How to Choose Pet Cremation Jewelry

It's sad when a close animal companion leaves this world. I've experienced it several times and each time I feel a strong need to have some sort of keepsake to remember my pet by. Some of the items in my memory box include baby kitten and puppy teeth and a 4" long whisker that my big cat shed the day before a dog caught him flat-footed.

When we really love our pets and can afford to give them a special send-off, we may decide to cremate them. Then comes the question "what do I do with my pet's ashes?". That can be a difficult question to answer. I know someone who still has their ashes in a cardboard box 2 years later because she can't decide what to do with them. Of course we could always spread some of the ashes at our pet's favorite outdoor spot or there's always the urn. But somehow an urn can feel a little cold and impersonal. Luckily there's pet cremation jewelry!

One of the best and most popular ways to have our pet's ashes close is to keep them in pet cremation jewelry. There are many types of cremation pendants that will hold a small portion of your pet's ashes. Most of these involve a small hollow pendant made out of metal, wood or a simple glass tube. You put the ashes of your pet in the hollow vessel and a plug or screw top seals the hole. This is a nice and convenient way to carry your pet's ashes as a piece of jewelry. Many of these manufactured cremation pendants are pretty basic and a bit uninspiring. However, there are some very beautiful pendants of this type and some of the more expensive ones are even handcrafted. Prices for these types of cremation pendants range from around $40 to over $1,000 with the average price for a quality piece running a bit over $100.

If your tastes run more towards the artistic and handcrafted, a unique and elegant way to keep your pet's ashes around your neck is a hand blown glass cremation pendant. These cremation pendants aren't just simple containers to put your pet's cremains in. Instead, the glass artist who creates them actually inserts your pet's ashes into the molten glass while they are creating your pendant! As the ashes are being inserted into the glass, a chemical reaction takes place that creates many tiny CO2 bubbles. These bubbles combine with the ash to form random intricate patterns . When your pendant is finished, you can see your pet's ashes inside and they become an integral part of the art inside the pendant.

These pendants are priced from around $60 to $200 with some artists also offering glass memorial marbles. Although it's more difficult to find a glass artist who will custom make these pendants, it's worth looking at some to see what they're like. Although as a glass artist I'm a bit biased, I can't think of a more beautiful and unique way to keep your pet's ashes close to you.