FLOWERS are nearly always present at a funeral or a celebration of life ceremony, as a symbol of our love and affection for the deceased. But as well as being visually arresting and fragrant, each chosen flower can often tell a story and over the years certain blooms and plants have become symbolic of specific emotions and thoughts and can be the perfect tribute to your lost loved one, marking your link to them in a subtle and appropriate way. Perhaps the most well know of funereal flowers is the lily, with its beautiful and elegant booms and strong fragrance. It is said the lily shows the departed’s soul has returned to a peaceful state of innocence. Lilies feature heavily in Christianity, and it is thought they were used to cover the Virgin Mary’s tomb, which is why they are often used to symbolize virginity and purity. In a similar vein, the peace lily plant is used to symbolize the rebirth of the deceased’s soul from the corporeal world to a heavenly afterlife and is a suitable token to give to someone in mourning, especially as it is a flower that will last a little longer than many. Roses, too, are a hardy flower in any arrangement and highly appropriate in a funeral display. They are a highly multifunctional flower, working well on their own or with other blooms in wreaths, standing displays or a casket spray. Roses are of course noted for the extensive range of colors they can bloom in, and each color often has a significance of its own. Classic red usually denotes love and grief, white for spirituality and purity, and yellow for eternity and friendship. Orchids, regardless of color, are taken universally to mean eternal love, and if given as a plant rather than cut in an arrangement, will last a long time with a little care. Chrysanthemums are an ancient bloom, often just called mums in the US. Arriving from the east, the flower has different meanings in different areas of the world. In Japan, the flower signifies royalty, and the emperor sits atop the Chrysanthemum Throne, and across Asia is often used to represent rebirth but in Europe and the Americas the meaning tends to symbolize honor and sympathy, and as with roses red marking love and white showing innocence. Carnations are frequently used in funeral sprays, again with colors representing values – again, red for love and affection, and white for innocence. In Catholic funerals, pink often features as it represents the Virgin Mary’s tears as it is said her tears created the bloom. The carnation as quite a sturdy flower, is also often used by talented florists to create arrangements in the colors and shapes of favorite sports team logos or showcasing activities and hobbies of the deceased. Hyacinths tend to be placed in arrangements of flowers and often are taken to mean someone is in your thoughts and prayers. Hydrangea, as well as being long lasting – especially if in plant form – is taken to mean heartfelt emotions. Gladioli are usually used in fan sprays and show sincerity, integrity, and strength of character. Daffodils and tulips mark renewal and fresh starts and are ideal to show encouragement and hope to someone grieving. Tulips represent elegance and grace. Yellow tulips represent cheerfulness. White tulips represent forgiveness. Purple tulips represent royalty and red tulips represent perfect love.

 GRIEVING is a highly personal and intense experience – people react in quite different ways to the death of a loved one. And there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ way to grieve – but it can be extremely hard for friends and family who may themselves be grieving – to know how best to respond to someone’s grief. How do you console someone who has just lost a life partner, a parent, a child, a close friend? Especially when the individual retreats into themselves and it seems that nothing you say or do is making any difference? The simple answer in most cases is just continue, to be there for the person who is grieving. It may seem it is not making any difference at the time, but it is and will be appreciated, even if much later. You are powerless to ‘fix’ the situation as it cannot be repaired. You cannot change someone else’s feelings or make them better – no one can. But you can be there, quietly offering your support and offer a positive outlook on the future – grief is a gradual and slow process that can be all encompassing at times. Grief can make small things seem highly symbolic, and small acts of kindness to help really can make a difference – dropping round a meal, sending a card, doing a small shop – they all can provide comfort to someone grieving. It demonstrates you care about them. Flexibility is important as grief can make people act and behave in ways they do not normally do so – invite someone to join you and your family at holidays or significant dates to help ease them through the difficult days, but also offer a way out with grace and accept a sudden cancellation, and just check in on them later. Do not be afraid to use the deceased’s name – it may bring on tears, but it will not make the grief worse. Offer hope and simply listen to the grieving person – there is little need to ask how they are for the answer is obvious to all that they are not good. Asking what they are feeling may help them express their emotions, and acknowledge grief is a process that takes time to move through. And because it is a process, many recently bereaved people find it more important for check-ins a little down the line as by then most people have returned to their lives and may not be checking in anymore – this is the time people can feel the most alone. Bereaved people often find it hard to reach out for help – especially after a few weeks in case people feel they should somehow be over it all by that point. If you can and want to help, be specific and ask if doing such-and-such would be appreciated – a shop, laundry, walking the dog. It must be something you can and want to do and means the person does not have to manage your help on top of everything else they are doing. Again, help may even be more appreciated as they adjust to the new normal – especially if a widow or widower who may not have been used to cooking meals or getting the car serviced as their partner took acre of those things. And most importantly – listen. The grieving person may not want advice or guidance, or judgment over how they are handling their grieving. Just listen and encourage them to share stories and memories. This is a time when it really is all about them – lend that shoulder to cry on and just listen.

REMEMBERING a loved one is a very personal act, reflecting who they were in a way that best suits their character. And while a traditional headstone at a grave serves well, today people are finding great comfort in a wide range of creative memorials. If you are trying to find the best way to remember your departed loved one, here are some ideas to help you find just the perfect memorial. A pocket charm – a small physical item you can carry round with you, like a talisman, that will prompt you to remember them every time you touch it. Make a playlist – all their favorite songs in one list, each prompting happy memories of times and events in their life.  Plant a tree – ideal for someone who loved nature, enjoyed hiking, or tended their garden, a tree will continue the life they left behind. Write their story – commit their life to paper, put down in words the times you spent together. If you are not a great wordsmith, never fear – there are writers out there who can do this for you by simply having a conversation with you. Get a tattoo – maybe their name, with their dates of birth and of passing, or of a favorite sports team you shared.  Build a cairn – a cairn is a pile of rocks, often built as navigational aids or on top of geographical highpoints, but increasingly used as a memorial and easily done in your own garden. Scrapbook -either physical or online, create a lasting memorial with photos, ticket stubs from concerts or travel – a great place to compile the odds and ends of their life in one place. Bury a time capsule – gather items and objects that symbolize the departed, from their hobbies and interests for example, and bury it – maybe with a date in the future to reopen that is significant to them such as a milestone birthday. Dinner – invite close friends to a dinner party featuring all the person’s favorite foods and dishes. This can easily become an annual tradition. Make a quilt – gather the person’s favorite T-shirts, hoodies, and sweatshirts – especially any with school or sports teams on them – and have them turned into a memorial quilt. Do a bucket list item – is there something your loved one always wanted to do but did not get chance? Complete it for them. Donate – give a gift in their name too a favorite charity or good cause, or even set up a scholarship or bursary in their name to help others through the years.

WHEN it is time to say goodbye to a loved one, we are faced with an amazing array of decisions that must be made quickly – and a key one is what kind of casket is suitable. Even this one decision has a dazzling array of choice and options to consider, and each come with quite different price points as well. That said, there are three main types to select – and they are traditional wood, metal, or cremation caskets, although each comes with its own list of sub options and choices. Traditionally caskets are made from wood as the most abundant and to hand material available. Picking a suitable wooden casket can be a similar process to choosing new furniture – pretty much any type of wood is available along with different styles, finishes, and ornamental features. They are often made from hardwoods like mahogany, oak, cherry or walnut although cheaper softwoods such as some types of pine are also commonly used. As you would expect, hardwoods will last longer when buried, and just as with furniture, the rarer and more demanded the wood, the more expensive the casket will be. A good wooden casket can start with pine at around $2,000 but can be more than $10,00 for a high-end mahogany casket. As metalworking technology has improved over the centuries, so metal has become an option in caskets as well. These are generally believed to be longer lasting when buried than wood caskets, though this will depend on the types of metal and wood in question as well as the chemistry of the soil in which a casket is buried. Commonly used metals for caskets include steel, copper, and bronze, and can come fitted with rubber sealers to aid body preservation as well As with woods, the rarer the metal chosen and the more ornate the style of casket selected, the higher the cost will be, with bronze at the top end. An average metal casket can be in the $2,500-4,500 range. The final general type of casket is a cremation casket. As the name implies, this type of casket is designed for a cremation rather than a burial. While some wooden coffins can be used in cremations, metal ones cannot, and nor can a casket have any metal adornments if it is being cremated. That said, some crematories may offer a service to remove items such as metal handles before the final cremation. One big advantage of cremation caskets is cost – since they are designed to be consumed quickly, they can be made from much lower cost materials, and as such be a much more environmentally friendly choice, such as cardboard, pressed boards or even canvas. These may not be the best for a viewing at a funeral service but may well meet the wishes of the deceased both financially and environmentally. Of course, it is possible to combine the two types as some firms will offer the option to rent a traditional casket for any funeral service and viewing and transfer the body to a more suitable cremation casket for the final departure.

WHILE a death is naturally a sad time for family and friends, increasingly those left behind are choosing to remember and celebrate the life of their departed one rather than commiserate at the loss. Of course, it is natural to grieve, and we do so because of the love and affection we had for the deceased. But why did we have that love and affection for them? Because of the way they made us feel, the way they loved us, the things they did and the people whose lives they touched. Today many traditional funerals are being augmented or replaced with celebrations of life, with ideas only limited by the imaginations of those celebrating. Funeral directors are pleased to work with families to ensure their send-off of their loved one reflects who that person was. Just as the departed was a unique individual, so your celebration can be customized to them, reflecting their passions, hobbies, and interests as well as reflection and respecting any faith or spiritual needs the family may have. If you are stuck for ideas, here are some of the commonly requested features of a celebration of life: Stories – we all have great stories of the person we loved. Adventures and scrapes we got into, journeys and trips we made, successes and blows we shared with them. Often other celebrants will be delighted to hear something they did not know. Some people will be happy to share these stories openly and publicly, others may prefer to write a note down for the family. Music – play the songs and tunes the deceased loved. Traditional funeral music and hymns are fine if you wish, but there is nothing that says that is all that is allowed. If they loved country, play country, if they enjoyed jazz, put on a number they danced to. Food – what was their favorite dish? What did they like to drink? Sharing a meal together is one of humanity’s oldest and most endearing traditions, common through all history, faiths, and cultures. What a suitable time to serve the food they most enjoyed. Memory boards – whether a table, a poster board, or a PowerPoint presentation put together a montage of images and pictures of the departed doing what they loved to do and being with the people they loved to be with. This will also help people share their stories and memories further. Causes – if the deceased had a particular charity, organization caused or non-profit they supported with time or money, a collection in their name can provide a legacy to help others. Hobbies – if a particular hobby or interest was well known, share it with everyone. Put out their model train display, or their baseball card collection, or their quilted blankets. Be proud of their passion and show others their skill and interest. Activity – mark the occasion with a symbolic gesture of your loved one’s passing. Balloon releases, fireworks, tree planting, seed spreading, or even bubble blowing are just some ideas people have used to mark the death of their loved one.

LOSING a loved one may be part of the cycle of life, but it is still hard to cope with for many of us as we hang onto cherished memories of the departed. But in today’s world there are a growing number of ways we can keep those memories alive in a physical form other than a traditional headstone or photograph, many of which help us capture the essence of our loved ones and create unique memorials with their own special stories to share with family members. Printing and photography have improved so rapidly in recent years thanks to digital technology that everyone has access to high quality and low-cost options at their local superstore, pharmacy or online. Simply upload a picture or take a snap of an old image and you can easily have it printed on anything you wish – a traditional photobook telling your departed’s life story all the way through to a beer glass for the dad that enjoyed a pint or a fleecy blanket to keep warm as you watch their favorite program on television. It is easy – especially with Pinterest – to find all sorts of imaginative ways to create a photo gallery mixed in with items and objects they loved. Jewelry is also increasingly common for people to commemorate departed family members – whether tokens with birthstones included, watches with photos on the face, or even lockets with images inside which have made a big comeback in recent years. It is possible to have the cremated ashes of a loved one turned into gemstones and incorporated into jewelry, and another popular way is to have any inherited pieces of jewelry recast and reset to fit yourself and your style while carrying the precious memories with you daily. For those who loved the outdoors and nature, planting a tree or favored flower or shrub is a perfect reminder of their presence in your life as you watch it grow through the years – especially if you are looking for just the right place to bury any ashes and have a memorial and place to go to remember. And as music is so important to so many people, a playlist of their favorite songs from their favorite bands and performers is a simple and very affordable way to keep their spirit alive within you, and easily sent to anyone who would like to add it to their own listening. Slideshows and movies are easier than ever to create and share, highlighting happy family events and memories for all to enjoy and reminisce over. Even old clothes can be turned into unique and valued keepsakes for the next generation – teddy bears made from a special jacket or shirt, and memory blankets quilted together using logos from sports teams or hobbies and interests they had brought together in a new family heirloom ready for the next generation.

With the holidays quickly approaching, many individuals may be experiencing more grief over their lost loved ones than usual. While this season is a wonderful and joyous time of year for many, it is a reminder of that empty chair at the dinner table or that spot on the sofa where those who have passed always sat. It can be so difficult to enjoy those big family dinners and traditions without those who mattered most to you. It is unrealistic to envision a holiday season where you do not feel those losses and mourn them. However, there are several ways you can positively honor those loved ones and keep their spirit alive throughout the years. To better help you cope and celebrate their lives, here are a few ways to remember your loved ones with each coming season. Hold a Special Ceremony for Them Whether it is a small family candlelight vigil, a lantern release, or simply putting together a slideshow of their most memorable photos and videos; putting aside a day to honor them through ceremony can help you process those feelings of grief and release some of those emotions. Time spent remembering those individuals can turn those feelings of sadness into joy and contentment knowing their spirit stays alive in you and your family. Keep Their Traditions Alive Have a sentimental and pensive conversation with your family about your favorite memories with those individuals. (It’s okay to shed a few tears!) Begin to think about the best ways to keep those memories alive and turn them into yearly traditions in remembrance of your loved ones. This time of year will never be the same without them, but it is still important that they remain a significant part of those family holiday experiences. Did your loved one have their own special little tradition they would perform each year? Maybe it was reading their favorite Christmas story, watching their favorite Christmas movie, or cooking that special dish they couldn’t do without each season. Keeping those traditions alive and designating special time to continue them can be a powerful cathartic experience and build off of those cherished memories. Give a Gift to Those Less Fortunate in Their Honor Did your loved one have a passion or soft spot for a charity or specific organization? What a better way to honor them than to serve others in their honor. May it be an animal shelter, veteran’s charity, or the Salvation Army, offering charity in their name can be a rewarding and sentimental act of remembrance this season. We understand that the holidays can be such a painful time of year, and while it is more than acceptable to feel and experience that pain each year, it is just as important to find some light in the darkness, for the sake of your family and the holiday spirit. Make sure your loved ones remain a happy and memorable part of the most wonderful time of the year. Clifford-Shoemaker Funeral Home has plenty of resources to get you through these difficult stages in life. You are never alone.