After cremations as part of the cremation services offered in Burtonsville, MD, some people have jewelry made with a small amount of their loved one’s cremation remains. The jewelry is wearable, so its purpose is to allow deceased loved ones to be close by when the jewelry is worn.
Is cremation jewelry weird? Cremations are outpacing traditional burials here in the United States. There are many reasons for this, but one of them is because of the flexibility in using cremated remains.
A portion of them can be kept or buried in an urn, a portion can be scattered in a favorite or special place, a portion can be used to help the environment (building coral reefs to sustain ocean life or mixed in with soil to plant trees and other plants), and a portion can be used to create wearable jewelry. And these are just a few of the options for using cremated remains.
But while people can understand scattering or burying some of a loved one’s cremated remains and using some of them to do something good for the environment, some people aren’t so sure about the whole idea of wearing jewelry that includes part of a deceased loved one’s cremated remains.
However, the practice of creating cremation jewelry has been around a very long time. From the 1300’s through the early 20th century, a very common tradition for people who had lost loved ones was to wear mourning rings.
These rings didn’t contain any of the cremated remains, but they gave the people wearing them a sense of having their deceased loved one near them all the time because strands of the hair of the deceased were incorporated into the creation of the ring.
While mourning rings fell out of favor as the last century passed, the idea of keeping a loved one who had died close by did not. It was that desire that led to the process of creating jewelry like rings, bracelets, lockets, and necklaces that contained a small amount of a loved one’s cremated remains.
If the thought of cremation jewelry seems a little weird to you, there are other ways to use a loved one’s cremation remains to memorialize them and keep a part of them close to you, if not too close (some people keep them even closer, having some of the cremation remains mixed with tattoo ink, and then getting a tattoo done with the special inks).
Having some of the cremation remains mixed with oil-based paints and then having a commemorative painting done with them is an option for using cremation remains that is gaining popularity. There are a number of professional painters around the country who specialize in this type of painting.
They will use special paints to create any kind of painting you want. It might be a portrait of your deceased loved one or something that represents a passion of theirs or an object that was special to them.
If a painting is not the way you want to create a permanent memorial to your loved one using some of their cremation remains, you can opt for other creative ways to incorporate them into something artistic.
An example would be to take some of the cremated remains and incorporate them with a favorite scent and melted wax to create a memory candle that you can place in a special place in your home that reminds you of your loved one.
If you want more information about cremation services offered in Burtonsville, MD, you can talk with our expert staff at Donald V. Borgwardt Funeral Home, P.A. You can drop by our funeral home at 4400 Powder Mill Rd., Beltsville, MD, 20705, or you can contact us today at (301) 937-1707.