Tag Archives: engagement ring

Cool Rings in Real Life: Sarah-Jane’s Pearl

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A while back, your recycled sterling silver artisan loving friends at Turtle Love Committee posted an ad asking people about their unique engagement rings. We got some wonderful responses back, including one from our new friend Sarah-Jane who wrote, “My boyfriend and I are currently ring shopping and we’re looking for unique pearl ring settings for our engagement ring. Pearls are one of my favorite gems. I love the organic, natural feel they have . . . You wouldn’t believe the backlash I’ve gotten from my friends and family though! None of them think it’s a good idea to have a pearl engagement ring. I think culture and the mega marketing of jewelry stores have brain-washed everyone into thinking that diamonds are the only kind of engagement rings.”

We hear you, Sarah-Jane! And we’re super glad you ended up finding a pearl engagement ring that suits you perfectly . . .

 

Turtle Love Committee: What is your favorite place in the whole wide world?
Sarah-Jane: My family home, which is in the country in Central Texas. It’s got quite a large acreage, giant oak trees, and a lake.

TLC: Childhood ambition?
SJ: Which one? It ran the gamut from lawyer and librarian to geophysicist and actress!

TLC: Current ambition?
SJ: To start my life with the man of my dreams and serve God as best I can with all that is within me.

TLC: What would you do if you had a million dollars?
SJ: Buy a kayak, a few mountain bikes, and truck to haul them. After that, I’d donate the rest.

TLC: Who is your partner?
SJ: Matt Menefee! A truly wonderful, caring man who loves the Lord, and me. He’s an elementary science teacher with a background in outdoor education.

TLC: How did you and your partner decide to get married?
SJ: I knew from the day we started dating (again) that I wanted to marry him. It took us the next ten months to figure out all the other details.

TLC: What does your wedding/engagement/commitment ring look like?
SJ: It’s a pearl and white sapphire ring set in 14k white gold.

TLC: What do you think about your ring(s)?
SJ: I love it! It is beautiful and exactly what I wanted. I understand pearls are fragile - much like a newly wed couple starting out. Things of great beauty and personal value often require lots of care. I see it as a good reminder that though diamonds are hard and require little attention; a marriage is not like that. Like a pearl, a relationship develops over time with lots of work from both sides. And it requires great care to keep its luster.

TLC: Pets?
SJ: Matt has Mr. Skittles the Wonder Dog (a Beagle/Pomeranian mix) and I have Nutmeg the Cat (a Snowshoe Siamese).

TLC: What do you do for work?
SJ: I’m a higher education communicator specialized in writing, research, photography, graphic design and social media. I work at a college in the Marketing & Communications office.

TLC: What are you passionate about?
SJ: People.

TLC: What is the last book you read?
SJ: “Let It Snow: Three Holiday Romances.”

TLC: Favorite beverage?
SJ: Coffee! No, hot tea! No, coffee! (No, both!)

If you would like to submit your super cool ring for our blog, we would love to hear about it!

Feel free to email us!

Enjoyable Proposals - Giacomo’s Story

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You won’t just find dinosaur bones at the museum. You might even find love, like our new friend Giacomo!

If you would like to share your proposal story too, email us!

Here’s Giacomo’s Story . . .

“Looking for an unconventional way of expressing my commitment I found your company the perfect fit. I purchased two styles of engagement rings. And then couldn’t decide which one to give my soon-to-be wife, so I gave her both! I asked her to marry me with our children present where she and I had our first date (this is the second marriage for both of us).

Everyone was in agreement, especially her!

We got married on November 6, 2009, at the Paterson Museum in New Jersey. Actually, that’s where I met her. She was bringing her class on a visit to the museum and I happen to be the museum’s director (and that was three years ago!).

We are very happy together. Some things get better each day. She wears both rings I proposed to her with: one on her hand and the aother around her neck on a chain.”

Aww, Giacomo – thanks for sharing your story with us! We’re super glad that Turtle Love Committee gets to be a part of your awesome relationship!

Cool Rings in Real Life: Genevia’s Peridot from TLC

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Nothing excites your recycled sterling silver artisan loving friends at Turtle Love Co. more than seeing our rings on happy faces. We signed into Facebook.com the other day and saw that someone had posted “Fan Pictures” - we hadn’t been that excited in a while! We contacted our new friend, Genevia, who had posted them and asked her if we could write about her Cool Ring in Real Life - especially since it was one of our very own Bryant ring in peridot!

Turtle Love Commitee: What is your favorite place in the whole wide world?
Genevia: By far, it’s the North Carolina Mountains. I spent so much time there as a kid with my family, so there’s a lot of great memories. It’s so beautiful and serene there.

TLC: Childhood ambition?
G: My childhood ambition was to be a brain surgeon, mainly because my cousin wanted to be one as well.

TLC: Current ambition?
G: To be the best mother and wife I can be.

TLC: What would you do if you had a million dollars?
G: Tithe 10% of it to our church, pay off our debt, do updates on our house, give money to charity, and do some upgrades on my Jeep!

TLC: Who is your partner?
G: Kenny is a wonderful man of God. He’s slightly cocky, very funny, and an amazing dad to our two kids, Gabriel (4) & Addison (almost 2). I never imagined that I would meet my husband online. Let alone a website called hotornot.com! But I did, and we’ve been together for a total of almost 7 years.

TLC: How did you and your partner decide to get married?
G: My husband and I got married after dating for 2 years. We had talked about getting married, but we weren’t engaged yet. Well, I got pregnant on Valentine’s Day 2005, and a few months later, we decided to get married.

TLC: What does your wedding/engagement/commitment ring look like?
G: I have the Raymond wedding band from TLC, which is a simple sterling silver band with squared edges. My engagement ring is the Bryant ring - a minimalist sterling silver ring, with a baguette cut peridot in a bezel setting.

TLC: What do you think about your ring(s)?
G: I LOVE my rings! I get compliments on them every day. I thought I wanted a traditional engagement and wedding band, but I am so glad I chose something simpler. Not as high maintenance and much easier to wear daily with two small children.

TLC: What’s your favorite color?
G: I guess if I had to pick one it would be either pink or green. I love all pink colors just because it’s so girly; and, I like green because it goes well with my skin tone, hair, and eyes.

TLC: Pets?
G: We have 2 dogs and both are rescues. Freckles is an 80lb pit bull and pointer mix, and Nestle is a 50lb chocolate lab and Irish setter mix.

TLC: What do you do for work?
G: I am a stay at home mom and home maker.

TLC: What are you passionate about?
G: I’m extremely passionate about childbirth and breastfeeding. After having two traumatic birth experiences and little support with breastfeeding my first child, I want to try to empower other women to do their research and discover what they think is the best option for them and their family! And not to just do everything their OBGYN and pediatricians tell them to do.

TLC: What is the last book you read?
G: I’m currently reading “Created to be His Help Meet” by Debi Pearl. A wonderful book for wives and wives-to-be on how to be a great wife and have a glorious marriage in the eyes of your spouse and God.

TLC: Favorite beverage?
G: Oh, there’s a few: sweet tea, Sundrop, and Cheerwine are all in a tie. It’s very hard to find Sundrop and Cheerwine here in Tennessee, so when I do, I thoroughly enjoy it!

TLC: Sweetest indulgence?
G: Plain and simple: chocolate chip cookies . . . I could eat them every day if I knew I wouldn’t gain a ton of weight!

If you would like to submit your super cool ring for our blog, we would love to hear about it!

Feel free to email us!

Cool Rings in Real Life: Hillary’s Awesome Yellow Sapphire

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Yay Hillary! Hillary wrote to us with pictures of her awesome engagement ring and the story behind it. Neato!

HIllary's Ring on Hand

Hi Turtle Love Committee,

I just wanted to share pictures of my unusual engagement ring for your blog. It’s a natural yellow sapphire set in a palladium band. When my fiance and I started looking for an engagement ring for me, I was immediately drawn to natural yellow sapphires both for their color and their silky brilliance. I chose palladium for the setting because it’s cheaper than 18 karat gold, and very similar to platinum in color, durability and hardness.

Although many traditional diamond engagement rings are beautiful, they really all look the same to me. I may be weird, but most of those traditional rings bore me. They just aren’t for me. It is quite refreshing, in my opinion, that your website offers engagement or commitment rings that are more affordable and original. I love the idea of engagement rings that don’t look like what an engagement ring is “supposed” to look like. I feel like a lot of pressure can get put onto couples to buy a diamond engagement ring, or an expensive engagement ring. Buying a diamond ring or an expensive ring seems to be expected, and it’s not necessarily as easy as one would think to stray from the norm. Websites like turtleloveco are great, because they remind us that it’s completely okay and cool to have a ring that doesn’t fit our society’s engagement ring archetype.

Thanks-

Hillary

Cool Rings in Real Life: Little Miss Shadow Dozier’s gorgeous ring - Again!

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joliesring

Jolie at Little Miss Shadow Dozier, whose ring has been admired by many, agreed to share a bit about herself and her gorgeous engagement and wedding rings.

My conclusion: she’s awesome. I think you’ll agree.

What’s your favorite color? That’s a tough call and changes a bit with the seasons and my mood. Right now probably Aegean Blue.

A fond memory? Having been married just this past year my fondest memory is of starting our new life together surrounded by all our family and friends. The wedding was beautiful and being with everyone dancing and laughing at the reception made it a moment I’ll never forget.

Childhood ambition? To be a paleontologist (yup…like Ross on Friends). I loved dinosaurs and planned on becoming a paleontologist up until middle school when I decided that while I loved dinosaurs, I didn’t really care for science.

Current ambition? I love what I do! If I wasn’t working at The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society I’d probably either teach or own a coffee/craft/used book store. I love cooking and crafting!

What would you do if you had a million dollars? Oh if I had a million dollars I would donate/tithe a lot of it. I’d invest some and for the rest I’d maybe go out on a limb and open up a little shop of my own that my husband and I could run. Something like a coffee shop/craft/used book store. Oh and take our families on some really fun vacation!

Who is your partner? My husband Beau is my knight in shining armor…literally. From the moment that we met there was a special connection and as if we needed further proof that we were meant to be about a month or two after he proposed he saved my life when I was the victim of a mugging outside our home. He’s a strong Christian man who loves me for me and has a heart of gold. I fall more in love with him with each passing day!

What do you think about your rings? I think our rings perfectly match our relationship. The engagement ring is timeless while still being wonderfully unique. It’s a ring that I will pass on to our children and they’ll pass on to their children. It’s an heirloom piece in it’s first generation. It came from a jewelry store here in our town but it’s so unique that I like to pretend we found it nestled in some cozy antique shop.

What are you passionate about? Life in general! I love God, my family and friends, cooking, crafting, hiking, running, reading, laughing and enjoying each moment as it comes!

Pets? One little pup named Frankie aka Frank or Frank-monster.

Favorite book? I have lots of favorites. My all-time favorite book is probably either “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” or “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”. I know those are considered children’s literature but there is really no better way to escape reality than by going back to your childhood favorites.

Pet peeve? I don’t like when people try to be annoying. Being annoying by accident is fine, it’s not your fault if you’re annoying by accident. Being annoying on purpose…watch out!

Favorite beverage? Really any bottled soft drink, but especially an ice-cold coca-cola from those cute mini bottles.

Sweetest indulgence? Yum…brownie sundaes!

If you could be any animal, what would you be? Either some sort of bird or a dolphin. I’ve never been good at gymnastics and both dolphins and birds have amazing acrobatic skills.

Readers: we’d love to profile you and your awesome engagement and/or wedding rings.

Please email turtleloveco at gmail dot com.

Cool Rings in Real Life: Little Miss Shadow Dozier’s Ring

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Little Miss Shadow Dozier, whose blog is here, recently wrote about her sapphire engagement ring (and about Turtle Love Committee).

She writes: “I’m so happy that Beau didn’t go the ‘what an engagement ring should look like’ route, it just wouldn’t have been me, it wouldn’t have been us!” Hooray for Little Miss Shadow Dozier and her partner!

Do you have an unusual engagement ring that you’d like to share? Email helpfulturtle at turtleloveco dot com! We’d love to profile you here!

Cool Rings in Real Life: Adrianne, The Head Turtle

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This post marks the beginning of a project profiling people with unique engagement rings, wedding bands, or other rings celebrating commitment. The goal of this series isn’t to judge the artistic merit of particular pieces of jewelry, but rather to validate and celebrate the decision to make a lifetime commitment without getting sucked into the hype of wearing a huge diamond ring. Since I’ll be trying to convince people to participate as “profilees,” it’s only fair that I should go first. Here goes:

Childhood ambition? Concert violinist.

What do you do for work? I own Turtle Love Committee, an online jeweler focused exclusively on cool engagement rings and wedding bands.

What would you do if you had a million dollars? Go on vacation. Then I’d come back home and keep running TLC. Repeat.

How many pets do you have? One: a snake named Monty. Well okay - he’s (a) a step-pet, and (b) actually a she. Whatever.

Favorite joke? Pete and Repeat went out in a boat. Pete fell out. Who was left?

Favorite book? Possession, by A.S. Byatt. But the book that I’ve read most recently is The Cat in the Hat, by Dr. Seuss.

Favorite beverage? Horchata Valenciana.

What did you do for fun today? Yoga on the back porch.

If you could be any animal, what would it be? A manatee.

What does your wedding/engagement/commitment ring look like? It’s a plain gold band from Sears, about 4mm wide. It cost around $50 (10 years ago). I don’t have an engagement ring.

What do you think about your ring? I love it - I don’t have to worry about losing it or comparing it to anyone else’s. Also, I feel like it gives me proletarian street cred.