Keely has been doing this thing recently where he sits near the photo collage of my old cat, Pumpkin, and extends a paw in front of the picture. I've tried to get a photo of him doing this, but every time I try, he immediately moves away from the picture. Cats...
I adopted Pumpkin when I lived in Hawaii and had her for sixteen years. Today is the anniversary of her death (three years ago). Since Keely has been doing this thing with the picture, I've been thinking about her a bit more than I normally do. Losing a pet is hard, and there's no real timeline for grief. When I first adopted Keely, I used to say little prayers to Pumpkin to help him be nicer (Keely had a hard life before I got him and it took him time to trust me) and maybe not attack my legs every day. I like to think she did her part, and is still helping him every now and then. This morning, he got up way earlier than he normally does, and when I got up to check on him, he was sitting by her picture. It was cute and sad and emotional.
When I drew the little cat in the window back in February, I don't know if I was consciously drawing Pumpkin. She was little her whole life, so the cat is definitely more her size than Keely's. I used the same drawing for today, but did it in orange instead. Pumpkin was a rare orange, female tabby. I ended up using satin stitch; I wanted to do long and short stitches to make it look more like fur, but I suck at those stitches, so I decided to go with something I do well instead.
Enjoy my little tribute to Pumpkin. Hug your pets!
Stitches: back stitch, satin stitch, stem stitch
Thread palette: DMC 310 (2, 4 strands), 910 (4 strands), 922 (2 strands)
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