Celebrate the life of a special pet this September with events and activities designed to help you find comfort and healing.
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A month of pet remembrance

No matter where you live, you can honor and celebrate special pets who live eternally in our hearts.

Patty Hegwood smiling and holding a small dog on her lap with a larger dog at her feet
Pet Loss Perspectives
Patty Hegwood interviews animal welfare professionals to learn how they navigate love and loss, and honor the animals who pass through their lives.
Person sitting with a dog on a bench under a tree while the sun sets in the background
Annual Blessing
Join us at Angels Rest for a special annual blessing as we celebrate and reflect on the lives of pets who have crossed the Rainbow Bridge.
Painting of a brown fluffy cat
Creating memorial arts and crafts
Join us at the Best Friends Roadhouse and Mercantile to learn how to express your feelings through art by creating a watercolor inspired by a beloved pet. Supplies are provided and all levels welcome.

Missed last year’s events or want to rewatch them? Here is the Love Lives On recording, How To Paint A Pet Memorial class, and Pet loss talk with Patty.

Heart with a paw print in the center of it

Remember your pet with a memorial

Remembering and sharing are part of healing — and can help to memorialize the unbreakable bond between you and your pet.

Pet memorial pages offer a digital space where you can create a memorial for your own pet or a grieving pet lover in your life, pay tribute to a cherished animal, or leave a virtual token of remembrance for a friend or loved one’s pet to show your sympathy and support.

When you create a memorial, your pet will also be remembered in an upcoming monthly blessing at Angels Rest, a final resting place for beloved animals here at Best Friends Animal Sanctuary.

Attend a monthly blessing

These blessing ceremonies are a longstanding Best Friends tradition, honoring and celebrating special pets who are gone from our lives but not from our hearts.

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You can view past blessings here.


Join us for a special annual blessing on September 24 at 4:30 p.m. MT

As part of Pet Memorial Month, you are also invited to join us at Angels Rest for a special annual blessing on September 24 at 4 p.m. MT to celebrate the profound effect that pets have on our lives. If you can’t attend in person, you can participate by creating a pet memorial that will be included in the final recording of the blessing we’ll post on our Facebook and YouTube pages on October 1. Please be sure to create your memorial by September 19 to have it included in the September blessing. Memorials created after September 19 will be included in the October blessing.

Other meaningful ways to remember your pet

There are several ways to pay tribute to the memory of a cherished pet, and each one can provide comfort while bringing love and care to animals around the country.

If you’d like to pay tribute to your pet or the pet of a loved one, wind chimes can be sent directly to you. 

Or you can choose to have wind chimes, a memorial brick, or a marker placed at Angels Rest or Angels Overlook here at Best Friends Animal Sanctuary — one of the most beautiful settings on Earth in which to memorialize our treasured animals.


Coping with pet loss

Grief over the passing of a pet is very real, but when you’re ready, there are paths to healing that can help you cope with the grief and sadness. 

Remembering and sharing are a part of the grieving process. To share memories and photos of your pet, create a memorial page. If you’re not ready to create a page, you can help homeless pets waiting to live their best lives with a gift in memory of your special pet

 

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About Best Friends Animal Society

Best Friends is working to end the killing of dogs and cats in U.S. shelters in part by getting more pets out of shelters and into loving homes.

We’ve come a long way since the first known city reached no-kill in 1994, and now we’re closer than ever to making the entire country no-kill. Of the roughly 3,900 shelters operating in America today, 1,300 of them are not yet no-kill, but nearly half are close with 100 or fewer additional pets to be saved, and we know what to do to get them there.

Best Friends is committed to working with passionate people like you to save homeless pets through adoption, volunteering, fostering, and advocacy. In addition to our pet adoption centers around the U.S, we also founded and run the nation's largest no-kill sanctuary for companion animals.

Working together, we can save homeless pets in our communities and secure a better future for our best friends. Together, we will bring the whole country to no-kill.