of a pet’s life. Many people today build websites devoted to their pets or make home videos of the most special moments with their furry friends. These make perfect pet memorials.
Photos do not have to be confined to photo albums to create memorial tributes however. Ceramic pet portraits are available in a variety of sizes and shapes, and can either be displayed alone or even be added to a cremation urn or memorial stone after the pet passes. One would simply choose their favorite photograph of their pet to have it created into a long-lasting and durable ceramic picture. There are also many cremation urns that will feature a photo, framed elegantly on the front of the urn. Depending on the urn selected, some may even have a frame that is easy to access, so a family can interchange their pet’s pictures as time goes on. Some pet grave markers can be laser-etched with a beloved companion’s photo, as well as their name and dates, to be set over the pet’s final resting place. These are just a few options of how pictures can be added to a memorial to create an unforgettable tribute to a fur-ever friend.
While photos make an excellent addition to a memorial, some families may find it too difficult to alway see a picture of their beloved pet. For those individuals, there are a variety of memorial options that range from traditional, to modern and even artistic. For example, cremation urns for pets are available in a variety of materials, suchs a metal, wood, glass, marble and ceramic, to name a few. Some urns may feature a design orientated towards a pet, such as paw prints, a ball of yarn or a bone, while others may have a simple design that is not inclined towards an animal. Some artists create special sculptures from natural and man-made materials, that feature a specific breed of pet, or an abstract figure that represents a companion animal. These sculptures may or may not have the option of holding cremation ash. Outdoor memorials, such as pet memorial rocks, offer a way to mark a pet’s favorite area in the yard or garden. There is no limit to how different memorial tributes can bring comfort and honor the memory of a cherished companion animal.
To some, it may seem macabre or strange to begin preparing a pet’s memorial while the animal is still alive. Experts say, don’t think of these projects as memorials. If you think of them as what they are, simple-but-pure celebrations of the animal’s life, they then have the capacity to function as a pet memorial for the days in which the pet will be gone, and as a fun project that will help the whole family enjoy the animal to the fullest extent while it is alive.