Printing is possibly the most aggravatingly and unnecessarily complicated part of photography, and getting consistent, accurate results is incredibly complicated. It is no wonder nobody outside the hardcore amateurs and a pro here and there prints these days.
If you have your own printer, there is
huge frustration, time and effort needed to get color management in order, and even then you have to have a
very strict printing workflow - if you neglect to check a single checkbox or even look at your printer sideways you have wasted several euros worth of paper and ink. Nothing is automated, you have to double-check everything with flaky drivers, inconsistent implementation and obscure descriptions. God forbid you have to re-install the drivers or OS, as you get to start from scratch. Oh the joy.
The really bad news is that it only gets worse if you use a printing service. The cheap to mid-priced ones are clueless when it comes to printing. You ask them what ICC profile you should use and you get a blank look. You ask them what output sharpening you should use and they give you a blank look. You ask them if you can print full bleed they'll call the cops on you. Print the same photo on different days and you get different results depending on the mood of the operator. These guys print huge volumes of small batches for people who couldn't care less about color accuracy or sharpness of their vacation shots. I bet they have competitions on how much they can mess a run and still get paid.
It doesn't get any better if you go up the scale and go to the local pro shop. These guys can't be bothered with that one guy who comes every month or so and buys a few prints. Good luck trying to proof anything with them. They work on huge volumes and huge batches.
After years of this I went and bought myself a 13" printer (Canon i9950). Now I get consistent results, and the ability to tweak and proof is worth the price of entry alone. Now if there just was a 17" printer with a comparable gamut and inky blacks...
Oh and these printers are huge. The 13" printer I have is closer to 30" wide, and if you get a 24" printer you apparently need a football team to move it. You need a separate room to operate it, especially if you want to have a table to peep at the prints.
I even found a local service which does a very good job for the occasional large print I want. They still insist on sRGB, but it's better than taping several 13" prints together
It is no wonder that many of the greatest photographers never printed a sheet.
To recap my rant: either way you cut it, it will suck. You
might get good results
eventually. If money is not an object, outsource the whole thing to a master printer. Send her the file and be done with it. You'll also live longer.