Resources

Funerals fill an important role for those mourning the loss of a loved one. By providing surviving family and friends with an atmosphere of care and support in which to share thoughts and feelings about death, funerals are the first step in the healing process. It is the traditional way to recognize the finality of death. Funerals are recognized rituals for the living to show their respect for the dead and to help survivors begin the grieving process.

You can have a full funeral service even for those choosing cremation. Planning a personalized ceremony or service will help begin the healing process. Overcoming the pain is never easy, but a meaningful funeral or tribute will help.

• Pick up the deceased and transport the body to the funeral home (anytime day or night)
  
• Notify government of passing, requested permission for cremation if applicable
  
• Arrange and prepare death certificates, registration of death, burial permits, 
  
• Provide certified copies of death certificates for insurance and benefit processing
• Prepare and submit obituary to the newspapers, social media, and radio stations of your choice
  
• Bathe and embalm the deceased body, if necessary
  
• Prepare the body for viewing including dressing and cosmetizing
  
• Assist the family with funeral arrangements and purchase of casket, urn, burial vault and cemetery plot
  
• Schedule the opening and closing of the grave with cemetery personnel
  
• Coordinate with clergy if a funeral or memorial service is to be held
  
• Arrange a police escort and transportation to the funeral and/or cemetery for the family
  
• Order funeral sprays and other flower arrangements, keepsakes as the family wishes
  
• Provide guidance Aftercare, or grief assistance, to the bereaved
  

For step by step information click on the tab Resources and then the link 'When a death occurs'.  Or call our office to ask our directors what the step you would need to take with the circumstances you are facing. 

If you request immediate assistance, yes. If the family wishes to spend a short time with the deceased to say good-bye, that’s perfectly acceptable. Your funeral director will come when your time is right.

Burial is the most common and traditional method of disposition, but cremation is increasingly selected because it can be less expensive and allows for more flexibility. 

It is all personal preference. 

Viewing is a part of many cultural and ethnic traditions. Many grief specialists believe that viewing aids the grief process by helping the bereaved recognize the reality of death. Viewing is encouraged for children, as long as the process is explained and the activity is voluntary.

Embalming sanitizes and preserves the body. Embalming makes it possible to lengthen the time between death and the final disposition, allowing family members time to arrange and participate in the type of service most comforting to them.

When compared to other major life events like births and weddings, funerals are not expensive. A wedding can costs at least three times as much; but because it is a happy event, wedding costs are rarely criticized. A funeral home is a 24-hour, labor-intensive business, with extensive facilities (viewing rooms, chapels, hearses, preparation room, excessive specialized equipment e etc.), these expenses must be factored into the cost of a funeral.

Additionally, the cost of a funeral includes not only merchandise, like caskets, but the services of a funeral director in making arrangements; filing appropriate forms; dealing with doctors, government, ministers, florists, newspapers and others; and seeing to all the necessary details. Funeral directors look upon their profession as a service, but it is also a business. Like any business, funeral homes must make a profit to exist.