taking own flowers to a funeral? Ettiquette?

Minxz

Hi, sorry if this is in the wrong place!
I am going to a funeral tomorrow, a dear elderly neighbour, but we couldn't afford a florists wreath.. so I am off soon to buy a really nice bouquet of flowers from somewhere like M & S later instead.

Is this acceptable? What do i do with them once we arrive... do i wait till the end of the service and get them from the car, or take them around the back where mourners gather afterwards?

Do I address the card to him or his family?
Sorry, but I've onyl ever been to one funeral before, and that was all doen through a florists as it was my partner's uncle.

thank you!

tiggs239

Had similar situation and we took ours to the funeral directors on the day of the funeral. They ensured they were with all the other flowers at the funeral.

peachyprice

Of course you can take your own flowers, that will be fine.

They will have a space at the cemetery with the name of the deceased, all the flowers will get put there when they are delivered by the florists, they won't necessarily all come from the same place or arrive at the same time anyway, you can put your there when you arrive.

If it's a burial you can take them to the graveside after the service, if it's a cremation they will stay there for a few days beforer the cemetary dspose of them.

HTH

Katie-Kat-Kins

You could always do a donation to charity in his name instead of sending flowers and just send a card to the family. You can donate as much or as little as you can comfortably afford and the family need only known that you have made "a donation". If you know of a charity close to his heart then you could just do it and send a normal sympathy card to the family and say inside that you have made a donation to xxx charity in his memory or you could ask the family if there is a charity he supports. You could just say that you would like to do this instead of sending flowers.

It is such a waste having lots of flowers at a funeral and they do just get disposed of after a couple of days, many funerals now are "family flowers only" and huge amounts of money can be raised for charity this way.

I have been to funerals where the charities have been really diverse, the air ambulance, flying doctors in africa, the prince's trust, the scouts, the mountain rescue, stonewall, the heart foundation, cancer research, macmillan etc etc etc

JC9297

Some people ask for people (except family) not to send/give flowers at all, they often ask people to give a donation to a specified charity instead, so worth checking.

Mankysteve

For my grama funeral recently it was a flowerless with a donation to McMillan trust so do check. I think that a better idea anyway.

ellay864

I'd echo the idea to check as I've been to a 'donations' funeral where somebody turned up with flowers. The widow got overwhelmed and quite upset, even though she knew there'd been nothing but kind intentions.
At my dad's funeral we had family flowers only but one very very close family friend arrived with 3 roses, one each from her, her husband and young son. She gave them to me and asked me to pass them to the appropriate person. I knew my mum wouldnt mind and passed them to go with the other flowers, but the funeral director assumed they were from me, my mum and brother and laid them on top of the coffin. His coffin was draped with the St John flag and his hat and medals, and it did look a lovely touch but our friend was mortified when she saw them!

catkins

Well having recently had to pay nearly £200 for a "DAD" for my father in law I would say taking a nice bouquet is a good idea.

I would happily have given that money to a charity but mother in law gave us so much grief and emotional blackmail over it we had no real choice. She then had the cheek to ask us to also give a donation to charity. We are not that rich!

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

I made a bouquet for my FIL's funeral myself. (I don't really go for mauve chrysanthemums and asters, which most people seem to do for funerals)


Got some puddywillow (can't use ss), stargazer lilies, freesias and some greenery. Bound them together with raffia rather than ribbon and wrapped them in some nice tissue paper.

So I saved lots of money (which promptly went on OH's suit) and it was apparently appreciated more than just paying for someone else to do it.


Florists often charge far lower prices and are very helpful if you go in and explain what you are doing - they seem to approve of someone doing it themselves.


And I scooted round to the house first, so left the flowers with the others.


Unless stated 'no flowers', I think I might find an unrequested donation to a charity the deceased wasn't necessarily even a supporter of, to be quite hurtful.

Oldernotwiser

The card on the flowers should be addressed to the deceased, not the family.

SailorSam

When my Mum died we asked for no flowers but if anyone wanted to make a donation we were giving it to my little nieces school. My Mum would have wanted that, she would have thought of lots of flowers as a waste.