I think I have to state right off that I’m not being compensated for this event in any way AND HOLY HELL do I wish I were! Also, that my husband isn’t eligible to enter even though he totally wants to.
Why?
Hope you’re sitting down.
In order to highlight the release of Cathy Maxwell’s new book, The Marriage Ring and the role jewelry plays in the novel, Avon books is giving away a $1500.00 gift certificate to Fragments, an online jewelry store.
Yeah, you read that right. $1500.00 US.
In The Marriage Ring, the heroine has an emotional attachment to a ring during the course of the story, and Maxwell highlights the significance of her own pieces of jewelry in this video about the book:
The poignant part is at the beginning, and then at 2:25. Have a tissue handy.
I love how she talks about the significance of jewelry for men, too.
The contest will run from today, 22 February, through Friday 26 February. That’s long for a typical contest here, but it’s a big prize, too.
Comments will close midnight on 26 February, and a winner will be chosen at random from among the contest.
The winner will be announced Monday 1 March at 11:00 am EST right here.
Contest is open to entries from the US and Canada only (I’m sorry).
The prize of a $1500 gift certificate to Fragments jewelry is bring provided by Avon books.
I am not being compensated to run this promotion, much as I wish I were decked out in sparkly things. Additional disclaimers: Lather, rinse, repeat. Accept no substitutes. Call toll free before digging. Variations in shading within garment may occur. Not the actual Beatles. This presentation has been modified from the original version to fit your screen.
Keep cool; process promptly.
Enough boring details – let’s have fun!
So, how do you enter this big honking giveaway? Leave a comment and tell us about the piece of jewelry that is the most significant to you. Where did it come from, why is it meaningful, and why is it worth more to you than its relative cost? Even though I’m not eligible: my wedding ring is probably my most significant piece of jewelry. It’s a plain gold band, very beat up and notched after 10 years of wearing, but inside Hubby’s are the words “i carry your heart,” and inside mine it says, “i carry it in my heart.” We read that poem as part of our vows when we were married, and I carry the words on my finger that folks used to believe led right to the heart.
What about you? Share, and you’re entered to win.
My most favorite favorite piece is actually something that I purchased for myself quite recently… but I’ve been lusting after it for years. It’s a ring with the most sea green peridots I’ve ever seen set all around the band. The best part about it is that it is both fancy and demure enough to be worn with practically anything!
I’ve never been much of a jewelry person, usually just wearing my silver hoop earrings and calling it a day, but this particular ring made me realize that I can cultivate a look around it. Also, since I wear it on my right instead of my left, it reminds me to be that strong woman that I deserve instead of compromising my values for someone else. I love my boyfriend, but Beyonce got it wrong imho. Women can buy their own rings and be much happier with the outcome. 🙂
My wedding ring/engagement ring set. I love them because my husband picked them out and gave them to me and also for their beauty. They’re gold with diamonds and lock together.
For me it is my great-grandfather’s marine core ring. It has been in my family for literally over a hundred years, and is easily the most meaningful piece of jewelry I own. It’s nice to have such a tangible piece of your heritage.
My most significant piece of jewelry is a silver claddagh ring that was bought for me by my boyfriend and domestic partner. He got it for me at the Michigan Renaissance Fair, and I bought him a similar one for his own hand. We both knew it was kind of cheesy, but we didn’t care. We neither of us make tons of money, but I think we were both craving some kind of physical symbol of how strongly we felt about each other.
I never take it off, and neither does he.
I’m still together with my high-school (even my middle-school, technically) sweetheart. When we’d been dating for one year, he gave me a bracelet that I’ve worn every day since. It’s a thin cuff made out of two loops of silver that form a slip knot in the middle. Our relationship has withstood years of long distance and many family issues, including his father’s death and my childhood abuse and PTSD. He’s always supported me and my bracelet is one symbol of that.
We both would like to get engaged before I leave for a graduate program in Scotland this fall. I’ve told him many times that I don’t need an engagement ring (notice the graduate school—we have no money right now!) but he says it’s important to him that I have one. I saw this contest and knew it might be just the thing to help us out!
captcha: costs48 (yeah, jewelry costs way more than that)
My engagement ring, even though it’s not the one he originally gave me.
We were in the middle of Hastings, where we first met in person, in the computer games aisle of all places. I was looking at the shelves and he was holding my hand. When I felt something move on my finger, I turned to look and he was adjusting a ring on my finger—a ring that hadn’t been there when we walked in the store or even minutes before I felt it there. In fact, had he not adjusted the ring, I’d never even have known what he was up to when he slipped it onto my finger, because I never noticed until he messed with it again. It was a plain gold band with a single emerald setting. Why emerald? Because green is my absolute favorite color.
Sneaky devil, wasn’t he?
Sadly though luckily, just before the warranty expired, the stone fell out. We were getting married in three days time. They had no others just like it nor would it be back in that amount of time, so we swapped it for another. The replacement ring is still a plain gold band but with three really dark blue sapphires, and in truth, much prettier than the original ring. However, I suppose it’s not the ring so much as the way he proposed and gave it to me that’s so special. And the original “ring” isn’t totally lost since I have one identical to it and always did. The ex before him had given me one for V-day from the kids. Did I tell current hubby that at the time he gave it to me? Nope, though he knows now.
A couple of years ago he bought me an actual wedding set, however, I still mostly wear the original gold band he bought me and my sapphire ring. They may not be fancy or a matched set, but he gave them to me and I love them for that reason alone.
I’m a total klutz, so after nine years of marriage (and almost 2 of engagement before that) my engagement ring has gotten a bit battered and nicked, and still looks fabulous. Nice image for our marriage. We get knocked about and smeared with dirt, but there’s still a diamond under the grime. Sometimes it just takes a little care to make it sparkle again.
I have two as well. The first story does not reflect well on me, but still, here it is. Once when we’d had a horrible argument, I got so mad at my husband that I flushed my wedding ring down the toilet. It was nothing fancy, just a plain gold band, but it represented a lot. To me, at that moment, my action was significant. Amazingly, he’s never noticed. I’d stopped wearing my engagement ring after our first child was born, because it didn’t seem to fit into my diaper-changing lifestyle, so perhaps he thinks I don’t wear it because I don’t wear the engagement ring.
The other piece isn’t owned by me, but I’ve always coveted it. It’s a beautiful emerald and pearl ring given to my grandmother by a man other than my grandfather. I’ve always had trouble imagining my very proper grandmother receiving jewelry from another man, but she received several pieces, which she doled out among her granddaughters. My sister received that ring, in my opinion, the most beautiful item.
My favorite piece is my diamond cross pendant. It was the first piece of “real” jewelry that I bought for myself after college, and 20 years later I still wear it nearly every day.
When my grandmother died she left behind three engagement rings. The first ring is mine. It is not a very expensive ring, a garnet surrounded by 13 other garnets in a simple 1930’s style band. It was her first. The second ring went to my cousin, the third to my mom. Each ring a little more elaborate, but always with garnets.
Why three rings? Well these rings tell a story. The first ring was the one my grandfather bought her when the married. See she had been a ‘proper’ southern lady whose father had died and whose widowed mother had struggled to keep the family together after his death. They had lost most of their wealth.
My grandfather was a ‘foreigner’ who had come through Ellis Island with his family. Him and his brothers had bought a farm down from where their parents bought theirs. For years he worked hard. Till one day he saw her, and her sister. Fourteen years older, he approached her mother to ask to court my grandmother. But her mother refused, “her daughter was too young so he would have to wait”. So he did. He found out that her birthday was the day before his. And on his next birthday, when my grandmother was 18 he returned. A year later he gave her the ring.
Ten years later, my grandmother took off that ring, and looked at her husband. “It is time I had a new ring.” She said. And that evening, beside her dinner plate was a box. But she put away that first ring, saved it. She got a ‘proper’ engagement ring the second time, still with a garnet, but this time with diamonds around it.
And my grandmother became very ill. The doctors gave her a few years to live. But one day my grandfather, who had worked three jobs during the Depression, had built his property into a nice farm, had built her a brick house any man would be proud of, looked at his wife and said. “I think it is time for you to get a new ring.” And laid her a diamond ring surrounded by their birthstone beside her plate.
My grandmother did not live much longer past that day. And years later I would ask my grandfather if he was scared of death. His response: “I have waited for twenty years to be with the woman I love, death does not scare me. I know she is waiting for me there.”
I was given the first ring when I turned 21. And understood then why she had asked for another. The band had been worn almost in two. As had her second. She never took off her rings. They were on her hands when she helped on the farm, when she washed dishes, when she cooked, when she tended to sick children. She wore them out with love.
And that is the standard for loving I hold in my heart. Jewelry is not the crowning glory of a relationship, but a marker. Wear it out with love.
On my 18th birthday my Mom gave me an antique ring. It’s 1/2 carat minor’s cut diamond in a platinum setting. Because of the cut we can determine the ring was set sometime in the late 1800’s. Other than a few years when I couldn’t fit the ring on my finger (because I’d gained too much weight) I never take this ring off.
My original engagement ring is most significant to me. The story goes:
In preparation of me moving 12 hours away to college, we were out shopping. I was distracted and worried about the upcoming long term separation with out a commitment. Distance on his part and temptation on mine had me in knots.
I must have been perusing the jewelry counter at Walmart when he came over and asked me what rings I like. I figured he was just being silly and teasing me while getting an idea of the kind of ring he would eventually purchase… So, I teased back and told him the CZ sparkled so much more than the diamonds and promptly pointed out the sappiest one. He motioned over the cashier and suddenly I had a $20 heart shaped cz surrounded by two wire hearts on a gold band and a cashier whispering to me, “Is this what I think it is”! I whispered back that I didn’t know and she giggled.
By the time we were in the car and on the way home I couldn’t stand it any more and asked him what the ring meant. He answered vaguely but eventually told me is was a symbol for me to remember him by, that he wanted to be with me always even though we were apart.
Years later I learned that he actually had $500 in cash in his pocket that day with the intention of buying me a ring… but the Walmart opportunity had been too good to pass up.
My most cherished piece of jewelry was an onyx ring with a silver band. My grandmother gave it to me the day she told me about my birth-mother, a woman hadn’t seen since I was a toddler. Until that moment, I had been raised thinking that my grandmother was my actual mother. So when she gave me this ring at the age of seven, she said that it had been my mom’s and that she wanted me to have it. I did not meet her face to face until I was 18. So that ring was the sole representation I had of a mother I didn’t know, but missed so very much. As children do, I lost that ring. I’ve cried many times over that loss. But it exists still in my mind, every facet, every aspect. Because even when I did not have a mother, I had that ring. And it reminded me that although she did not keep me, it was enough that she wanted me to be here. I realize this may not be the type of story your contest asked for, but it is the truth.
I have a beautiful white gold chain, with a white and yellow gold pendant and a small diamond that my parents bought for me when I graduated from university. I’m the first person on both sides of the family to pursue higher education, and it was a very big deal for my mom and dad. They had bought me jewelry before, but with this piece, they really hit the nail on the head. It’s simple, and elegant and beautiful, and every single time I put it on (which is frequently – I’m wearing it today!), I think of my mom and dad, and the smiles on their faces when they gave it to me.
My most treasured piece of jewelry is a 14 kt amethyst ring. It’s special to me because my godmother got the ring when I was 10 yrs old, and I thought it was the most beautiful thing in the world. I used to beg her for it all the time and she would always say, I’m saving this for something special . I always admired that ring, but as I grew up I didn’t think she would ever give it to me, and I kind of forgot that I asked her for it. When I turned 25 and started my catering company, I had a big grand opening. My god mother turned up for it and she handed me a envelope, in the envelope was the ring and a note saying “I told you I was saving this for something special” I was so shocked and excited, I had all but forgotten about the ring, and it’s still as beautiful as the day she first bought it. 🙂
My second engagement ring from my husband. We were just out of medical school and up to our ears in debt so it was an enormous blow when my ring (and the rings of all the nurses currently on the ward) was stolen from the narcotics drawer by a pharm tech who disappeared with all the dilaudid in the hospital. But my husband, then fiance, managed to get together enough money to buy another ring from the woman who cleaned the nursery (and sold jewelry out of her locker). It cost about $150; he chose the opal and the setting and she made it for us. Lots of memories in that ring.
I’m hip-deep in the painful process of becoming a published author, and rejection is inevitable. To keep my hope afloat, I commissioned a necklace from a talented jewelry artisan and friend. On a hand-hammered silver horseshoe are stamped the words “no power in the ‘verse can stop me”, a favorite quote from Joss Whedon’s Firefly. I kiss it every time I get a rejection, and I hope I’m wearing it when I finally get that phone call offering representation and, eventually the book deal of my dreams.
I have two pieces of jewelry that mean a lot to me. The first is a pair of earrings my mom got me for Christmas this year (not a long time to form an attachment, but believe me, it’s there!). My mom and I have VERY different taste in jewelry, and she acknowledges that it’s mostly miss when she gives me stuff. So the fact that this year, she not only got it right, she got it so perfectly right, means a lot to me. I’ve worn them almost every day this year, and they’ll remind me of her for years to come.
The other story is sad. My grandmother died when I was in high school, very suddenly. My cousin got her engagement ring, which I had always loved. I wouldn’t have had a problem with that if it weren’t for the fact that my cousin had the ring dismantled to get to the diamond, so she could reset it in her own wedding ring. Thus losing forever one of my favorite links to my grandmother. It’s been years and I still haven’t quite forgiven her.
When I was little, my grandmother always wore the same necklace—a gold charm of a hand with crossed fingers, and I loved it. When I was old enough to ask about it, she told me that my grandfather had it made for her when she was undergoing treatment for melanoma—because she always crossed her fingers that it would turn out ok, and it did. When my grandma passed away suddenly last year, the only thing I wanted was the crossed fingers necklace, I didn’t care about the pearls or the diamonds or anything else. Unfortunately, my sister wanted the hand too. I was expecting to have to fight for the necklace and that wasn’t something I wanted to do—my grandma wasn’t one to put up with sibling rivalry. Imagine my surprise when my sister said that yes, she wanted it, but I could have it, because Grandma Bobbie wouldn’t want us to fight over it. Now, I wear the crossed fingers every day and get a lot of compliments on it. It reminds me, not only of my grandma, but also my sister, and is the most special piece of jewelry I own.
Like so many others, I have 2 items as well; both rings. The first being, of course, my wedding set. We picked out the engagement ring setting then the diamond that best suited the ring and my hand. Since at that time the trend was for ugly (IMHO) little notched wedding bands to go with the engagement ring, we didn’t get the matched band but took the ring to a designer and had two bands to go on either side of the ring made for it. They are all soldered together and it’s one piece – the only piece I wear every day.
Since hubby was in chiropractic college when we got engaged, we had to wait to buy an engagement ring and we were both sad about that. His mom had purchased 6 cameo rings in Italy back in the 60’s – one for each daughter and one for each daughter-in-law. So when hubby was telling her of our disappointment in not having an engagement ring, she sent my cameo for me to wear. It is a beautiful piece with fine gold filigree all the way around the cameo; when we were in Italy we looked for similar rings and found none as finely worked as mine. We found similar earrings, and now they accompany the ring on occasion.
I had the absolute best Mother in Law, and miss her every day since she left us in 2001. But this year is our 20th wedding anniversary, so I’ve had both rings for 21 years now. Sigh. I can’t believe it’s been that long, and yet I can’t remember a time without my husband and best friend.
Ha – security word is living44 – and I am living and 44!
My grandmother’s simple little gold ring. I loved living on their farm even though it had no electricity or running water, it abounded in love.
Cliche, but my wedding ring. It’s an antique eternity band, nothing spectacular. It’s not the most expensive piece I own, but will always mean the most to me.
My sister and I share our jewelry because, realistically, neither one of us has money for jewelry. I’m a college student attempting not to starve; she has rent to pay and a household to keep fed on a small paycheck. There’s not much money left over. So I’m going to tell you what pieces we both love, and the piece that I love. Hands down, the set that we both wear the most often is the set that’s the nicest either of us own: the garnet earrings, bracelet, and necklace (technically, two sets that I started wearing together). I got the pieces my senior year of high school from an aunt who does, we all admit, play favorites. Big sis wore them for her wedding anniversary, when she was panicking that she didn’t have anything nice enough to wear for a nice dinner. And I wore them for both high school graduation and a number of assorted dates. Mostly, I love the fact that not only do these pieces tie me together with the aunt who gave them to me, they also tie me to my sister, who has always been there for me when I’d allow her.
The other piece didn’t cost much—it’s a cheap novelty necklace that my sister’s significant other found somewhere. But they thought of me when it was time to give it away; it was my Christmas present this year, when I wasn’t actually expecting either of them to give me much more than somewhere to hang out for a couple days. I’ve realized in the past couple months, I’ve only removed the necklace a couple times—it matters a lot to me. I attend college thousands of miles away from my family and this is a way of reminding myself that I have a family who loves me and that there’s always going to be a tie binding us together. Even if it is embodied by a cheap design of a fairy dancing with a moon.
spamword: thought63—I promise, I have more than 63 thoughts in my head.
I guess I have two jewelry stories to share.
I’ve always had a bit of a nervous relationship with jewelry since nearly every significant piece I’ve worn more than once has broken until recently. When I was about 10, my great grandmother gave me a freshwater pearl necklace. It felt special because it was probably my first ‘real’ piece of jewelry. I still have it but haven’t worn it in years because I’m afraid to break or lose it. After she passed away, I inherited some more jewelry from her but I think the necklace is still my favorite because of the memories associated with it.
The second piece is a new one – the only jewelry my boyfriend has ever gotten me. We’ve been together six years now and are planning to get engaged formally sometime after I finish grad school in May. Unfortunately we’re both really poor right now and have hefty school loans to pay off in a rather terrible job market; he’s actually living with family in another state right now because that was where he could find work. An engagement ring seems like a frivolous expense when that money could be better spent on plane tickets so we can see each other. I feel silly even thinking about a ring. But my guy is a sweetheart and wanted to do something special for me so this Christmas he gave me a tiny opal teardrop pendant necklace. He was so nervous about it that he had to tell me all about it on the phone before I flew out to see him; he wanted to be absolutely sure I’d love it. Even if it hadn’t have been pretty much perfect I would’ve loved it because he picked it out for me.
This makes me so sad. I recently lost my engagement ring. It was a simple round solitaire and I miss it on my finger.
My engagement ring. For the obvious reasons, plus it’s also the most beautiful piece of jewelry I’ve ever owned.
Such sweet stories! Pah on anyone saying jewelry is fluff. My most significant piece was a bulova gold watch my ex bought me in 1984. I was so thrilled! It was gold and had 4 (tiny) diamonds. It was the biggest best gift I’d had up to that point in my life so when we got home, we made a baby! Our first child was concieved that day. That watch made it through 18 years of marriage, 4 kids, countless jobs and divorce but it was stolen from my home in 2004. It still breaks my heart when I think about it. I loved that watch.
For me it’s my husband’s wedding ring that I wear on the middle finger of my right hand. He doesn’t wear it anymore because he had a bicycle crash and broke that finger. I went to the crash site and made him take his ring off before his finger swelled up too much. He wasn’t too worried about it because he was more concerned about his little finger that was at right angles to his hand because it was dislocated. I’m glad I made him take it off, because otherwise they would have had to cut it off. I bought him a replacement when it was obvious after much physical therapy that his knuckle was never going to go down enough to get it back on. He wanted to send this one in and get it replaced with a bigger size by the ring company, but I’m a firm believer in the psychic energy of inanimate objects. This ring had been a part of our lives, soaking up our energy and love for more than ten years. I wasn’t letting it go. So, a symbol of our love but also of the fragility of life.
Oh and that accident? I got a phone call using my husband’s cell. “Uh, hi. My name’s Bob. I’m calling from your husband’s cell phone. He’s had an accident. The bike’s okay.” SRSLY, dude? I mean, RLY?! That’s really what he said!
My grandparents were married for 52 years before my Mammy died. I was thirteen and looked just like her. For a few months after she died, Pappy would just look at me and start crying. About six months after her death, he seemed better. Happier. Turned out he met Patricia. She had just lost her husband.
A year after Mammy died, Pappy married Patricia with Mammy’s ring. Not her original wedding ring, a Depression era symbol in more ways than one, but the big ole honkin’ rock Pappy bought her after they had been married about thirty years and he could afford it.
Thus I had the privilege of two amazing grandmothers from my paternal side. Women who were united by their love of my grandfather and his family. His family grew to include thirteen grandchildren and fourteen great-grandchildren before he lost Patricia to Alzheimer’s. His fifteenth great-grandchild, my baby girl who shares his name, was born ten days after her death. I spent my maternity leave at his house with my two children. We talked, I wrote down the stories he told me of his youth and courtship of the two women he loved, scanned all his old photos, and cooked all of his favorite things.
He was diagnosed with terminal cancer when my baby daughter was eight weeks old. Putting his affairs in order, he informed me that he had been thinking.
“I want Mammy’s ring to go to Theron. And I want you to wear it until she is old enough for it.”
I reminded him that he had six other granddaughters and several great granddaughters.
“I know. I’ve put a lot of thought into it. I decided that I want the ring to go to Theron because she was coming into this world while Patricia was leaving it.”
He died two years ago and I think of him every time that ring sparkles in the sun.
Somewhere in the depths of my jewelry box are the brooches.
My grandfather was one of the last airline navigators and traveled all over the world. My grandmother often went with him or used his airline passes, and purchased jewelry on as many coasts as she could. I have an extensive set of Bangkok silver and enamel, rings from Hong Kong and Dehli, silver from Cairo, and yet, of all this bounty, there are two brooches that I make a point of pulling out and wearing.
One is a basic jade oval cab set in silver, but the jade and the style are from Alaska, and it’s some of the jade which my grandpa picked up out of the fields up there near midsummers when he and a friend went out in the middle of the night to harvest jade in daylight.
The other is old, from my great grandmother at least and maybe older. It’s just a victorian cameo, set in silver with marcasite chips. But it’s a cameo done in mother of pearl, about the size of my thumbnail and the woman looks like us. At some point, it was transitioned to be a pendant as well as a pin, and I wear it as both, as some of the oldest history I have.
A beautiful jade necklace that I’ve never worn. It belonged to my grandmother (whose father was a jeweller). I get it out occasionally and just run it through my fingers and marvel at it.
For me, its a tie between two pieces of jewelry. My wedding ring means so much to me especially since my hubby never took his matching band off through all his years as a firefighter. Many firefighters don’t wear wedding rings because of the potential danger during the job and I told my hubby I would understand if he didn’t wear his at work but he said there was no way he would take his off because it meant to much to him.
The second piece that means so much to me is a large amethyst ring I have. When I was pregnant with my oldest son, my hubby and I went panning for gemstones. We had a huge amount of luck and found a lot of great stones. Without even realizing that it would be my son’s birthstone, I chose the amethyst as the first stone we got cut and set into a ring. It is a beautiful almost flawless tone but what makes it so special is the tie to my oldest son who just turned 13.
I think the jewelry with most significance to me was garnet ring my dad & stepmom gave me when I was 18. It was a beautiful stone, a simple & elegant setting of yellow gold and I loved wearing it everyday. The sad part is, I manged to lose it on my honeymoon (age 24 1/2) when I was putting on suntan lotion and the ring slipped off my finger, and in classic slow-mo (it seemed) took a giant bounce off the pier and into the ocean. We even paid divers to look for it, but it was never to be found. I always tried to look at it as the ring from my maidenhood made way for the wifely ring… but now that I’m divorce, I’m just saddened by its loss.
These stories are all pretty amazing. I wish I had one to share – but no one in my family has ever had any jewelry that was sentimental. If either of my grandmothers had jewelry, it never made it down to my generation. My mother has nothing of note. And me – I would love to own jewelry, but other than a few pieces that are just for fun, I have nothing – divorced, so wedding set means bubkis. One day perhaps I’ll have enough saved to get something just for me – that I can pass down to my daughter.
My grandmother had this beautiful gold Nantucket basket on a gold chain that she wore all the time when I was a child. When I was around 4 or 5 I asked her if I could have it when she died (I still can’t believe I did that…).
When I graduated from college, she gave me that necklace and just writing about it now is making me tear up. It’s by far the most meaningful thing I own, jewelry or otherwise.
For me, it is my grandmother’s ring, pale gold with a heart face, she wore it for as long as I knew her and it was on her hand until her last breath. The hospital had removed it and handed it back to us with all her belongings and I claimed it for my own. I wear it everyday for obvious reasons.
Every time I attempted to do this with my real life story, my eyes burned too much to let me see the message box. I began to think there was a reason for this, that I should not be sharing the story after all, but just holding it close to me.
Instead, I will relate a great romance novel jewelry gesture: The pirate hero, knowing he is about to be separated from the heroine, takes the small hoop from his ear and exchanges it with the pearl in hers. (It might have been the other way ‘round, come to think of it.) Loved the gesture, though. Stays with me still, although the name of the book and the author both have been lost to the mists of time.
I love reading everyone’s stories on here!
The only real ring I have is my $30 silver wedding band and my 6 year old daughter and I were talking about why I don’t have jewels like “the Disney princesses” (we were reading a book about Cinderella).
She then found a piece of pipe cleaner from her art supplies, put a green bead on it, then twisted it into a ring for me.
I will always treasure my “emerald” because I know it came from her heart and a wish to give me a “real” jewel. That girl can drive me crazy sometimes, but she has her sweet moments!
This isn’t even going to come close to comparing to most of the stories here, but, well…here I go.
Although I do have a small amount of jewelry I treasure greatly, the piece that has the most significance for me right now is my university grad ring. I was in one of the tougher degree programs at my university, a six-years-in-five one; I just graduated last May. It took a lot of sacrifices for me, of time and emotional/mental health, in order to make it. (Seriously, there was one period where I felt triumphant when it had been a full week since I’d last cried my eyes out over the damn program. The second floor women’s bathroom floor and I became intimately acquainted that semester.) There were countless times I wished I could quit or change degrees to something a little easier, but I’d come so far, I couldn’t bear the thought of starting over.
In my fifth year, when I received my ring, it was a constant reminder that the goal was in sight. I was almost there. And even now, I still wear it daily and look at it, and marvel that hey, I actually stuck it out to the end and made it. Now it makes me smile to think that, even if it may not seem like much to an outsider, I did something truly worthwhile.
Jewelry is the only thing I am sentimental about so I am having a hard time deciding which ones mean the most.
My mother always wanted a pair of diamond earrings. Didn’t matter how big they were, she just wanted a pair. One christmas when I was little they were on sale at the local drug store and she made sure that my brother and I have enough money to buy them for her. We didn’t. I am going to guess that I got her a coffee mug instead. My dad thought the earrings were impractical, so he never bought her a pair. We didn’t find out until many years later how disappointed she was. So when I was in my twenties and out of school and had my head on straight. I bought her a tiny pair of diamond earrings. I think they cost less than $50 but they were real. She loved them. And so Mom, at the age of 52, pierced her ears a second time and wore them until the day she died almost two years later.