How to Personalize a Funeral Service

In the United States, 2.4 million funerals are held each year.

If you’re currently funeral planning, you might be wondering how to make it more personal to the deceased.

thankfully, we’re here to provide you with some help when you plan a funeral, so make sure you keep reading.

Talk to Officiant

First, try talking to the officiant. It’s important that you talk to the officiant to make sure that you make the service is personal as possible. 

The officiant does this often, so they know different ways to make it more personal. They can add a personal touch, and they can even talk to family members to learn more about the deceased.

When everyone collaborates together, it can really make the funeral a lot more personal.

Establish a Memorial

Another way you could make it more personal is to make a memorial at the funeral. It could either be laid on the grave or stored in the area where the funeral will be hosted.

The memorial could even have donations that could be given in honor of the loved one. In most cases, the organization will be something that the deceased’s person cared a lot about.

You might also want to make a memorial gift like a brick, sign, plaque, or something else that could be engraved with the loved one’s name.

You could also do something like plant a tree in their name to remember them. 

Display Personal Belongings

If you have any personalized belongings from your loved one, try displaying some of them. Do they have any passions or hobbies? 

Did they have a favorite book? A favorite season? Any of these can help make the funeral more personal and memorable. 

Create Art

If you have an artistic side, you can try and create some art specifically for the funeral. If you’re not artistic, then you could bring a blank canvas for other people to collaborate and plan together. 

If you bring the art supplies, encourage guests to either bring a quilt square, create some type of scrapbook page, make a book of memories, or bring pictures with the loved one.

Some people might want to write some favorite sayings or memories that they shared.

Just make sure that you bring all of the supplies with you.

Design Funeral Program

You can also design a special funeral program. If you invest in cremation services, for example, you might want to do a different funeral.

Instead of going to a graveyard and burying the loved one, you can instead gather and spread the ashes somewhere where the loved one was. 

You might also want to plan out something like a slideshow of pictures and videos of the loved one. All of these will help to make the funeral feel more personalized toward the loved one.

Have a Photo Display

Some funerals have an area where there can be some memorial photos. This can show who was closest with the loved one or even them doing their passion.

You could even make a large display or collage of photos. If you have a display, you could even include some of their most favorite items to show people who they really were.

Have Guests Take Something Home

If you bring a lot of items that the loved one had, you could even offer some of them for guests to take home. This could help people get closure and feel closer to the deceased person. 

For example, if they collected books, you could take a lot of their books and hand them out to people. You may even want to inscribe the books as well.

This will give people a tangible reminder and also a memento to be able to remember someone by. 

Add Music

Music can pull emotions out of people and make them feel things, so it can be very helpful in funeral planning. You can ask the funeral home if they have some sort of speaker system that you could use during the event. 

It could also be better if you played your loved one’s favorite songs. If they had a favorite artist or favorite genre, then you could make a playlist to play as you bid them farewell.

This is also a great way to build a community and take pressure off yourself. 

If you want to make it even more special, you can hire a live musician to play music as well. 

Set the Mood

The most important thing when planning a funeral is making sure that you set the mood for everyone. 

You should try and make it a positive mood rather than somber. This way, you’ll be bidding the loved one farewell in their honor. They may have wanted people to not be sad, so you should honor their wishes and try and have it uplifting.

To give a positive mood, then you’ll need to get bright flowers, brighten the lighting, and play uplifting music. 

However, you should always honor the deceased’s last wishes for whether they wanted a happy or somber ceremony.

Learn More About Funeral Planning

These are only a few things to try when funeral planning to make it more personalized, but there are other things that you can try as well.

We know that planning a funeral can be overwhelming, but we’re here to help you out. 

If you need more information or tips, check out our website to find even more articles just like this one!

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