• Caroline Britton

    Funeral Celebrant, Wedding/Civil Union Celebrant and Grief Companion

  • Services Offered

    A little bit about me....

    Civil Union Celebrant, Funeral Celebrant, Wedding Celebrant, Waikato, Celebrant, Bay of Plenty, Hamilton, Te Awamutu

    My passion is working with people to create the service they desire

    Being a celebrant is an exciting opportunity and a privilege, working with people to mark milestones of joy, sadness, birth and renewal. My goal is to create a service, whether it's a wedding ceremony, a celebration of a new life, or a farewell to a loved one, that reflects their personalities.

     

    Each service is unique and personal to you. It can be as simple, or as involved as you would like it to be and you will be involved in every stage. I will do my very best to ensure the process of planning your ceremony is as smooth as possible and includes your ideas. After your ceremony, I will leave you with a complete script as a keepsake.

     

    Residing in beautiful Pirongia, I am available to travel anywhere in the Waikato and Bay of Plenty, and throughout New Zealand upon request.

  • Funeral Celebrant

     

    Coping with the loss of someone you love is one of life’s biggest challenges, requiring love and compassion from everyone around you to help you to deal with your grief.

     

    It is an enormous privilege to work with families to plan a fitting “End of Life” Celebration for their loved ones. Every person has a story to tell and I believe it is an honour to facilitate the funeral process. Each service is unique and personal. It can be as simple, or as involved as needed to reflect the personality of your loved one.

     

    I will do my very best to ensure that the process is as smooth as possible, includes your ideas and provides comfort to your family as you say farewell.

     

    With a background in communication and people development through coaching and mentoring relationships, I am warm, compassionate and articulate. In addition to writing and facilitating the service, I am able to help family members to write and deliver their eulogies.

     

    I also often work with people before they pass to write their life story. Sharing philosophies, life time-lines and precious memories before it’s too late helps your loved ones to prepare your funeral service and present your life story accurately, reflecting all that you would want to include. You will also be providing them with vital information at a time when emotions run high and precious memories can get “fuddled.” And even better, you are providing them with important family history that can be handed down through the future generations of your family – a wonderful gift.

     

    I have resources available that will capture your wishes for your “End of Life” celebration, from your wishes regarding burial, or cremation, how you would like your service to run, the music you would like included, reading choices and the length of service.

     

    Let’s chat.

     

    Wedding/Civil Union Celebrant

     

    It is an absolute pleasure and a privilege to work with couples to create their dream wedding day – one that they and their guests will remember forever.

     

    I love playing a part in one of the most important milestones you will celebrate as a couple.

     

    As we begin to design your dream day, I provide you with a comprehensive ceremony builder booklet, which includes much more than just the legal requirements of your ceremony. You will have wording choices for every part of the ceremony – choices of poetry, quotes and readings to include, suggestions on how to include departed loved ones and ceremonies that join two families as one. It’s your day, planned to reflect your personalities.

     

    I am extremely organised and happy to meet as often as you’d like, including a pre-wedding rehearsal, to ensure that every detail is perfect so that you can relax and enjoy the magic that is your wedding day.

     

    If you’d like to chat, please get in touch with me.

     

     

    Grief Companioning

     

    As your grief companion, I help you to connect with your feelings and develop strategies to deal with your grief and move your life forward.

     

    Together, we explore your feelings – you talk and I listen because you are the one person in this world who knows you best. Together, we explore strategies and steps that focus on the future and create forward momentum in your life.

     

    There are two important aspects to grief companioning: Understanding the events that have happened and the resulting feelings that you have at this moment in your life. and focusing on the future, one step at a time. You pick your destination, then together, we’ll plan how to get there, developing your resilience along the way,

     

    As a communication facilitator, I have 30 years plus experience working with people in training, coaching and mentoring relationships to develop their skills and design their futures.

     

    If you need help to understand your grief, and to perhaps release feelings of guilt as you learn to be happy again – let’s chat.

     

     

  • Testimonials

    “Thank you for sending through a copy of Dad’s complete service and thank you for doing such a wonderful job on Thursday. It was a beautiful service and your support and guidance made it easy for us.” – L

     

    “Thank you so much Carol. I’m not sure we can adequately express our gratitude for what you have done in enabling us to farewell Mum and Dad in such a beautiful manner. Both funerals were lovely and I know Mum and Dad in their humble way, would have been truly amazed at how well they were loved. Thank you.” – SAJ

     

    “I’m not sure if I thanked you on the day, but am doing so now. Comments from everyone that it was such a lovely service. We thought so too and one which Mum would have loved and been proud of. It was a pleasure to have you conduct Mum’s final life history.” – A

     

    “Thank you so much for taking Mum’s celebration of life. Everything was so nicely done from the organ player to sending a copy of the actual service; that was a lovely kind gesture for you to do. Thank you so much for carrying out the family wishes. We have had a lot of comments that it was a lovely send off. From deep within our hearts, thank you so much.” - F, F and C, L and T and their families.

     

    Dear Caroline, Thank you so much for your guidance and support as we farewelled our Dad, Ken, recently. Your own contributions were perfectly timed and placed and your facilitation of everything we wanted to include made our very difficult job much easier. We’ve had lots of feedback from friends and family about the great job you did for us and how much your presence made a real difference to everyone who came to say goodbye to Dad. It all made our day much more bearable and we wouldn’t hesitate to recommend you to other families. With sincerest thanks, N, J and S

     

    “From the first moment I met you, I felt it was like talking to family. Thank you.”

    - The Smith family

     

    “Thank you for this (full copy of the service including all open tributes), it is great. I must also thank you for the beautiful service you conducted for mum. We love your work.” – R

     

    “Hi Caroline, I would like to thank you so very much for such a lovely warm and caring service; it was just as if you had personally known mum. Everyone commented about it and thought you did a fabulous job as, of course, we did. Thank you again for being a lovely person. You are a special lady in our family’s eyes and may you have many blessings and love come your way. It can’t be an easy job, but boy you made it look easy. Thank again and god bless.” – P

     

    “Thanks for guiding is through the process of farewelling Dad. Dad’s mates were also keeping an eye on us and they wanted a good send off for Dad and they gave unanimous feedback that they were very happy with the service. It was really kind of uplifting although sad at the same time. You have a very lovely was about you Caroline – well suited to the role.” P K

     

    Weddings

     

    “Caroline displays tremendous empathy with people from all walks of life.” J and D

     

    “Caroline creates meaningful and memorable ceremonies that reflect the wishes of the people she is working with.” L and M

     

    “Caroline has acutely perceptive listening skills with an innate ability to bring people together.” A and P

  • Packages and Pricing

    Available on request

  • Resources

    Journeying Through Grief – A guide to help you to cope with the death of someone you love.

     

    This is a 26-page booklet that covers topics such as:

    - Typical reactions you might expect when some-one you love dies

    - Myths and facts

    - How support from other will help you to heal

    - Helping someone on their journey

    - Words you might use

    - Explaining death to a child

    - Understanding how children and teens view death

    - Staying positive

     

     

     

     

     

    Happy in MY Skin - Maintaining your self esteem and confidence

     

    Styled as a “story,” this book is a short, sharp, practical look at the skills required to develop self-esteem and build confidence, and includes worksheets to illustrate the concepts and cement the learning.

     

    With testimonials from Jennifer Read Hawthorne, inspirational speaker and #1 best-selling co-author of Chicken Soup for the Woman’s Soul and Life Lessons for Loving the Way You Live, Jo-anne Wilkinson, co-founder and executive trustee of the New Zealand Foundation for Youth Development, Steve Viglione, author of the international best-seller, the I AM Affirmation Book, Discovering the Value of Who You Are and Rhonda Ryder, founder of www.KidsAwakening.com, this book helps people to develop the ability to focus positively on their attributes and skills, and learn to value themselves for who they are.

    $19.95 + P & P