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Look Up Mancat Monday

If you love cats, sharing makes us purrrr :-)

Things are looking up. Some say it’s always better to look up.

It’s been warm enough to sit outside in the garden without a coat. Yesterday Merlin luxuriated and I happily sweated in the sun on our picnic blanket. He may have pulled another rabbit out of the nine lives hat. His litter box score was bulls-eye perfect this week. And we spent quality time snoozing and meditating together when a mountain of stress threatened my sanity. Cats are better than most shrinks.

merlin-cat-bed-quote-look up

Odin and Domino are cavorting happily all over the property. Odin who has not traveled in a car since he arrived here three years ago (thanks mobile vet) suddenly expressed interest in auto interiors. Maybe he knows something I don’t?

Odin the cat in car-shortcut quote

I began creating a memorial garden for Gris Gris and Odin stopped by to pay his respects. Spring is a wonderful time to create or revamp a pet memorial garden. it doesn’t need to be big and if you have no garden, a patio planter and some creativity can substitute.

So far, I’ve used some old bricks, transplanted some bulbs and moss, plus added a wrought-iron owl to keep watch over our dear boy. it will take shape and transform organically. During the winter when he was buried under the snow, I felt some of my grief safely compartmentalized like food in a freezer. Once the snow melted and the dull brown ground emerged, i felt the sadness seeping to the surface. The burial mound like the rest of the winter worn garden reflected my mood but I didn’t feel like moping. There was too much outdoor work to be done. There’s a time sob under the covers curled in a ball and a time to unfurl and feel something different. The promise of spring and renewal urged tendrils of hope to reach out.

All the mental planning of what the memorial garden would look like felt good but it wasn’t as rewarding as the physical exertion of moving garden furniture, rolling birch tree stumps, digging the ground and carrying bricks. Like grieving, it’s a work in progress but every act symbolizes love. Every action is a step towards healing.

Have you created a memorial garden or special spot for your pet? If you’d like to participate in a future post I’m doing on memorial gardens, please email your images to [email protected]

Please include your name, the name of the pet and any other details of interest. Thanks! No matter what, I hope things are looking up for you this week!

Cat grave-memorial garden

34 Comments

  • meowmeowmans

    What a beautiful memorial garden to Gris Gris. We don’t really have a place here at the townhouse to build a garden, but we have all of our angels here with us, each in a box selected just for them, depending upon their unique personalities.

  • The Swiss Cats

    Mum doesn’t build memorials : our garden border has concrete pillars. Every dead cat is buried in front of a precise pillar on one of the garden’s sides. We know where is the place of every angel. Mum and Dad are thinking of doing something that doesn’t look like a cemetery, but rather like a celebration of life and happy memories : annual flowers ? A flowering shrub ? Nothing is decided yet… (since 4 years !) Purrs

  • Penelope

    Oh! That memorial garden is beauteous! Wes has one for Licorice and it has a beautiful Don Juan Rose in it . When mes passes over the bridge, me has asked that mes get buried beside him. Odin, mes sends yous much Love!
    Kisses
    Nellie

  • Cathy Keisha

    TW used to bury her departed goldfish in her backyard when she was a child but we don’t have photos. The backyard later became the burial grounds for cats. Again no photos. After she moved, the new owners may have paved over the yard and all those memories.

  • Skeeter and Izzy

    Layla, the garden is looking beautiful like Gris Gris. I am trying to create a garden here too for all of those that have owned my heart and for one that owned my soul. I haven’t been able to start a garden yet for her. I fall apart every time I try. It was 5 years April 4th and I will never forgive myself for causing her death.She is as much a part of me as the heart that beats in my chest.We shared this world for 11 years. This is a story that I just can’t fully speak yet. I am broken forever.
    Luvs
    Skeeter and Izzy and the Feral Gang + Twig and Peanut and Romeo

    • Layla Morgan Wilde

      Oh such heartbreak especially with the recent anniversary of your soul cat’s passing. Once you begin to work on the garden for the others, you may find a small stone or other natural object to wedge a tiny crack towards forgiveness. She has forgiven you and you have begun to speak of it so perhaps healing can begin?

  • Flynn

    I am glad Merlin is feeling good.
    I have a memorial garden for all the cats who came before. Each has a rose planted by their grave and there is a clematis on the fence. It is not looking so good after the very wet winter but I have taken the winter pansies up and started weeding ready for the summer bedding.

  • Sometimes, Cats Herd You

    What a beautiful memorial garden. We don’t have one, but the head peep doesn’t enjoy gardening. The act of creating the garden, the ongoing curation of plants and symbols, is part of the therapeutic value of the memorial garden, and it would be kind of lost on someone who uses HBO words the whole time she is doing what’s necessary not to embarrass the neighbors. But for those who feel more of a connection to nature, a memorial of garden is a touching expression of remembrance.

  • Oui Oui

    What a lovely thing to do! And Gris Gris must be looking down in pleasure. I have a terra cotta cat planter which reminds me of all the kitties who have passed since I have a very small townhouse yard. MMM would hiss at it when I first adopted her. {{eye roll}}

  • Angel AbbyGrace

    I’ve been hung up on finishing Abby’s garden. There has to be reasons for that. But, I finally found a piece of what I wanted to help not finish it off but compliment it and give it an Abby touch. Also I am incorporating Grace into the small flower bed I had originally set for Abby. I think it will morph each season as new things are added and old things taken away. I just want to see Beauty as I look out my window and see this space that is very important to me. To my eyes, Abby was the most beautiful cat in any universe and I know I am seeing her with my soul. I miss her so Layla.

  • Anonymous

    Cats ARE better than ANY shrink. Good to know Merlin is doing WELL!!!! He is a gorgeous statesman

    LOOOVE the memorial garden!!!

    Something I should think about … in due time. The boyz are 12.

  • da tabbies o trout towne

    doodz…de garden yur mom did for gris is awesum….we noe him apurreciates it….

    once spring iz troo lee heer….we knot sure it act shoo a lee iz yet….all de brown will be in full colorz….

    gram paw dude & sauce’s gardenz R both still that way yet….funkee brown…soon as we see sum signs oh plantings…we will send yur mom sum snapshots !!! ♥

  • The Island Cats

    The memorial garden is really looking great. We can’t wait to see it finished. We don’t have a memorial garden, though we do have an angel kitty in our yard that looks over all of us.

  • Tamago

    The memorial garden is looking very beautiful. I love the owl watching over your Gris Gris.
    Glad Merlin is doing well and had perfect litter box score 🙂
    Have a wonderful new week!

  • Sammy

    Great post……it’s sometimes difficult to pull ourselves out of that “ball under the covers” stage but Spring helps a lot…..new beginnings….I’m happy that Merlin is feeling good – Sam seemed to withdraw a lot from everything this winter but now that the weather has warmed up a bit he seems more “himself”…..it makes me happy too!

    Hugs, Pam

  • Sparkle

    My human is actually pretty unsentimental. She doesn’t do memorial gardens or anything else like that. She says it would give her too many reasons to feel sad and look back instead of looking forward.

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