Family Tree Funeral Company

21/06/2026

📸We were back at the Saxon Barn in Leonard Stanley a short while ago for a photo shoot. We hope you like our new team photo!

Huge thanks to the Saxon Barn for allowing us to shoot against their beautiful stone wall and to Sarah Turton for taking the pics.

Pictured left to right are: David Lambert, Catherine Miller, Jane Diamond + Ian Paradine. Find out more about them by heading to our website: https://www.familytreefunerals.co.uk/we-are-people-first-funeral-directors-second/

19/06/2026

The Advertising Standards Authority has found that some direct cremation providers don't deliver what they promise. Not all direct cremations are equal - so please do your research. And know this: you can have a simple, dignified direct cremation carried out locally by an independent funeral director who knows your community.

You can read the article here: https://tinyurl.com/PureCremNews

familytreefunerals.co.uk

19/06/2026

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 100 five-star Google reviews.

We've just reached a milestone that means a great deal to us - our 100th five-star Google review.⭐

⭐Each one represents a family who trusted us with the most important farewell they will ever arrange. That trust is not something we take lightly, and reading every review reminds us why we do what we do.

Thank you, Stroud - and beyond. It is a privilege to serve this community.⭐

You can find the link to all the reviews on our linktree bio or use this url: https://tinyurl.com/FTFreviews

📍 Family Tree Funeral Company,
Independent funeral director in Stroud.
www.familytreefunerals.co.uk

16/06/2026

🌻We’re glad to help highlight Sunflowers Su***de Support’s Creativity Hub needle felting event on Friday 26 June at Sunflowers HQ. Moments of creativity and community can make a real difference for people navigating grief and loss.🌻

Connect with them to book or find out more via their website: https://www.sunflowerssuicidesupport.org.uk/peer-support-groups

12/06/2026

A Farewell at Home

Gillian's farewell happened at home. In her garden. With the people she loved around her.

Her grandchildren carried her out for the final time. The family walked her to the end of the road.

It was, by all accounts, one of the most personal and meaningful ceremonies those present had ever attended.

We've shared Gillian's story on our blog - a glimpse of what's possible when a family is gently supported to do things in their own way.

🔗 Link to read is in our bio - or visit:https://www.familytreefunerals.co.uk/2026/05/29/a-farewell-at-home-gillians-story/

With grateful thanks to Denise and Gillian's family for sharing this.

09/06/2026

There is something quietly profound about the fact that natural burial grounds are places where life thrives. 🌱

We've been thinking about this lately - and revisiting a story from our blog about a frog found at the bottom of a grave just before a funeral. A small, unexpected moment of life in a place we might only associate with loss. 🐸

Natural burial allows us to give something back. The grave becomes part of a living landscape - wildflowers, grasses, insects, birds. A place that, over time, belongs to nature as much as to memory.🌸

It's one of the reasons we are proud to be corporate supporters of the Stroud Valleys Project, working to protect and restore the wildlife and wild places of our local area.

Read "Life in the Grave" on our website news page:
👉 https://www.familytreefunerals.co.uk/2017/11/06/life-in-the-grave/

🌱

04/06/2026

A nurse in Gloucestershire is asking keen sewers to make fabric bags - so that no bereaved family ever has to carry their loved one's belongings home in an old plastic bag. 👩‍⚕️

Debbie Williams, who works for Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Trust, knows from personal experience how impersonal and clinical that can feel. Since 2022, volunteers have been sewing simple fabric bags to replace them - and it has made a real difference to families. ❤️‍🩹

Now stocks are running low, and she's putting out the call again.

It's a small thing. And it's everything. ⭐

This kind of care and compassion - in the quiet, practical details of how we treat people at the end of life - is exactly what we believe in at Family Tree Funerals. Dignity doesn't begin and end with the funeral. It runs through each part of life.

If you sew, take a look - the pattern is available via Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Trust on Facebook and we've also added it to our linktree bio. 🪡

01/06/2026

We're so grateful for this recent testimonial from a Family Tree family. It means the world to know our care, guidance and attention to detail helped create a funeral that felt meaningful and special at a difficult time.

🌟You can find all recent reviews via the link in our instagram linktree or within our page links.🌟

familytreefunerals.co.uk
🙏🙏🙏

28/05/2026

We absolutely love this kind of care and compassion initiated by Debbie Williams Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust - it's a small thing - and it's everything.

During Dying Matters Week in 2022 we put out a request for sewers to help create a stock of fabric ‘property bags’ so that our hospital colleagues had something dignified to use to give personal belongings back to family members of a deceased relative.
The response was heartwarming with lots of beautifully sewn bags in wonderful materials arriving at the Trust.
Those are now running low, and End of Life Lead Debbie Williams is hoping that sewing enthusiasts will again pull out their needles to help us replenish our stock.
She said: “These property bags have been hugely welcomed both by our staff and by relatives. They represent kindness and sympathy at a very difficult time.
“We were incredibly grateful for the response when we first appealed for them – I’d love to allow colleagues across the Trust to continue using them by having some more created.”
Dying Matters Awareness Week runs from May 4-10 and aims to help people talk about dying and grief and to plan for the end of life. More on the week can be found on the Hospice UK website here.
Bag-making instructions are available for download on our website (link in comments) if you’d like to try making one, or more.
For more on End of Life care, Dying Matters Week or sewing of Property Bags you can email: [email protected]
Bags can be sent to End of Life Care, Gloucestershire Health and Care NHS Foundation Trust, Edward Jenner Court, 1010 Pioneer Avenue, Brockworth, Gloucester, GL3 4AW.