Obituary outline and How to write an obituary

If you are the type of person that skipped the instructions in school and dove into your assignments feet first you can scroll right on down to the obituary template i have written up for your convenience. ..............

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If you would like a little info before you dive right in feel free to read my little post.

One of the most common questions that I get asked as a funeral director is, "How do i write an obituary?". The answer is simple......how ever you want to. The easiest way to write an obituary is obviously to follow the crowd and use a simple outline that is commonly used and accepted by the public. Other options you have are to write a poetic eulogy to your loved one talking how wonderful they were and what you'll miss most about them. Another option is to write your own obituary before hand and write it from your perspective to those who will miss you. However you choose to write an obituary it is completely perfect.

If you decided you want to write an obituary in the simplest fashion following the commonly used and accepted outline, your first step would be to read a few obituaries either online or in the local news paper.
You can even find interesting obituaries of famous people on findagrave.com. Next, follow the outline and decide what are the most important facts about your loved one are that you would like to shout from the rooftops and let the world know about. While doing this remember that your loved one is special and deserves to be recognized for their achievement, many times friends that your loved one makes later on in life never learned of half of the amazing things that they did until they read it in the obituary. Following this step you'll need to make a list of all your family members that deserve to be named in the obituary and those that can be assigned a number (normally children, with spouses of children in parentheses, and the spouse of the deceased are named and siblings, grandchildren and great-grandchildren are numbered.) You will now need to add the funeral/memorial information including date, time and place of all the events such as viewing, service, and graveside/interment. Last of all trim down what you don't want to pay for in the copy that will be sent to the paper because some news papers charge per line and some papers charge per word so you will end up paying for the classified add space either way. Keep in mind that many times funeral homes will post longer versions of obituaries on their websites free of charge if you decided you want to put a shorter version in the paper.

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Now that the writing process is complete you have a choice to make, should you add a picture of not. If you decided to add a picture of your loved one remember that there is always a better picture than the one on their drivers license (I have submitted a few obituaries with the photo from the drivers license and remember that if you don't like your license picture your loved one most likely didn't like theirs).  Choose a picture that people will recognize, one that makes you say, "That is so (insert loved one's name here)", and one that your loved one would choose (don't make them haunt you for the rest of your days by putting "that" picture in the paper or online).

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However you choose to write your obituary you will do great. Below I have written a small outline that you can print out and use as a guide when writing an obituary. If you get stuck in the writing process always feel free to ask your local funeral director for help.

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Funeral Services Listed at the bottom are normally added by the funeral home that you choose but you may include them in your obituary prior to submitting it.They are listed in this order.

Thanks for reading my little post. I hope it was helpful to you in your task of writing an obituary.