I cannot promise you a world, Can't afford any fancy things, I cannot buy you diamond rings, No string of pearls

Russell Thompkins Jr of the Stylistics claiming his poverty prevents him giving his love any gifts. Sing along to the karaoke version here!

Really that's a poor excuse for being thoughtless. Jewellery doesn't have to have financial value to have great sentimental value attached to it. That's one of the real pleasures of giving and receiving jewellery.  Of all the pieces that I have been given, it is one of no value that shows great thought behind it; making its worth priceless to me.

As mentioned in my earlier blogs, my compulsion to pick up objects on the beach saw me, on the Andalusian coast earlier this year, picking up small fragments of household tiles. They had been worn smooth by the sea, one side was terracotta, the other glazed in white. I brought some home and there they languish with the inactive shell collection.
My 26th wedding anniversary arrived and my husband gave me one of these tiles. He had spotted a tile piece on the beach that had been formed into the shape of a heart and had hidden it in his pocket. Once home he had drilled it and threaded cord through and had the back engraved.
I enjoy wearing it, not for its value but for the associated memory and the thoughtfulness of the gesture.

My Tile Pendant from a beach near Nerja, Andalusia, Spain.

The same with inherited jewellery, it doesn't have to be of large value to be enjoyed and to invoke memories of the relative to whom it belonged. A wonderful thing about jewellery is that it is enduring, it can be repaired, remounted even re-designed so that future generations can keep wearing whilst appreciating the history of a family piece.

My friend had the stones from several of his mothers rings made into this unique modern brooch. The value of the gold in the old settings was more than sufficient to pay for the new piece and he also received a cheque for the remaining value in the gold scrap. Brilliant!

Don't leave your jewellery abandoned in hidden places, dust it off, repair it, redesign it. Find out about the person it belonged to, any pictures of them wearing the piece? when and why it was given? Wear it with pride and enjoy sharing the story behind the jewellery.

The stones were taken out of this old out ring that wasn't being worn, re-polished

and then set into this new contemporary design. What an improvement!

Do you have any jewellery with a romantic story associated with it? Got any family pieces with an interesting history? share them with me here, I am curious to read  them.