When people purchase feline cards and gift items from me intending to use them as sympathy gifts for a friend or family member they often choose a more fine art image that clearly looks like the feline who is grieved but without a sympathetic message so the recipient can just enjoy the image and not cry over the sentiment.
And sometimes they choose a subject that doesn’t look just like the feline who is grieved, but similar, depicted with a loose or less than photorealistic style, to soften the impact and just recognize the loss.
I’ve created many paintings of my own cats, photorealistic portraits and somewhat looser styles of formal paintings as well as informal daily sketches in every media from pencil to oil pastel. I’ve printed these images as cards and used them on my handmade gift items and I’ve found that people choose from these images as less formal sympathy messages.
Greeting cards, larger rectangular 5″ x 7″ and square cards, are printed on 100# cover. Note cards, smaller and ranging in size from 4.25″ x 5.5″ (A2) to 4″ x 6.25″ (A6) are printed on a variety of paper stocks to match the original artwork and include a matching envelope, packed in a resealable sleeve.
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
Every day I design, make and sell many different gift items featuring my artwork and photography—that’s how the votives came to be and got me started making custom pet memorial gifts.
Most of these I make with my cat art, my own cats from my 45 years of rescue and foster. At vendor shows and online people buy them as gifts for themselves or others, and sometimes those are remembrance gifts.
At a recent Sunday farmers market here in my home town a family of four adults saw my cat artwork and stopped in to look over the dishtowels and tiles, keepsake boxes and garden flags as well as the Custom Pet Memorial Votives, Suncatchers and Garden Flags. I introduced myself as the artist and told them all the cats here had been with me at some point in the past 45 years, either as a foster or one who stayed.
Catching bits of their conversations it seemed they got the idea to look for a gift for someone special to all of them from my feline gift items.
I share many, many stories with other cat lovers at the farmers market, and I asked their permission to share this one in particular because of the painting that inspired it and the extraordinary coincidences between my sweet Peaches and another dilute calico named Sugar, and involving the keepsake above. They gladly gave me the permission.
Peaches and Sugar
The group of people stopped by my tent and looked in, saw kitty things, and decided to look around, some stepping in and others looking from outside. I always greet people who show that level of interest in cats saying, “I’ve rescued and fostered cats for 45 years, and here are all those cats.” Then I usually continue, “This is all my own artwork, based on cats I’ve rescued, known loved and sometimes they stayed with me for one reason or another, and maybe add, “I’ve lived with a big variety of cats so you’re likely to find a cat who looks like yours.” And sometimes, “Yes, these are all real cats, no stock photos, no AI!” That’s a lot of talk, but it’s all true, and it’s very engaging because at that point I usually start hearing stories and even seeing photos of the cats in question and it’s all great fun.
One of them first saw “Peaches and Peonies” on the garden flag in my display and remarked to each other how much that looked like a certain cat, someone else’s cat, maybe a friend or family member. Peaches is very popular and in addition to the garden flag I have her image on a tile, a keepsake, a votive lamp, greeting cards, a refrigerator magnet, and when I have framed or single prints she’s there too. One person was looking at everything on the table and I knew I didn’t need to tell her she would find that artwork on other things. She found the tile and they agreed that was better for “him” than the garden flag. And then they found the keepsake.
“I can’t believe, this looks just like her!” she said. “And this would be so good for him.” They all agreed with her and she turned to me and said, “We’ll get this. Our father just lost his old kitty two months ago. She was his heart cat and he’s kind of lost without her.” People often buy the keepsakes for pets they’ve lost or as gifts for others and I didn’t need to explain that to her, she already knew. I wrote up her receipt, ran her transaction and handed her the keepsake in a bag as they all talked among themselves.
“But you really wouldn’t believe how much this cat looks his cat,” she said, “let me show you a photo.” Scrolling on her phone she found one and showed me.
This cat had Peaches’ exact face! That little mask that I remembered! Little round face, pink nose, I couldn’t believe it!
Pointing to the peach-colored area on Peaches’ shoulder on the garden flag she said, “That area is just the same as on his cat, she has that too,” and she mentioned all the white.
“What was his kitty’s name?” I asked “Sugar,” she replied.
“And this is Peaches! So close!” I said.
“And she was 21 years old too, that was a long time,” she told me.
I was speechless for a moment and told them, “My Peaches was 21 too!” I told them that Peaches had come to me as a foster with her sister after their person had died and a mutual friend was taking care of her house and asked me. Peaches’ sister only lived 10 months, but little Peaches went on. “I forget she was only with me for six years, it still seems like a lifetime she was with me,” I told them.
We all laughed and said it was too much coincidence, it was meant to be. “We’ll have to tell him all this too. I really think it will help him knowing about Peaches,” one of them said.
“That’s why I do this,” I said. “Tell him I’ll remember his Sugar whenever I look at Peaches.”
Okay, so I had a few tears on my face. I’m an easy cry. But I just had to share that story, so that you know of Sugar too.
About the keepsake boxes
Mewsette shares a sampler of keepsake boxes.
Nearly all of my keepsake boxes are made from new wooden cigar boxes, thanks to my cousin who worked in a cigar store for several years. Others have been made from very well-loved vintage cigar boxes along with some newer ones, and here and there an unfinished cardboard keepsake box.
I add my artwork to the top surface with a waterproof vinyl label and preserve as much of the artwork and embellishments already on the cigar boxes as I can but cover up the cigar information just about everywhere with washi tapes, cut vinyl, painted detailing and even bits metal bling from jewelry and other things that coordinate with the art and the box.
I generally make a big batch of them at the beginning of the season and let them all sell, but if popular ones sell I’ll make another of that design.
You can check what’s available in keepsake boxes on my ecommerce site Portraits of Animals on the keepsakes page. They retail for $20.00 each (in person).
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
The links in this article lead to another one of my websites, The Creative Cat, where it was originally published.
For some reason I’ve always remembered this photo of my Kublai from sometime in May, 1996, with my Pentax film camera, looking at me through the frame of the bishop’s weed stems along the front walk, the warm late afternoon sun highlighting the rich mahogany tint in his fur so he’d stand out against the sunwashed leaves reflecting on his eyes, the same shade of pale green. Yes, all those details. There are times when I wish my memory for visual detail wasn’t so deep, but most of the time, and at moments like this, I am deeply grateful for my rich visual memory of these moments.
Especially when for years I thought I’d somehow lost this photo. Sometimes favorite photos do get lost because they aren’t “stored” or kept together with other similar things in one logical place. They end up on the refrigerator and then when you clean it off they go in a drawer, or maybe they go in a frame in the bedroom, but then you move cat things to the living room and things are separated or organized differently.
But his intent expression, focused on me, communicating, in that lovely setting, I absorbed each detail and could visualize it as if it was in front of me every May and June, the months when bishop’s weed sprouted its Queen Anne’s lace-like flowers and the sun came around the spruce to illuminate it all and create longer dark shadows underneath and behind. And Kublai sketched into the scene with burnt umber as the sun brushed just enough detail to put the shapes together and realize a rather large black cat was studying you.
This past winter when I dug into my bins of photos, at least now all bins and envelopes collected into the studio, I finally found the whole envelope separated from where it should be because I had it out for the reference photo for A Rosy Glow, painted in 1998, and along with finally finding these two photos of Kublai found others of Stanley and Allegro and Sophie that are just daily cat things but so precious now in memory.
What was he communicating? He would travel on to his next life on September 19 that year. His will was strong but his muscular body was weakening with a condition for which there was no diagnosis at that time, and which responded to palliative treatments until it didn’t. I felt him slipping away. He let me know he was holding firm, and he knew I was doing all I could to keep him here. But we were both aware of what might be ahead.
Below, another angle of him at that same moment, and in studying the negatives I see that I took this photo first, then likely walked around to the right, around the rhododendron still monopolizing that corner of the porch, to see if I could catch him behind that leafy cover and purrhaps between the stems of its blooms…and so I did.
Kublai on the front walk in the sun, May 1996.
One of the reasons this image came to mind so often in the past decade was that Mimi loved the front walk, especially when the sun came around and she could nibble her catnip and then roll around, curl up and nap on the warm concrete. So many times I resolved to find that photo and then photographed Mimi, unknowingly in many of the same places and postures. Here she is from May 2024; especially sweet because she would leave for her next life on August 10 that year. I know I had always tried to get a photo of Mimi to match the photo of Kublai in my memory and I was pretty sure I hadn’t achieved that. But little did I know that as I took photos of her through the years, especially during the months of her last summer, that there was a rhyme scheme between the eras.
Mimi on the front walk in the sun, May 2004.
And there she is in one of her pauses between visiting individual catnip plants, moving in and out of the sun and shade as we knew, as Kublai and I knew, that her will was as strong as it had ever been, but I also felt her slipping away.
Keeping out of the sun but exploring the catnip!
And sometimes when I followed Mimi, and I know she tried to match what I was visualizing as she always did, it had always been her little game with me to read my mind and resist, and then find the spot and the pose I’d been imagining, I thought of them both as one being, one continuum of guidance and protection. Bridging them was Cookie, who was never in the front but definitely in the back yard and especially the garden, the three were all one powerful presence for me.
Turning around to look at me, May 2024.
Below Mimi gives it one more try though she’s tired by now. I know that I never sensed that continuum, that lineage of cats who came into my life and played that role as I rescued and fostered others and learned and still learn my trades and continue to make this house a home, the rhyme pattern from one era to the next, until now, when I’m kind of on my own, but by now I should know how to be a grown up and not need guidance, right?
Mimi looking at me from between the plants, May 2024.
They may only be with me in memory, but they are always with me in the sun sparkles and deep shadows of late afternoon, tending to evening when the veil thins and we are, in a way, all together.
From the time I began writing about my experiences in pet loss, relating what I was feeling and thinking about it as I moved through grief, readers have thanked me, often in private, for my honesty, grateful to know another shared their feelings as they moved through grief, or helped them make a decision.
Thank you for following our grief journey after losing three members of our feline family.
I hope sharing our experiences have helped you in some way, as sharing my experiences with you helps me.
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
Here’s a votive I created for a customer and shipped it directly to Rosie’s family with a note from the sender in the card you see below. Below that is the recipient’s response.
Rosie’s votive with the complimentary sympathy card at her person’s home.
Both the sender and recipient permitted me to use the photo and comment between the two sisters.
Rosie’s Votive with candle.
When I designed my first custom votive for a friend using a portrait I’d painted for her, I actually cried when I lit the candle and look at the kitty’s face. Now I do that with every one I make. I consider the creation of a remembrance item an honor.
The sample votive you see here was ordered by one friend to give to another, and both parties gave me permission to share the images. I never use any image of a custom item without permission.
For more information on votives, visit A Quick Introduction then follow the links to read about choosing a photo and ordering.
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
Two cat figures that ended up becoming part of Mimi’s memory.
Mimi has sent me messages regularly since the day she answered the cardinal and joined her children in their next life. As loving and caring as she was in life, she continues to give me prompts and encouragement in several different ways. You never know where the messages will come from or how the visitor will appear to you. But they will. They love and care about you as they did in life and still want to be near you. Another “Little Visit” from an animal companion who’s gone on to their next life.
From my pet loss journal September 15, 2024
Thinking of Mimi, here in her favorite spot just three months before she went to spirit on August 10, 2024…
Mimi on my mat.
Just like September 9 when the wooden black cat figure had fallen on my yoga mat when I needed a reminder about my exercise, this morning a cat shadow was on my yoga mat, right in Mimi’s spot. The shadow was from the running cat figure on the tall votive holder.
The shadow of the metal cat figure on my yoga mat.
The running cat votive holder.
I saw it upside down at first, then when I walked around to see and photograph right side up I could see it was literally moving! As the breeze moved the leaves the sun shone through, the running cat silhouette changed shape accordingly and seemed to be running through the dapples.
I was recently remembering Mimi’s daily run across the yard to the deck, even last autumn. She never ceases to guide me. I was having trouble settling back down to exercises without her. I wanted to get right to my big driveway project. But I stopped and limbered up with yoga, and focused, thought I did forget to ride my exercise bike.
The running cat shadow between my hands on the yoga mat.
Above is from my pet loss journal for September 15, 2024. It was just about six weeks since I’d lost Mimi, but she was never far. Little visits from her and little signs to guide me were frequent, sometimes leaving behind a feather or leaf or other physical object. I did my best to spend time with the moment, record these things and keep the objects if I could, taking photos and video if possible to mark the time and day and look at later.
Mimi on my mat between my hands.
Cat figures and geraniums
Over Mimi’s last summer both the wooden cat figure and the red geranium became a part of Mimi’s living spirit, and then a part of her memory, just as the running cat shadow did afterward.
It’s an interesting process how we embrace that change in status for objects we associate with our precious companions once they’ve gone to their next life; I call these “attachments” and have a series of articles about my own, including this article.
The wooden cat figure
The wooden cat figure.
This little wooden cat figure came into our house with Peaches and Cream, all the way back in 2005. Their person had died and her good friend, also a friend of mine, took care of the two in the house as she sorted and organized her friend’s things. No home could be found for two 15-year-old cats who looked a little ragged after their experience. I had agreed if no home was found I would take them and they arrived with a number of cat things, as we people who live with cats tend to collect.
The cat figure was obviously handmade from that era of cat silhouette shapes for doorframes and shelves and was finished just as you see here, kind of rough, but cute. I wish I knew the story. Was it inspired by a beloved black cat? Who designed it, made it, painted it? I didn’t think to ask then and never found out.
It fell on the concrete at some point and the wood split just in front of the hips. For years I displayed it on this little table on the front porch with the two pieces just pressed against each other, seen below in a photo of nearly all my front porch welcome cats. The faux stone welcome kitty on the shutter between the front door and window is the missing one, and that one came with Mimi’s cat figure with Peaches and Cream too.
Front porch welcome kitties.
In 2020 when I cleaned up the front porch I moved it indoors to repair and it hung out on my workbench until summer 2024 when I got busy with little things around the house so it was easier for me to accommodate Mimi’s needs as she became less active.
I was never fond of the face on this kitty, the little fake smile, or the incomplete background of scribbled black paint and considered a fresh coat of solid black paint because I love solid black silhouettes, then I reconsidered. This was another person’s creative idea, either made by or made for a person who loved cats, and I’d rather leave it with whomever that was. That would carry on anothers’ memory even farther, something I think about my own work.
How the kitty figure became Mimi’s cat figure
When the glue was dry I walked around with Mimi looking for a place outside to display it. At that point I decided it should rest on the arm of Mimi’s purple rocker on the front porch where kitty could still welcome others to our home. But as I occasionally glanced out my front window from my desk I was unnerved thinking Mimi was outside sitting on the arm of the rocker—the figure is fairly large and pretty much Mimi-sized as she was then—and I had to remove it from there. I didn’t even bother taking a photo, I had to rescue her that quickly!
That’s when the cat figure became associated with Mimi in her last months. After that I referred to it as “Mimi’s cat figure” or “the cat figure” and as “she.”
I walked around with Mimi and Mimi’s cat figure a few more times but didn’t find a good place for her to balance as she needed to and be visible, so I just put her in the basket on my bike on the deck so I’d see her and keep thinking about where she should go. There she stayed through Mimi’s last days and when we put her to sleep, and my lost days following.
Mimi has something to say about this
Until September 9, the day after Pet Memorial Sunday:
Wooden cat figure on my yoga mat today!
I have no idea how she got from my bike basket to where she was, upside down, on the edge of my yoga mat—the basket was four feet off the ground and about six feet to the right, the kickstand and bike’s wheels propped in place so the bike couldn’t move on its own. Unless a squirrel gave the cat figure some assistance maybe Mimi had pushed the figure out of the basket and the figure bounced to that spot to make me get to this. And she also managed to stay glued together and not have any other breaks!
Okay, Mimi, I’ll find a place for you! I stood there holding Mimi’s cat figure, spinning slowly around, and wondering where Mimi would want to be. I balanced the figure on both the arm of Mimi’s turquoise rocker, one of her favorite places all through the years, and on the deck rail, Mimi’s other favorite place out there as she had walked the plank from one side to the other for years. The figure looked cute, easily seen, and I could see her from the kitchen, but I didn’t feel these were right.
I turned around and glanced up at the windowsill under my kitchen window, and knew that was the place. Mimi could keep watch over her territory and me, and she needed to be in a higher spot. The slot on the back of her paw and tail that was to wrap around the edge was nearly twice as high as the thickness of the shelf so she’d easily fall off and that wouldn’t do. I found convenient bottle caps that filled the space and held Mimi’s cat figure firmly on the shelf. And there she’s been since then, all the way on the end of the windowsill so I don’t risk knocking her off when I fully open the casement window.
Mimi’s cat figure watches over the deck.
The bonus of that spot was that I could see the tips of the Mimi’s ears and back right outside the kitchen window when I was at the sink.
Mimi’s cat figure on the windowsill outside.
This past November I was out in the yard near Mimi’s Favorite Scratching Tree and just happened to glance to the right back at the house. I saw Mimi’s cat figure in full morning sun watching me, and smiled, again thinking of her joyful dash across the yard and up the steps to the deck after she’d jumped down from her tree.
Mimi’s cat figure is watching out for me out in the yard.
The red geraniums
The red geranium is on Mimi’s garden chair.
Mimi never minded her bell collar which she wore from 2012 to her last day, but she was apparently particular about the color. Until her last two years she wore a harness and leash outdoors, but just in case she escaped, which she did with one harness, the collar was necessary. Plus, she learned she could summon me with it by jingling it a few times in the kitchen or wherever she was in the house and I’d come looking for her. She was “the lady in red” because she shredded every other color collar I’d gotten her, cotton and nylon, until the red one she wore for at least a decade.
Mimi models for Independence Day
Her red collar is there under the pink harness, and though the geranium looks pink it’s actually the older red one, this from 2018.
I have always kept my geraniums for years, outside in summer, indoors in winter, taking cuttings each year for new plants. Some of my main plants are over a decade old and they’ve always been shades of pink and red. They do stop producing leaves and flowers and the red one above did several years ago, but a couple years ago someone gave me a red one at the end of the summer because they didn’t want to keep it. That one immediately became Mimi’s geranium.
Mr. Max on the chairs.
And so it was that after she’d gone on to her next life I put it on the wicker chair she napped on in the garden, until frost. That’s where it sat this past summer too. It bloomed all summer and even greeted Mr. Max in August for his brief and joyful forays into the back yard.
They faded geranium blossom.
At the beginning of October what seemed to be the last bloom had faded and looking at Mewsette’s garden chair and thinking of Mimi, with Mr. Max’s recent loss, the fading bloom really made me sad. It’s the principle of the garden to accept that everything fades, fails and disappears in cycles and I’ve always loved that for the sense of constant renewal, but this year, after all the losses, it just felt like an ending. But looking a little closer I could see one tiny bud, and another, getting ready to start developing.
The new blossoms at the end of October.
The days had grown cold and we had our first frost two nights later. I knew it was coming and the geraniums were safely inside, really seeming like an ending, of the season, of those memories. But that’s not the end of warm autumn weather and I took them back outside on warm days and left them when nights were temperate. At the end of October those buds matured, two last flowers that stayed bright well into November, when they came inside for good, the red and magenta in my bedroom window upstairs.
And the baby red geraniums
I had left the cuttings in little pots outside through the summer, but decided to plant them in clay pots for indoor life over the winter. At the beginning of December the red pot of cuttings produced one bright flower, and about 10 days later another. The last withered petals of the second bloom finally fell this past week, the first week of January. As with the plant they came from, two other buds are already forming, will soon grow, swell and bloom.
So, endings for individual flowers, but the main plant continues, and the cuttings will become their own mature plants someday.
Coming together
The running cat figure has been with me since the late 90s and will continue to be out on the deck, here seen a little above and to the right of center against the brush at the end of the yard.
The running cat votive holder.
Mimi’s cat figure has found a home on that windowsill looking out over her territory and me, and I still look at the tips of her ears whenever I’m at the sink.
The red geranium herself has years left, and many other plants made from her cuttings, like the new generation blooming on the inside of the kitchen window. Here is where they all come together, Mimi’s little support structure.
The blooming red geranium cuttings are on the kitchen windowsill—inside, right behind Mimi’s cat figure is on the kitchen windowsill—outside, and looking past all three I can see the running cat figure silhouetted against the trees at the end of the yard, a trio of unrelated things, each from a different time with a different purpose, each sending me a message of love and affection from Mimi, perhaps even chosen by her to represent her spirit in this mortal world.
Mimi’s cat figure on the windowsill outside.
And now a new one
And she led me to yet another cat figure. I visited my friend Judi’s multi-family estate sale in her shop here in Carnegie at the beginning of December. I’m always guaranteed to find things I can use around the house or in my handmade gifts.
The new kitty figure.
Aside from all the other things I saw and and chose, I kept walking back and forth past a cat figure on the wall. This kitty had pumpkins around her neck, below. I’m not fond of black cats used for Halloween decorations but the pumpkins were nicely done. I’m not one to purchase these sorts of things—I’d rather make them. But this one…I felt a sense of Mimi. Judi has known me and my cats for years and knew what I was talking about when I told her how this little kitty on the wall was getting into my heart. Rather than it seeming like a gratuitous black cat silhouette used for Halloween I almost felt she was looking at me with kind of a humorous twinkle, if her painted eyes could twinkle. And she’s about the same size as Mimi.
So I did bring the kitty home.
Once again I couldn’t decide where this kitty should go. A few days later, walking up the steps onto the deck I looked at the original Mimi cat figure on the shelf and knew the blank space between the shelf and the door was waiting for this cat figure. I took the pumpkins off and put one of Mimi’s old collars on the kitty. Now both of them watch over me.
Two wooden cat figures.
I could use the pumpkins on something else entirely when the season came around.
The pumpkins that kitty wore around her neck.
Also read articles about Pet Loss and Pet Loss in the First Person, where I share my own experiences, and enjoy my self-published book of my own stories of sensing my cats’ presence with me after they’ve gone on to their next life.
Little Visits
Stories of sensing my cats’ presence after they’ve gone to their next life
This post on The Creative Cat includes the text as well as a video with my reading of the stories illustrated with photos and art.
Click the image to read and listen to Little Visits.
And a note from “The Creative Cat” where I originally published this essay, and where I write about pet loss just about every Sunday…
Thank you for following our grief journey after losing seven members of our feline family.
I hope sharing our experiences have helped you in some way, as sharing my experiences with you helps me.
You can read all the articles related to their losses by tapping one of the images here, in the side bar or in articles about pet loww. You can also read all my articles about my own losses in the category “Pet Loss in the First Person”
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
I began my design ideas for suncatchers the same way I did with many of my handmade gifts, wanting to see my art on gift items I saw in stores. In the early 90s I bought a 3.25″ x 3.25″ square bevel-edge clear suncatcher with a kitten etched in the center, which I not only liked but found inspiring. I had lots of pencil and ink sketches that would work on things like this. I held that idea all these years knowing I’d want my artwork on that beveled glass somehow, someday.
That etched kitten suncatcher from the early 90s is pretty battered by now.
And like most of my memorial gift items, my suncatchers began as personal gifts for friends who’d lost their animal companions. Using the standards I’d set up to create the images on my Custom Pet Memorial Votives I was ready to make good on that suncatcher idea, beginning with the round beveled shape.
The original round Custom Pet Memorial Suncatcher
I wanted a piece of glass with a generous beveled edge that would cast rainbows when the sun shone through it the same as my little one did. Clear beveled glass pieces, preferably predrilled, were surprisingly not easy to find as many were too small for a nice-sized image and few were beveled, but I finally found a 5″ circle with 3/16″ thick glass and a deep beveled edge at least a 3/8″ wide. This glass feels substantial in your hand and the bevel is generous, the image is a good size.
I made a few for friends, then made a quantity of them for my longtime customer who owns the pet cremation business where I’ve taken my cats for the past 20 years; I manage her website, photograph urns and events and provide design and promotional services.
We host a Pet Memorial Sunday celebration each September and I make a custom gift for each person who has RSVP’d. The suncatcher idea proved to be popular right away.
5″ beveled glass suncatcher.
Planning the square Custom Pet Memorial Suncatcher
I still wanted the square shape, though, partly to see my original inspiration, and to offer an alternative shape, and because not all images fit well in a circle.
The company I buy from has 4″ squares which would seem to have less presentation space than the 5″ circle so I debated, then bought some to work with. The outside dimension is smaller but the corners allow the image to be almost as large as the circle. Below is the square, modeled by Buckwheat, whose portrait I painted years ago and whose person encouraged me to use his image.
4″ square beveled glass pet memorial suncatcher.
And working out the rectangular Custom Pet Memorial Suncatcher
I had another idea, of course…the company also carried a graceful arch-top rectangle I’d wanted to try but found they wouldn’t be carrying it after current inventory ran out.
I had been looking at their 3″ x 5″ rectangle and also debated because it’s a difficult shape to fit, but when the company suggested that shape as an alternative—all their customer service people use all their products so you get the best real advice—I decided to go with it.
The first time I offered one at the Blessing of the Animals that vertical rectangular was immediately popular and I had several orders.
The image area on this shape is 2.25″ x 4.25″. This suncatcher is modeled by Pixie, a beloved rescue kitty of a friend in rescue who’s been the recipient of just about all my new ideas; there’s a lot of loss in rescue.
Pixie, a 3″ x 5″ beveled rectangle glass suncatcher.
The rectangle and square are just as popular as the original circle.
What recipients have said:
“I have her suncatcher hanging in my kitchen window. I stand there and look at her every morning while I drink my coffee.”
Anonymous recipient, in person
I want to thank you for the very special, beautiful glass ornament suncatcher …It brought a tear to my eye that day and the day I hung it up in the sunlight. You really have a very special talent.
Anonymous recipient, in a letter
And they don’t have to be memorials
Custom suncatchers also make unique customized gifts even when they aren’t in sympathy for a loss. One of the suncatchers ordered at the Blessing of the Animals was a Fathers Day gift for a friend’s husband for a kitty who is very much alive.
A suncatcher can hang on any window, mirror or any place you want to see the image of your beloved animal companion.
Standard with each suncatcher
I use my skills as an artist in traditional media and on computer to remove backgrounds, touch up lighting and composition, and add a background color or pattern that complements the subject (see Choosing a Photo…).
A sympathy note card is also included. The one shown below is available with every suncatcher. You can visit my page of Animal Sympathy Cards to see a selection of others. If I am to ship directly to the recipient you can give me a note which I will write inside the card, otherwise I send you a blank card for your personal use.
Love Never Ends note card
The price includes shipping, whether to you, your practice or business, or drop-shipped to the recipient, within the continental US. I have rates for international shipping.
I include a care and use card with each suncatcher. This card has a link to this website.
Little extras
Adding an extra subject, a special background pattern like a favorite blanket or chair are extra, usually no more than $10 per addition. Adding a name or other brief text is optional and is included.
Suncatchers are kept in confidence
I photograph each Suncatcher I make for my records and to keep the details of what it looked like for my reference. I never use a custom pet memorial gift in any public venue, whether for display or self-promotion, without permission of both the giver and the recipient.
Order a Custom Suncatcher
Visit Suncatchers to read about all the shapes and order yours. As I mention above with the notecard, if your suncatcher is a gift for someone else I can ship it to them with a note from you.
All suncatchers range between $25.00 and $30.00 including shipping.
Adding an extra subject, a special background pattern like a favorite blanket or chair are extra, usually no more than $10 per addition.
Further customization by adding a name, dates or brief text is included in the price.
I can ship a suncatcher to your recipient with a note from you at no extra charge.
Custom suncatchers also make unique customized gifts even when they aren’t in sympathy for a loss.
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
I make several non-customized memorial gifts, some intended for sympathy and remembrance, and some simply as gifts for animal lovers that can be used as remembrances.
Every day I design, make and sell many different gift items featuring my artwork and photography—that’s how the votives came to be. People have purchased the non-customized gifts when ordering a votive or other customized remembrance isn’t possible or when they want a gift to give right away.
About the image “I Will Always Walk With You”
Original photo for “I will Always Walk With You”
This particular design was based on a chance photo from a July morning in 2009 just three days after we lost Namir, and Cookie and I were out in our back yard, each doing our thing and remembering him, me racing from flower to glistening dewdrop with my camera.
They often followed or preceded me as I wandered. I happened to see my wet footprint and Cookie’s wet pawprints walking next to me on the flagstone path around my yard. Cookie and I were both missing Namir; he would have been with us on that morning, I feel he was.
Later that month I knew it had to be one of the set of sympathy cards I was designing and what text I’d use. I designed a few other remembrance items too.
About the “I Will Always Walk With You” Garden Flag
Flags are 11″ x 15″ and can be displayed outside in the garden or used indoors as a small banner. I print my flags on one side of cotton canvas duck fabric and stitch the pocket and hem. Cast iron flag stand is extra. Flags have been colorfast and resisted fraying for two years in just about all of my test yards around the country except where there’s been some wild weather. I’ve left my own out through the winter.
I was a little surprised at the popularity of this flag—I sell at least one at nearly every vendor event where I display my pet memorial gifts.
Scroll down to read about ordering a single flag or a quantity.
I make this flag in quantity because it’s also popular at my vendor events, so they can be ordered in quantity.
A single flag is $20.00 including shipping.
I can ship a single flag to your recipient with a note from you at no extra charge.
If you have an animal-related practice or business and want to order in quantity:
The first flag is $20.00, each extra flag is $10.00 each up to five with greater discounts for six. My price breakdowns are:
one = $20.00
two = $30.00
three = $40.00
six = $50.00
Order an “I Will Always Walk With You” Garden Flag
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
This particular design was based on a chance photo from a June morning in 2009 when Cookie and Namir and I were out in our back yard, each doing our thing, they smelling and tasting and stalking, me racing from flower to glistening dewdrop with my camera. They often followed or preceded me as I wandered, and I happened to see the stepping stone at the bottom of the steps with my wet footprint and two pawprints, a faint third above them. We lost Namir a few weeks later, and when I reviewed the photos from that morning I found this one and immediately knew it had to be one of the set of sympathy cards I was designing and what text I’d use. Later I designed a few other remembrance items too.
“I Will Always Walk With You” animal sympathy card.
“I Will Always Walk With You” Pet Remembrance Gift
This remembrance is a print of my photo “I Will Always Walk With You” on a cradled wood panel, and a combination of finishes around the sides to coordinate with the image and appear like stone. A bottom panel adheres with Velcro, strong enough to hold things inside but not a tight enough fit for loose cremains like an urn.
It serves a double purpose: as a decorative item or a sort of keepsake that can hold a pet’s cremains contained in a bag along with keepsake items. In either case it can sit on a table or shelf flat or up on its bottom edge.
Without the base panel, because of the “cradles”, or wooden frame backing that forms the sides, it can also hang on the wall.
The size is 5″ x 7″ x 1.5″.
This coordinates with of one of my Animal Sympathy Cards, one of three in the dozen that are non-species-specific, so can be used for any pet with paws; in some cases those distinctive pawprints stand for animals in general.
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
I featured all my Custom Pet Memorial and non-custom pet remembrance gifts, and animal portraits. Hosted by The Creatures of the Creator 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
Unity Presbyterian Church, 1146 Greentree Road, Green Tree
I’m a member of this pet support group at a local church. I’m so happy to be a part of this event to celebrate our animals each year. Last year I met Winnie and her family, and made a few new friends too.
I’ve been busy creating some new Custom Pet Memorial items that I’ll share after this event is over…because I’m still working on them today!
And my display looks a little “flat” compared to the usual—because it is! Storms were moving in and very gusty winds were tossing things around including all those glass votives and suncatchers so I laid everything flat on the table. And if certain areas of the photo are a little blurry, that’s why.
I’ll have my Custom Pet Memorial items:
Custom Pet Memorial Votives
Several styles of Custom Pet Memorial Suncatchers
Custom Pet Memorial Garden flags
Non-custom pet memorial remembrances:
Non-custom votives
Non-custom pet remembrance garden flags
Non-custom remembrance keepsakes
Love Never Ends votive
Window Silhouette Votive Lamp
Love Never Ends garden flag
A selection of Animal Sympathy Cards.
Custom Commissioned Portraits samples and Gift Certificates.
Marketplace is a feature on The Creative Cat to share the latest coming out of my studio with my readers. Once a week on Thursday I feature something new in my “shop” .
Find out more about creating custom items for your own home using the images you see here. Visit the “Ordering Custom Art” page to see samples and read bout how to order.
Sign up for my e-newsletter (below), check the widget on the sidebar on my home page, or sign up to receive posts on Portraits of Animals Marketplace. I plan on plenty of events this coming summer in the Pittsburgh area.
It’s all done under the close and careful supervision of my studio cats!
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
Custom pet memorial gifts are not only loving remembrances to have or give as a gift, they may also be a lovely gift with a favorite photo of a beloved animal companion while they’re still around to enjoy.
Mothers Day, Fathers Day, Memorial Day are observed in the next two months. Memorial Day is seen as a universal day of remembrance while Mothers or Fathers days are celebrations of a mother or father or the person who filled those roles for you, or for a friend or family member who considers themselves a pet parent. A gift that recognizes a loved one’s love for their animal companion or their grief at their loss is very personal and special.
A custom votive, suncatcher or garden flag for yourself or others celebrate or remember a beloved animal companion, created with images that you provide. I can ship gifts directly to your recipient with a customized sympathy card if it’s a remembrance at no extra charge.
And a discount from now until the end of May
Custom Pet Memorial Gifts Offer
25% discount on your Custom Pet Memorial Gift
or Custom Pet Memorial Gift Certificate
Use coupon code CUSTOMMEMORIALGIFT25 in your shopping cart.
Offer good until May 31, 2026
About the votives
Beginning as memorial gifts, I make your Custom Pet Memorial Votive with love and sympathy on the loss of a precious companion, be it yours, or a friend’s or family member’s companion. I designed the memorial votives to focus on your companion’s face, and position their image so that the votive candle shines through their face, especially their eyes. During the day your votive captures ambient light even without the candle, but in the evening, when the candle is lit, the flickering light through your pet’s face in a darkened area is warm and intimate. Watch the video below as I place a lighted votive candle into Luna’s custom memorial votive.
How I designed the Custom Pet Memorial Votives
I designed the first of these memorial votives, as a gift to a friend who had rescued Oscar and had previously commissioned a portrait of him. Rather than using his entire portrait where he is sitting up, I designed it to focus on his face and positioned him so that the votive candle would alight his face, and especially his eyes. From its effect on me, and Oscar’s family’s reaction, I knew this was an idea that I could share with other animal lovers.
A custom memorial votive for Oscar.
So I designed the memorial votives to focus on your companion’s face, and position their image so that the votive candle shines through their face, especially their eyes. During the day your votive captures ambient light even without the candle, but in the evening, when the candle is lit, the flickering light through your pet’s face in a darkened area is warm and intimate. Watch the video below as I place a lighted votive candle into Luna’s custom memorial votive.
I use 4″ x 4″ a square glass votive. Working with your supplied photo or artwork, I use my decades of pet portraiture on paper and canvas and my Photoshop skills to prepare the image to fit the votive. I remove background distractions and correct distortions if necessary, and add a color or gentle pattern that suits your pet, pulling ideas from the supplied photos.
I print that image on a frosted vinyl label that holds the image with clarity and diffuses the light of the candle, and wraps completely around the outside of the votive.
I can customize backgrounds too, using patterns or other decorations you choose. Customizations cost $5.00 to $10.00 extra.
Ziggy Stardust needed to have stars on her votive.
Ziggy Stardust
I can combine multiple photos so that animals appear together, or use each side of the votive for a different pet.
You can use a wax votive, but as much as I love real candles and flickering candlelight, with years of curious feline noses and waving tails I’ve been trained to use flameless candles. I provide an LED votive candle with each votive I make that has an inexpensive and easily purchased replaceable battery so that you don’t need to run out and find a brand new votive to continue remembering your pet when the original grows dim.
For more information and ordering:
A basic votive with one subject and no extras is $40.00 including shipping. This includes a use and care card and a complimentary sympathy card if needed.
A suncatcher can hang on any window, or a mirror or any place you want to see the image of your beloved animal companion. And they also make unique customized gifts even when they aren’t in sympathy for a loss.
As with the votives, working with your supplied photo or artwork, I use my decades of pet portraiture on paper and canvas and my Photoshop skills to prepare the image to fit the image area on the suncatcher. I remove background distractions and correct distortions if necessary, and add a color or gentle pattern that suits your pet, pulling ideas from the supplied photos.
I print that image on a frosted vinyl label that holds the image with clarity and diffuses the light of the candle, trim it to fit the image area.
Shapes and sizes
I offer four different sizes/shapes, as seen above: a 6″ acrylic circle, a 5″ deep beveled circle, a 3″ x 5″ deep beveled rectangle, and a 4″ x 4″ square. Remember that the deep bevel on all but the 6″ acrylic is between 3/8″ to 1/2″ and that reduces the image area from the outside dimensions to a smaller area.
For more information and ordering:
Each basic suncatcher with one subject and no extras is $30 including shipping. This includes a use and care card and a complimentary sympathy card if needed.
I spent a couple of years experimenting with ways to make my own 11″ x 15″ garden flags, and once I began selling the Custom Pet Memorial Votives it was a natural step to also make Custom Pet Memorial Garden Flags. I take the photo you provide and enlarge and crop it to fit the image space on the flag. Garden flags are printed on one side of cotton duck canvas with a rod pocket sewn at the top and a heavy hem at the bottom to prevent curling.
Your custom garden flag doesn’t need to be used in the garden, or it can come inside for winter, using a wire or wooden bracket that’s used for pennants, small quilts or weavings.
Below I have my samples displayed indoors for one of my open houses.
Pet Memorial Votives and Garden Flags
A few samples.
For more information and ordering:
Each basic garden flag with one subject and no extras is $30 including shipping. This includes a use and care card and a complimentary sympathy card if needed.
Each gift is packaged with a small care and use card and a message of sympathy from me if they are remembrances, “May their light shine on you always.”
If your votive is a gift a sympathy card with your message is included
You may include a message to any recipient. I offer memorial note cards that are blank inside where I will write your message and include it, in an envelope, with the votive. There is no charge for this.
The card for your votive.
I prepare and print your photo or artwork of your pet onto a frosted vinyl label, then burnish it onto a cube-shaped glass vase 3″ in each dimension. A sympathy card and an LED tea light are included. The price includes shipping, whether to you or a friend.
If this votive is a gift…
I’ll be happy to ship it directly with a card at no extra charge.
Use the drop-down below to enter your choice of standard or other sympathy card.
Use the text box below to enter your message for the sympathy card and optional text for the back, if necessary.
If you’ve chosen a sympathy card from my collection, use the text box below to enter the design name.
Please enter the recipient’s address in the “Shipping Address” area of the shopping cart.
Whether the votive is for you or a gift for a recipient, the votive and card are carefully packed and shipped in a Priority Mail box.
Custom Pet Memorial Gifts Offer
25% discount on your Custom Pet Memorial Gift
or Custom Pet Memorial Gift Certificate
Use coupon code CUSTOMMEMORIALGIFT25 in your shopping cart.
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
The forget-me-nots are blooming in my back yard and it reminds me of all the memories I have of my cats pictured with the sweet blue flowers in one way or another, in this case growing in my windowbox. The photo on this card was a very lucky capture and a treasured memory, and though it’s not in my main dozen set of sympathy cards it was a request for a custom card several times. I thought those customers had a good idea and decided to just publish it as a card so no one would need to request a custom card again.
About Sophie and the photo
Sophie was always in one of the windows when I left and when I returned, and she always managed to use the curtains to dramatic advantage. This is one of my fondest memories of her, nestled in the creamy lace with the spring-blooming forget-me-nots in the windowbox.
So each year when I transplant the forget-me-nots from the yard to the windowbox I remember Sophie and this particular beautiful moment in 2005—May 4, 2005 to be exact. It was Sophie’s year to pose in forget-me-nots and she gave me many poses from the first two weeks of May, but of all of them, this is my favorite.
Sophie especially watched me leave the house, and in the evenings I closed my curtains before I left. She liked to play around with the curtain—I would inspect the lace to see her white fur through the mesh, or she dramatically appeared from between the panels, around the edge or underneath, but she was always there with her big round eyes.
On this day the forget-me-nots in the windowbox were in full flower and in the late afternoon the warm spring sun angled into the window imparting a creamy tone to the lace. Sophie began her little game with the curtain while I was still indoors and I started photographing even then. As I walked toward the street I turned around to get a last look at her and immediately pulled my little digital point-and-shoot back out of my purse and took as many photos of her peering through the curtain at me, the warm dappled light, the flowers below.
About the card
Unlike most of my sympathy cards this card has no text on the front.
Cards are blank inside but can be customized with your message for an extra charge.
Individual cards are shipped by first class mail.
Sets of six and twelve are packed in a clear-top stationery box. Price includes shipping via Priority Mail.
All images and content are copyrighted and may not be used or reproduced in any way without my written permission. Please contact me if you are interested in using any of my content.
