Pet Postcards

Pet Postcards
4" x 6" 
Pokey Bolton has organized her second fundraiser for the Friends for Life, no kill animal shelter in Houston, TX.  The donated quilted postcards are sold at the International Quilt Festival in Houston, TX.  They sell for $20 each, and all the money is donated.  Last year they sold out of all their postcards and raised more than $20,000!!  As a personal challenge, I decided to try to make more than I did last year.  Last year I made 6, with the help of my daughter.  This year, so far, I have 11. The first series, of the dogs, was super fun to make.  I love how colorful they are, and that they use some of my batik fabrics.  I can honestly say that I did not enjoy cutting out the little dog from fabric 7 times, but I love the way it looks, especially the little ears!  Next time, I may consider using a screen printing technique.  But they are fabulous, yes?

And, I made a cat series to go with it.  These were taken from photographs of my cats....which were a litter of rescue kittens that I did not find homes for.  They are named the flying cat boys because late at night they would run and chase each other, practically FLYING over my king sized bed.  All, while I was trying to get to sleep.  Such is the nature of cats. 

I made one image of each cat, and an extra one as a tribute to Smokey.  He died this summer and we miss him so much it still hurts.  He had an operation to remove an object from his tummy that he swallowed.  It was supposed to be routine and a quick recovery.  Instead, his blood didn't clot, and he died within a day of his surgery despite heroic efforts on the part of his health care team at the emergency animal hospital.  It is never easy to lose a pet, and this one was no exception.  We were lucky to know him and to love him.  He will be missed.