Posted on 09/08/2013 10:27:51 PM PDT by Slings and Arrows
Want to keep Fido in your life forever? How about turning him into some jewelry? Or a record? Grieving pet owners have turned to some creative extremes in order to immortalize their beloved pet. And in honor of National Pet Memorial Day on Sunday, September 8th, we’re showcasing some of the weirdest memorial services out there.
How do you remember your pets? Would you ever try any of these methods?
1. Hug A Pillow Containing Their Ashes
If you’ve ever wanted to give your long gone furry friends a big fat hug, the soft-hearted pillow will let you cuddle up and take a nap with your deceased pet. The Soft-Hearted pillow contains a small plastic pouch that will seal in their ashes tight so you can cuddle them for eternity. You can even personalize your pillow with embroidery or trimmings to further memorialize your critter.
Image: soft-hearted.com
2. Rock Out With Their Record
Whether you named your pet after a musician or “How Much Is That Doggie In The Window” makes you think of your beloved critter, sometimes music is one of the best ways to remember your lost loved one. That’s why And Vinyl presses ashes into vinyl records for you to listen to forever after. You can either use your favorite song or have the company write a track specifically for you and your pet. The company will even paint a portrait of your pet using its ashes and include that as the album’s cover art.
Image: Nina / Flickr
3. Make A Necklace From Their Hair
If your fluffy kitty or puppy left hair all over the house, or if you had a chance to shave off some of their fur before their cremation or burial, you can always try rolling their fur into balls and then turning those balls into jewelry like designer Kate Benjamin.
Image: Kate Benjamin / moderncat.net
4. Wear A Sweater Made From Their Fur
Alternatively, if you want a bigger tribute made from your critter’s fur then you can always have the hair turned into yarn and then knitted into sweaters like these people who are part of Erwan Fichou’s Dogwool series. While the models used in Fichou’s series are given their own jackets made from their dog’s fur courtesy of the photographer, you’ll have to find your own knitter to work with the fur because Fichou will only accept volunteers who are willing to pose in the jackets beside the pets who provided the fur.
Image: Erwan Fichou
5. Load Bullets With Their Ashes
Did little Fido love hunting with you? Then why not take him on one more hunt by loading up your shotgun cartridges with his ashes like Joanna Booth did with her husband’s ashes? While you can probably find a weapons dealer locally who could help add the ashes to your bullets, Caledonian Cartridge Company in England will most certainly be willing to take on the challenge, being as how they already helped Mrs. Booth with the process.
6. Form A Diamond With Their Ashes
Pets only live for a short while, but diamonds are forever, so why not let your past pet live on forever in a stunning piece of jewelry? A Japanese company named Lidy can turn your pet’s ashes into a yellow diamond up to one carat in size, which can then be set into a jewelry piece for you to wear for the rest of your life.
Image: Lidy
7. Create Jewelry From Their Nose
Artist Jackie Kaufman uses a quick-forming silicon mold to take imprints of pet’s noses, which she then uses to cast metal pendants. While the process is fast enough that it doesn’t bother living cats and dogs, it could just as easily be adapted for those who have recently passed away.
Image: Rock My World Inc / Etsy
8. Tattoo Them On Your Arm
Sure you could tattoo a portrait of your pet on your arm, but if you really want to personalize your tribute tattoo, you could always incorporate some of your furry friend’s ashes. While there are a lot of tattoo shops willing to mix the ashes in with the ink they use, be sure you ask ahead of time because some shops are unwilling to perform this procedure.
Image: macwagen / Flickr
9. Immortalize Them As Art
If you aren’t up to inking a permanent tribute of your pet onto your skin, then you can always have a more traditional portrait of them painted by artist Wayne DeFrances, who will incorporate your pet’s ashes into the paint he uses.
Note: The Image is for illustration purposes and is not of Wayne DeFrances or his artwork.
Image: Mykl Roventine / Flickr
10. Clone Them
If you just can’t give up your beloved pet, you can always try cloning them if you have a DNA sample and $50,000 lying around like Bernann McKinney did when she got five clones of her beloved pit bull created. Of course, the new puppy clone may look just like your old furry friend, but it will not grow up to have the same personality and behavioral traits, so really, aren’t you better off adopting a new puppy from your local animal shelter?
I actually like the nose print idea.
I’m thinking of making my own.
The silicone mold material can be bought at Michaels and I could use a simple plaster mold technique.
In fact, I could just use polymer clay instead of metal and make it black and shiny...:)
Aluminum canoe with full pyrotechnics and kerosene bladders.
Would need musical accompaniment.
Too beat to think of anything but Wagner at the moment.
Call the satellite “Valhalla” and the projectiles a “Zeus system”.
I know that’s mixing Greek/roman pantheon with Nordic.
Mjolnir system?
I lived with a friend that had 2 English Labs... and he gave them free reign of the house... I hated vacuuming doghair from everything, especially the couches, so every week or I would take he lads out to the middle of the yard and spend a good 1/2 hour brushing each dog with one of those “Furminator” brushes... which was actually more like a lice comb. They tolerated it to a degree... one was more obnoxious than the other of course...but when I was done, it looked like a lawnmower ran over a rabbit... I often considered taking the fur and spinning it into fiber... as it was quite soft And there was a LOT oofit. Thing is, with all the Frontline the boys would get, I was more inclined to treat the fur like toxic waste.
“They” say that if you have a groundhog problem, you can put dog fur in the mouth of the burrow and the gophers will Amscray.
Tull’s Broadsword & The Beast as an intro with a Tyr finale.
:)
Works for me!
-this coming from the guy who wants to have a weaponized burial.
Hunter S. Thompson, eat your heart out.
Cue “In the Hall of the Mountain King.”
Lol!
I’m honored.
How would Odinn take it?
And on an unrelated note: I have a Killswitch Engaged song stuck in my head.
Sheesh! They left out freeze-drying! A friend of ours has her cat on her desk, curled up on her favorite pillow. Sometimes, she;ll take her to the office, put her & the pillow on on the desk.
It seems to be popular.
For Halla, RIP little Princess.
We have 4 cats and a kitty sized Furminator.
The two longhaired girls tolerate it, more or less. It’s attention so they don’t outright reject it, but they’d rather be petted and tend to get a bit squirmy and annoyed.
The shorthaired brothers would pretty much let you comb them bald, I think. One will stand there and purr as long as you brush and politely tap your hand with a single claw extended just enough to feel the point of when you stop, trying to get you to resume. The other stands and stares wide eyed, but for him that’s great enthusiasm...if he didn’t like it you’d never be able to get him out from under the bed! Daft skittish beast...
We buried ours in the pasture. I remember them none the less.
Wagner is Excellent, but since my Lynn-Dah is a Labrador/Chow mix, I was thinking of something more like Inuit seal skin drums/Chinese Opera Blend.
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