MUSKEGON, Mich. — Living rooms are meant for living in.
The coffee table in Montanna Scalf's Muskegon apartment? Not so aptly named.
“I like to think that I'm kind of like a surgeon but my patients aren't as risky as real ones," she said.
Her coffee table has no beverages in sight. It's been turned into an operating table.
“If I cut one wrong stitch, the whole thing is going to unravel. So you have to be very careful with where you're cutting," Montanna said.
In the hospital of Dr. Montanna, every patient is a friend — and every friend is patient.
"They’re friends that can't talk back," she laughed.
“I didn't talk to many people growing up," Montanna explained. “I think my parents kind of noticed that. And so they would just buy me a stuffed animal here stuffed animal there”
Though their comfort never fades, their cotton certainly does.
“I was just kind of feeling alone because my husband works third shift. And I was like, I really want someone around me besides just my cat.”
She pulled her old stuffed animals out of storage. They certainly smelled like they hadn't been loved on in decades.
"This is my first client," she said, holding a bunny. "He's just over 20 years old. My parents got him for me when I was born. After we pulled them out, I was like, You know what, I gotta fix him up his ears were all droopy. He looked so sad.”
While working to restore an old friend, something new was born.
“I'm like, 'Oh, wait! I do actually have something here," she said.
Now her living room is hardly enough room for her booming business.
"More and more people just kept contacting me and they're like, 'Oh, can you fix my nose? Oh, can you give them more stuffing? His beads fell out,'" she said. “It kind of has been turning into a full-time job, which is great.”
One little stuffed rabbit ignited a passion for Montanna. And though her patients are soft, this job is not without its hardships.
“The most recent client that I've had, she said a 60-year-old bear. And it was that Frankenstein bear," she said. “She was like, I need this bear to come back good… it was my mom's… my mom has passed.”
“The wolf that was in the house fire when the owner, Keegan, was a child. She said that basically everything was lost. And they were just kind of digging through the rubble. And they thankfully found that wolf for her.”
Montanna said the wolf reeked like smoke.
"It was such a sad process just to see like, what that stuffed animal alone went through, let alone what the families went through," she said. "Being able to give that type of stuffed animal back… is just amazing.”
On the table in her living room, meant for coffee, there are no cups in sight. Only scissors, pin cushions and seam rippers.
But it is the site where Montanna’s cup overflows.
"Stuffed animals being kept in people's lives is a very important thing to do," Montanna smiled, “Whether they're young, or whether they're old, ‘cause its memories.”
► If you have stuffed animals you want to save for another lifetime of love, you can book Montanna's services on her Facebook page here.
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