Although you can plan an entire funeral service from start to finish without hiring special vehicles or making arrangements for a procession, elegant transportation provides a nice touch to the day. Whether you opt for a fleet of limousines to take you from the funeral home to the cemetery, or if everyone hauls out a bicycle and takes one last ride in honor of the deceased, there are plenty of ways to make a funeral unique with these transportation ideas.
Traditional Funeral Escorts
One of the nice things about funeral options today is that families have choices when it comes to how they want to take care of a loved one’s final remains. Burial, cremation, body donation, sending your body into space—with enough money, you can do almost anything to make your final farewell special.
While most of us will probably skip the space step, burial and cremation remain the top choices across cultures and religions. Cremation is less expensive and generally comes with less fanfare than burial, but burial itself can also be streamlined thanks to options in DIY casketry and direct burial.
If the idea of calling funeral homes and meeting with estate planners to make advance funeral arrangements isn’t one you cherish, you may be able to find online options to save you time and money. Although unheard of just a few years ago, online funeral planning is now a viable option that allows you to plan and even pay for your funeral from the comfort of your own home.
How Online Funeral Planning Works
There are two ways you can pre-plan a funeral online. The first option requires nothing more from you than to make decisions regarding your wishes. For example, you can:
Print out a funeral planning worksheet, which you can then fill out regarding your specific wishes.
Find a funeral planning app or other online option that allows you to make decisions and email your answers to family members.
Coordinate funeral pre-plan options with a specific funeral home, which will use the information provided to contact you at a later date.
Britney Spears should hit the mall one more time to find an appropriate outfit for this funeral.
The fastest way to give offense at a funeral is to wear something inappropriate, and guidelines of what not to wear to a funeral often outline the most obvious funeral attire no-nos. Things like excessively short skirts, shorts, flip flops, casual jeans, or clothes that are dirty or torn are all commonly avoided—and with good reason. Anything that belongs at a beach or in a nightclub isn’t right for the formal and somber setting of a funeral.
While most of us can be expected to avoid the more obvious funeral attire pitfalls, there are also more subtle fashion choices you should avoid. Follow our what not to wear to a funeral guide below to ensure that you present yourself in a way that is respectful and appropriate for the day.
One of the most common pieces of advice on how to save money on a funeral is to buy a casket online. Funeral homes mark up items like caskets, urns, and other burial effects by hundreds or even thousands of dollars—an amount of money that can seem insurmountable when you’re already facing such a devastating loss. Because the FTC’s Funeral Rule requires that funeral homes accept these items from a third-party vendor, you can shop around for caskets online.
However, buying anything online comes with a risk. Because you’re talking about an item that comes with a hefty price tag (and requires immediate shipping), it’s important to get things right. If you’re hesitant to buy a casket online because of the dangers of internet shopping, here are a few tips to ensure a safe transaction.
Although it might sound preemptive and a bit macabre to plan your own funeral, this kind of advance arrangement is becoming more and more common. Not only does pre-planning a funeral allow you to have more control over what happens to your remains after you pass, but it can also save your family quite a bit of grief and money.
Planning your own funeral can be as simple as making a list of your wishes and ensuring your family knows where it is, or as complex as paying for everything in advance (even going so far as to purchase the casket or arrange every detail with the funeral home). There is no wrong way to go about it, but here are a few suggestions for getting started.
Choose Your Final Interment Plan
The cremation process is difficult for many people to picture happening to their loved one’s remains. Unlike burial, which gives a feeling of calm quiet and eternal rest, cremation is hot, messy, and oftentimes frightening. You might be afraid that the body won’t be treated with respect, or that the incredibly high temperatures required to break a body down are uncontrolled and dangerous.
While historical cremation practices might hold this to be true, modern-day cremation and cremation ovens are quite safe, sanitary, and practical. The cremation process is regulated so that it becomes more of a scientific breakdown of bodily remains than a blazing inferno, with the result that it is actually more decorous than the slow decay of a body underground.
When most people plan a traditional burial during funeral plans, they do it because there is comfort to be found in the familiar. The act of saying goodbye to a loved one is something that everyone goes through at some time or another, spanning generations and cultures and even socioeconomic status. No matter what the circumstances of your loss, knowing others have gone through the same funeral planning steps you have is a good way to put your grief into perspective.
Of course, that doesn’t mean you can’t personalize a funeral. Some of the best traditions are the ones we make ourselves, and customizing burial is easier than ever before thanks to retailers offering more options in casket colors, materials, and details. For example, pink caskets are growing in popularity among female burials (or may even be purchased as part of the breast cancer awareness campaign). Offered in everything from a delicate shell to a more vibrant shade of pink, caskets like these allow you to add a touch of color and whimsy to an otherwise bleak day.
In cases where an individual did not make advance funeral plans, chances are fairly good that a spouse or adult child will be responsible for planning and financing the funeral. Long held as the custom across countries and cultures, the idea that a child must bear the burden of burial is one that many of us recognize. After all, these are the individuals who brought us into the world…it seems only fitting that we send them out of it.
Unfortunately, circumstances and financial hardship often get in the way of these types of plans. In addition to the emotional toll that losing a parent can have on an individual, it can be difficult to know where to find the resources to cover funeral costs as well as what types of decisions to make to best honor your parent.
If a parent’s death has recently occurred, we suggest you sit down with other siblings and your remaining parent to go over your options and to discuss funeral planning details. Depending on what kind of pre-plan funeral arrangements were made and your financial situation, you could rely on any of the following payment types.
Funeral costs are a real concern for most families facing the death and burial of a loved one. At a time when stress and anxiety are already higher than average, knowing that you will be expected to pay out thousands of dollars to provide a fitting farewell can prove difficult.
While more and more families are preparing for this eventuality with funeral pre-paid packages, there are options for those who have not planned ahead. In addition to financing a funeral, you can manage funeral costs by comparison shopping, selecting lower-cost burial alternatives, and coordinating services at the funeral home of your choice.
Online Funeral Planner Assistance
If you are preparing to plan a funeral, we suggest following this guide to estimate costs and come up with the best options for your family. Losing a loved one will always be difficult—and financing a funeral is rarely something anyone looks forward to—but with the right resources and support, you can come up with a beautiful funeral that won’t break the bank.
 |
Need to send sympathy flowers today? Our florists offer same day delivery to ANYWHERE and gorgeous arrangements
|
|
Appropriate attire to wear to a funeral For Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, & Hindu funerals
|
