Wills and Estates: Making your cremation wishes known<\/p>\n
Published 3:00 pm Thursday, October 1, 2026<\/p>\n
Earlier this year, the province designated its first ash dispersal site on B.C. waterways in Delta, giving families another option when deciding what to do with cremated remains.<\/p>\n
The designation highlights one of the many decisions families can make ahead of time: what to do with their loved one\u2019s cremated remains. <\/p>\n
Planning ahead give families more time to consider what their loved ones wanted and how they can be remembered.<\/p>\n
Randy Terrace, location manager at Henderson\u2019s Langley Funeral Home, said the first step is having a conversation.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst of all, discuss their wishes with their family. So that everybody\u2019s on the same page, or on board with it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Families can discuss what they want to happen with the cremated remains, whether they want them kept, buried, included in a keepsake, or scattered.<\/p>\n
Planning ahead can help prevent families from being left with unanswered questions. <\/p>\n
Terrace explained that a person\u2019s wishes can be lost if they are not discussed with family or put in writing.<\/p>\n
After decades of working in the funeral industry, both Terrace and Gwen Clark, senior funeral director at Henderson\u2019s, said they have seen more people choosing cremation.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel people generally choose cremation because it\u2019s more cost-effective,\u201d said Clark. \u201cIt also seems more environmentally ethical and healthy for our environment,\u201d said Clark.<\/p>\n
Cost can be one factor in choosing cremation, but it is not the only one. Religious or cultural traditions, personal preferences, and the flexibility cremation provides can all play a role.<\/p>\n
Flexibility might look like dividing cremated remains among relatives who live in different countries, noted Terrace. <\/p>\n
Clark said that with the growing Sikh population in the Lower Mainland, some families choose to bring their loved one\u2019s ashes back to India.<\/p>\n
Henderson\u2019s also sees families choose more personalized keepsakes, including glass ornaments, jewelry, or turning ashes into a diamond using purified carbon from the cremated remains.<\/p>\n
Whatever one decides to do with the ashes, people can prearrange many of the details with a local funeral provider, including arrangements for a final resting place.<\/p>\n
Bakerview Memorial Cemetery, Metro Vancouver\u2019s newest large-format cemetery in Aldergrove, offers options such as columbarium niches, in-ground cremation spaces, cremation shrines, and granite post memorials. An urn could also be buried in a space originally intended for a full casket.<\/p>\n
Staff at Bakerview also emphasized the importance of making decisions ahead of time. <\/p>\n
\u201cPlanning ahead gives families the opportunity to make decisions when they have time to think about what they want, rather than having to make everything immediately following a death,\u201d said office manager Marci Alexander.<\/p>\n
She also noted that planning can allow families to finance arrangements over time, rather than dealing with the entire cost at once.<\/p>\n
For families considering scattering ashes, both Henderson\u2019s and Bakerview recommend checking the rules in their municipality, as guidelines can vary between areas.<\/p>\n
Alexander said people should also consider whether scattering is the right choice for their family, as cremated remains cannot be recovered once they are scattered. Alternatively, a permanent memorial can provide a place for relatives and future generations to visit.<\/p>\n
While there isn\u2019t one single approach to handling cremated remains, funeral and cemetery representatives agree that people should understand their options and discuss their wishes well in advance. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wills and Estates: Making your cremation wishes known Published 3:00 pm Thursday, October 1, 2026 Earlier this year,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":917299,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[49,48,61],"class_list":["post-917298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/917298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=917298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/917298\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/917299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=917298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=917298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=917298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}