Practical Elements To Include When Planning Your Own Memorial Service

You may want to spare your family the task and expense of planning your final arrangements. You instead might want to take charge now while you are still alive and make sure that these plans are carried out to your specifications.

With that in mind, you can plan out your arrangements with a reputable funeral service where you live. You can stipulate what elements that you want to include in your own memorial service.

The Question of a Visitation

When you plan out your memorial service, you can decide whether or not you want to have a wake or a visitation before the actual service. Some people prefer to have visitations to allow family members and friends to gain closure. The visitation serves to allow people to say a final goodbye to the deceased before he or she is laid to rest.

However, a visitation can require that you purchase certain services as part of your overall memorial service package. You may need to pay for a casket, as well as services like embalming and dressing of your remains. You also will need to pay the hourly rate for using the funeral home's chapel or visitation room.

Casket or Urn

Many people also prefer to have their remains present at a memorial service. This aspect provides tangible closure for family members who actually need to see their loved one in an urn or casket as a way of saying goodbye. Your remains may also need to be present if you are religious and want them to be blessed or prayed over at the memorial service.

You will need to decide what kind of casket or urn to use if you want to have your remains present. The prices for both can range from fairly affordable to very expensive. The pricing largely depends on how decorative the urn or casket is and what material it is made from.

Finally, as you plan your memorial service, you can choose what prayers, music, and religious readings to use in it. Your family and friends may not know your preferences. You can stipulate these elements by laying out your plans for your memorial service and having them written down and filed with a funeral home.

You can take charge of your memorial service now before you pass away. You can decide important factors like whether or not to have a visitation. You can also choose your urn, casket, prayers, music, and readings.