Call Kurtis: How Your Dead Relatives Can Live On After They Die

SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — Nearly half of Americans are cremated after they die. Some families choose to spread their loved one's ashes or keep them on a mantle.

But others, like Constance Flannery of San Francisco, are redefining burial and turning them into a living memorial.

We found a couple companies are giving people the option of converting ashes into living bushes or trees.

Flannery says her husband Owen was her best friend and she was smitten with him at first sight, "I immediately fell madly in love with him."

She says Owen proposed on their first date. "He said this is really crazy, will you marry me? And I said, 'this is really crazy....Yes.'"

But after 44 years of marriage, Owen died after a long illness. "He passed in our arms," said Flannery.

Missing talking to her best friend, she decided to keep him close. Just a walk outside her back door, she found a place to continue those talks—"Hi Owen, you're looking good."

In a sacred corner of her yard, she can now talk to Owen, laugh, cry and shower him with love.

Flannery transformed Owen ashes into a princess bush. "The bud is beautiful the leaves are so nice and soft."

The invention to transform Owen from ashes into a shrub is called a Bios-Urn. It's a biodegradable urn made by a Spanish company used to grow trees. You put your loved one's ashes on the bottom, then planting material and a tree seed on top.

Describing the device, Flannery says, "It looks like a giant coffee cup made of cardboard."

We asked Flannery what Owen would think of the fact he's now a bush.

Flannery laughs, "I think he'd find it very amusing. I think he'd be fine with it."

Mark Brewer's company out of Denver is The Living Urn. It's a similar device for turning loved ones into living memorials.

"People build decks by the tree and put chairs out there and have coffee," said Brewer.

The Living Urn also has potted options for families in apartments or who move a lot.

Brewer's own wife Anna grew her late grandmother into a potted rose bush.

"She was a woman with a big heart," said Anna. "Beautiful flower. Beautiful color, and it just represents her, symbolizes her."

Anna's memories of her grandmother will always be alive; "Something's growing from this. Circle of life," she said.

Both companies, Bios-Urn and The Living Urn price their living memorials at around $200 for people and charge a little less for animal urns.

But what if the shrub dies? Would it be like losing a loved one all over again?

Flannery says she would take it in stride, "I'd be sad. I'd be very sad. But I'd put another one in."

The Living Urn offers options based on where you live and which trees would thrive there. You can choose from all different trees, Maple, Pine, Ginkgo, Beech, and Ash.

Legally, burying your loved one's remains in your backyard can be a gray area according to the Department of Consumer Affairs.

The California Department of Public Health recommends getting a disposition permit from the county you plan the burial.