[Closed] Funeral Plans..any DIY experts still about?

Good question. Try here for a start:

https://humanism.org.uk/ceremonies/non-religious-funerals/

I read about one guy who got his mates to take his coffin to the crematorium on a bike trailer.

Selfishly I view it as some else's problem 😉 . I [s]probably[/s] don't care what happens to me Once dead.

Donate body to medical science job jobbed.

IANAFD, but a school mate is.

What happens to the coffin after the curtains close, one was over 1k, whats to stop them selling it again to the next family?

[i]Professional ethics, principally. While it is incredibly wasteful to burn that much (value) if that's your wish, so be it. You can also get dressed in your best Savile Row suit at £'000's too. I'll be happy to go in a pair of George pyjamas and a cardboard coffin[/i]

Do you have to have a hearse and cars etc seems like pretty expensive taxi's, can you just go in the back of an estate car?

[i]Yep, if you want. Still worth probably employing a FD to handle arrangements and disbursements, but you don't have to use their cars[/i]

Storage-my garage is pretty cool, is there a reason to have to use an funeral directors morgue?

[i]I'm pretty sure this isn't OK, but some religions still want the deceased brought home prior to the funeral - but how long that's allowed for and how the body must be preserved prior to that, a decent FD can advise[/i]

Cremations is there a "compare the cremation" type service to get the best price?

[i]Yellow pages and a telephone?[/i]

Burials- presume my gardens out of the question, if so any tips on finding a suitable spot?

[i]Your garden's fine, within reason. As long as you won't leach into the water courses, or present a health hazard to the dearly remaining. You do need authorisation, and it has to go on your deeds IIRC. Which may affect resale value.....[/i]

Any other tips for the non religious to die and be sent off with minimum fuss and expense?

[i]Humanist service, quick private cremation in a cardboard box, tray of pasties from Greggs and £50 behind the bar of the local[/i]

I keep telling my wife to dump me in the back garden when I'm gone. If I have to be disposed off at a cost then just get me a cardboard coffin, no flowers and just spend the money on the wake. She thinks I'm joking.

minimal fuss = donate to medical science. You might not be accepted, so you should have back up arrangements.

But I think all this is missing the point a bit. The funeral isn't for you, at the point of the funeral you are going to be none the wiser to whatever happens with your remains. The funeral is to help those left behind and forms an important part of the grieving process. Doing as you please with no regard to the people who are mourning your loss is a pretty selfish final act.

My dads was the bare minimum cremation style event with a hearse and someone walking in front etc, i think it was around £2.5k

They would be considered in the plans, I'll ask em, but I suspect they're grief would be better served by a few grand for a holiday if the usual format funeral could be replaced by something more personal.

I saw a program where people in India were being disposed of by floating into the local river. Unfortunately this had the side effect of growing massive catfish with a taste for human flesh that began eating the locals

Some farmer near Avebury plans to build a long barrow and is going to offer people the chance to be buried in it.

I'm hoping for a Viking funeral in a burning longboat 8)

minimal fuss = donate to medical science.

Presumably you'd still have a funereal, so it's only marginally less fuss than burying or cremating you.

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I'm going to crash a burning ferrari into a tanker full of aeroplane fuel and be vaporised in a massive fireball to a hair rock sound track.(I may not have looked too closely at the costings or legal implications yet but am quitely confident it's a goer)

I'm hoping for a Viking funeral in a burning longboat

Burial at sea for me. But getting to a piece of the ocean deep enough to be free of a trawlers nets won't be cheap. Kind of hoping that my SIL still owns her yacht, I'm sure she'd oblige.

Sounds like you need a Sky Burial.

Can you do it on Snowdon?

One of my aunts donated her body for medical research. We had a service for her about 18 months after she died. Don't know what happened to or if there were any remains.

I'm sure I read somewhere that Sikhs have been given special dispensation to have a funeral pyre dictated by their religion. Therefore they wouldn't be any problem agreeing it for a non sikh I suppose, due to equality. So costs could be kept to a minimum if you were lucky enough to die around the end of Oct/start of Nov.

Take up deep sea scuba diving. That's what my mate did. No body to bury so super cheap.

Donate body to medical science job jobbed.

Exactly

I have it in my will that I get burnt in a box with none of this funeral rubbish. Small family event when scattering my ashes. Having been to a fair few funerals, I view the curtains closing and the coffin sinking as the pinnacle of torture for those left behind.

i like the idea of the tibetan way of death. the deceased is left for the animals e.t.c (to return to the planet/nature).

so that for me (let the vultures/pomeranian's feast on me gizzards).

just hope i'm dead first obviously 😉

Any other tips for the non religious to die and be sent off with minimum fuss and expense?

A more environmentally friendly alternative to being cremated is to get mulched. Its worth making sure invitees to the funeral are advised to bring ear defenders as your coffin doesn't glide as quietly through the curtain into the chipper as it does to the furnace. You can then request that the sack of remains gets [s]scattered[/s] forked in at a favourite beauty spot

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Its worth making sure invitees to the funeral are advised to bring ear defenders

...and eye protection. Obviously.

It's 'Elf and Safety gorn mad, I tell you.

When my grandmother died we went the DIY route. She wouldn't have tolerated anything less.

We got a cardboard coffin online. We collected her from the hospital mortuary and took her to the crematorium in the back of my brother's E Class Mercedes estate, we test fitted the coffin in my C5 estate and it was too small.

We made arrangements with the crematorium, they asked us to turn up first thing, so early in fact they hadn't changed into their formal gear. They were Hoovering in combat trousers, polo shirts and trainers when we arrived. They went through all the bowing and nonsense anyway, which made us laugh.

They never sent us a bill.

My mother did the flowers.

They said they had never seen a DIY funeral like ours before. That would have pleased my Grandmother. She was always an innovator.

We planted three thousand Daffodil bulbs in her memory.

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Google Natural death Handbook and Natural death society.

Lots of funneral directors and funneral suppliers online for cheap stuff.

Serious question. If the relative in question doesn't mind, and signs it off prior to departure etc. is it possible to keep the skull and have it treated to keep as a memento?

Don't judge me.

Who's to judge?

Googling Alas Poor Yorick throws up some 'interesting' results.

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But I think all this is missing the point a bit. The funeral isn't for you, at the point of the funeral you are going to be none the wiser to whatever happens with your remains. The funeral is to help those left behind and forms an important part of the grieving process. Doing as you please with no regard to the people who are mourning your loss is a pretty selfish final act.

This is very true.

I've been to a couple of cremations in the last 12 months, and they've both been bobbins. One was 'MCed' by the funeral director and the other by a humanist. Worse public speakers who clearly knew next to nothing of their subject (in this case the dead dude and their family) and more importantly appeared to care even less, I have yet to meet. Makes me proud of the relatively non conventional and semi DIY job we sorted for my father. A family member and/or close friend capable of running the show, and giving a good speech with humerous and more profound elements is the key. The rest of the traditional tripe just gets in the way. Why folk with so little charisma, lack of empathy and basic research ability get into these roles I have no idea.

A few months later (on his birthday) we launched a handful of sodding huge rockets packed full of his ashes over his favourite loch, which made an excellent last trip.

My brothers funeral in NZ I helped dig the hole!

Wicker basket in the woods,

Now off to the pub!

great thread, marked in my favourites.

Wingsuit into a volcano.

Training to fly one and chartering the plane to take you up will probably be more expensive than most funerals, but you only live once eh?

craigxxl - Member

I keep telling my wife to dump me in the back garden when I'm gone.

You need to add "to be with the first wife"

I've noticed there seems to be a lot of adverts targeted at the oldsters about paying for funeral plans effectively
playing on the fear of not paying their way...

I'm from the fk it school of thought tbh .... no kids or siblings ...

I have asked Mrs DoD to get me one of those benches with a plaque though...

I've noticed there seems to be a lot of adverts targeted at the oldsters about paying for funeral plans effectively

I think it's quite a kindness to those that are left behind, even more so if you have no kids and no siblings. Lets assume you die before mrs DudeOfDoom, she is going to need to sort everything out on your behalf at a time when she's grief stricken and facing an uncertain future. Wouldn't it be a lot easier on her if everything was prearranged and paid for?

When my friend died his partner told me he was cremated with no ceremony and at no expense. She was given his ashes and a few months later all his friends went for a walk along the Spey, a river many of us had paddled with him, and spread the ashes. With a bit kept back for summits etc.

It was a lot nicer than any of the funerals i've been to religious or humanist.

I've noticed there seems to be a lot of adverts targeted at the oldsters about paying for funeral plans effectively

I think it's quite a kindness to those that are left behind, even more so if you have no kids and no siblings. Lets assume you die before mrs DudeOfDoom, she is going to need to sort everything out on your behalf at a time when she's grief stricken and facing an uncertain future. Wouldn't it be a lot easier on her if everything was prearranged and paid for?

Indeed - its quite a dear do and but more importantly you're loved ones would have enough on their plate what with having been bereaved and everything. Its not just that it costs money, people aren't generally comfortable with discussing their death and the arrangements to follow - but not doing so means the people who you leave behind have to debate it, not everyone has the same idea as to whats appropriate or suitable. The circumstances of your death might be quite harrowing, emotions might be running quite high. The best thing about a pre-paid service is theirs no doubt that its 'what he/she would have wanted'

Don't qualify as an expert but when dad died unexpectedly a couple of years ago my brother and me had no idea how he wanted things to go. Having said that we had a fairly good sense of what he might have liked were he attending his funeral - so to speak. We tried to get him buried at sea (this is quite hard and really you need to live on the south coast as that's were there are designated burial areas). Although we did almost everything including the catering and driving his body to the crematorium (in the back of his much loved camper) it was still expensive.

Here's what we did:
Modded dad's camper to carry the body (willow - cheapest/eco)
He was a massive fan of James bond so naturally a tux and and the JB theme music played a part
He was a musician - friends and ex-pupils played music,
His best friend and I spoke about his life
A couple of days later we took the ashes to sea in his boat for burial in a casket his best friend made and drank some Lagavulin

None of the above (the stuff that mattered) involved a funeral director who was needed for all the stuff with the crematorium, keeping the body etc.

Would seem to make sense to make your wishes known to friends or family.

A few months later (on his birthday) we launched a handful of sodding huge rockets packed full of his ashes over his favourite loch, which made an excellent last trip.

I've wanted this for a while. Mrs Squirrelking hates fireworks though *sigh*

Serious question. If the relative in question doesn't mind, and signs it off prior to departure etc. is it possible to keep the skull and have it treated to keep as a memento?

Don't judge me.

I don't imagine there would be much issue given a dentist I know had one in his student days (not that long ago and a thought for those going the medical science route). Another idea I had was to have my skeleton mounted on a motorbike, ribcage along the fuel tank and such. Might be an expensive white elephant...

As for pre-paid, do your research. Heard stories of funeral directors who take the money then don't want to know when the time comes as they are 'making a loss'. Definitely DON'T want that looming over your family (happened to my wifes Grandpa IIRC).

So I'm now feeling the best way to go will be-

Set aside some money and full and complete instructions.

Select a cardboard/pine/wicker box in advance.

I choose a crematorium in advance.

I leave instructions on who to tell both formally and friends etc.

Sufficient £ for FD to store, box and transport me in one car with a driver only.

Friends/Family to carry me.

Friends/Family to talk if they want.

I choose a couple of songs to play.

They choose a venue for socialising afterwards.

Choose a place method to spread my ashes this actually tricky but hopefully there be a bit of time to consider it. (The skull thing is intresting but I'm not sure I would like my Mums/Dads skull on a shelf.)

I think I would prefer a woodland burial but venues appear thin on the ground, that may not be the case when the time comes so relatives could make that choice as they could anything else they would prefer whilst staying within the general theme of things.

Thanks for your views, you've helped me think that one through!

Ta

Interesting thread Wilbur!

My brothers and I are the only people we can think of that have any concern how my dad's funeral is conducted. We all have kids, so we have to think of them.
In his will he requests cremation and a certain church for his ashes (with his mum and sister).
Apart from that it's down to us.

Anyone wants a skull, I'll leave you mine in my will. You can't have my dad's though!