Hi Leslie, how are you?

We've only been married a year and I still have the same diamond. It's a quarter carat set in 14K white gold - so it does have some scratching but it's minimal. 10K gold, for example, is much softer than 14K and up, so it will show its wear more.

I would like to "move up" to a larger stone someday when we can afford it. of course my MIL also went shopping with my DH and I think influenced him to spend only X amount of dollars. he spent $500 and got a nice estate piece. However, after nearly 7 years together, I was hoping for something bigger! LOL My dream ring was a 1 carat princess cut stone set in platinum. Oh well. Especially since my MIL, the "influencer," "had nothing when they first got married" (you know, the story along the lines of "we had to walk four miles in the snow in our barefeet to get to school") and yet has a 3/4 diamond set in platinum! Of course, in the sixties, platinum was not as common and less expensive than it is now. I read that, actually, Elvis Presley introduced a comeback in platinum when he married Priscilla, who had a platinum ring. Now it's outrageously expensive - but until then had only been used for scientific things, like conductors and such. And now people can get titanium rings, which are VERY expensive. I think they look ugly. And of course my MIL received a 2 carat ring (yes, you read me right!) for their 30th or something or other - must be nice. *sigh*

My mother just got a new setting after 20+ years of marriage. It's a nice stone, on all outward appearances, but upon further examination it has a huge crack in it, I believe. I almost feel bad for her, because I think she deserves the best! So when looking for a diamond, you would be wise to find the best diamond for your money, rather than size. That's what my husband did, so I guess I have to hand it to him. The stone is small, but perfect quality (cut) with no flaws and near colorless. Which is good!

I also have my great grandmother's diamond that I received on my wedding day. As her only living great grand at the time she passed away, it was willed to me when I was ten years old. I used to try it on from time to time when I was a kid (cringe!) and think princess thoughts about wearing diamonds and being married some day LOL but now that I own it I never wear it, simply because I'm afraid the stone is unstable. It's a blue diamond, which are worth more, I guess, and is an old mine cut, which means the diamond is raised on the top and not flat like traditional, modern stones.

So, I'm sure this has been WAY more info than you needed! LOL

I use my engagement ring as my band as well. It is a 1 1/4 marquise cut diamond surrounded by 9 channel set diamonds on each side. I just love it. I wouldn't think of changing it. We have been married for 6 years and it still looks like new.

Tina

Actually, the higher the number, the softer the ring. The reasoning behind that is that the lower the number is the smaller amount of gold is used for the ring or piece of jewelry. So the piece also has other things in it to make it and it will make it stronger. My ring is 14k gold but it's in horrible shape. White gold is stronger and also this setting is also a wider band than what I have had. My mother has been in the jewerly business for about 8+ years now and I've learned a lot about it!

I guess I'm not feeling so bad about changing the ring now because like I said, my MIL paid for it so my fiance' couldn't really probably get what he would have liked to. He said about looking at different cuts but anything other than the normal round cut costs more and he wanted me to have a larger diamond instead of this fancy cut one that was really tiny for the same price. My Mom said that to me right away and said it was a beautiful ring. Mine is a 1/4 carat round stone, very plain but I'm not into too fancy of jewelry since I'm a SAHM. Anyway I asked him a million times about doing this and how he felt and he gave me the total go ahead. This way it will be more of our ring than it was, I guess. I didn't get a whole new ring and didn't replace the diamond so it's still part of what he picked for me and the important part of the ring. That band really costs nothing to make. It will also have some sentimental value because the band I'm using is the one my father gave my mother years ago. It was also a cheaper way to do something different to my ring, have it changed over to fit the type of jewerly I wear and also made it stronger and worth more.

~Leslie~

The higher the number, the more gold there is in it. So 10K would have the least amount of gold and most amount of other alloys.

Exactly. I remember my mother telling me about this when she bought a pair of 24k gold earrings. They were these teardrop things hanging from the ear and she said that you had to be careful with them because they could end up smashed or dented or whatever. I remember always looking at them and imagining squeezing them and what would happen. I later found out when she lost another 24K gold hoop in the parking lot at the store and when they found it, it was flat! LOL

I got a diamond & saphire ring for my engagement ring. It was replaced with a plain band when we married & I got an 10 diamond anniversary band when we had been married 10 years. I wear the engagement ring when I dress up on my right hand & the diamond band on my left hand. The plain one I wear for every day.

Carlotta, that is what most people in Europe do. The engagement ring is typically used as a special piece of jewelry rather than worn everyday like most American women do. And in some parts of Europe, the wedding ring is worn on the right hand instead of the left. Many of my husband's Dutch relatives do this.

FOr my wedding reception I had little "wedding trivia" cards on all the tables so I had to do some research on this whole thing - very interesting!

Yes I received an engagement ring. However, after several years of marriage my diamond fell out of it one day while I was cleaning. DH & I never found the diamond. About 4 yrs. ago my DH went out and bought me a new diamond engagement ring and matching wedding band.

DH had his cherished Howdy Doody spoon from when he was a kid made into a ring for me and presented it to me when he proposed. I still have it and wear it often, but not every day. Obviously, it doesn't match my wedding ring.

Dave knew better than to try to buy me jewelry on his own (I'm very picky), so we went shopping together for my estate engagement ring. It's very old-fashioned, like 1920s or 1930s, lots of filigree (sp?), a nice clear diamond with an interesting cut that I have no idea what it is but it sparkles beautifully, and 2 triangle sapphires on the sides all in white gold. The band broke and the sapphires have been replaced a few times due to falling out, but all in all the same piece, which I would never change. Our wedding bands are plain white gold. It's been 10 years so far, and both the ring and the husband are keepers.

When you're cleaning you are better off to remove your rings. My mother just told me that things like bleach will wear down the prongs over time. Cleaners are often the reasons why people loose their stones.

My husband and I purchased my wedding set together. The engagment ring was to be welding with the wedding ring to make one piece. I have exactly what I want. I will never replace it. Even when the jeweler screwed up the welding job, I refused a new ring. I took the ring I had been wearing for over a year and the wedding band piece to another jeweler who fixed the welding in 24 hours for me. The ring has a total weight of .5 carats, and was very expensive because of the quality and especially because of the exquist setting. My husband had planned to spend more on me, but he wanted me to have what I wanted. It turned out to be his favorite as well. I will only be married once and one wedding ring is all I will ever own. I do not understand how woman could and do change their wedding rings.

Also, I read that you should avoid wearing your rings in swimming pools, because the chlorine will harm the color of the diamond. I just threw out a guide on how to care for jewelry that I tore from a magazine when I got my ring - I should have saved it!

Alice,
In our case I guess I've always wanted my ring to match my other jewelry. I almost NEVER wear yellow gold and I really don't like how it looks. My fiance' knew I didn't wear yellow gold but things like that mean absoulty nothing to his mother...she's a wash your hair and go, no make-up, jeans and t-shirt kind of person. I also realized that ring meant absoultly nothing to my fiance' when we had our problems. To him, it was just a piece of jewerly. I think we needed a fresh start and I felt in a way the ring was jinxed and always would be. At least now my fiance' is talking more seriously about getting married and things. Before it was a bad word.

Phyllis,
Actually you shouldn't wear any jewerly in cholrine. It will tarnish silver and sometimes gold and white gold and ruin the stones. It's very harsh to most anything like that. I've always taken my jewerly out before I go swimming. Mostly out of fear of losing it but also because it's harmful to the piece.

~Leslie~

Leslie,
I don't understand having a ring changed, normally. But I am not saying you're wrong. In fact, I can completely see why you did what you did. (Actually, I meantioned this thread to my huisband and said to him something like..."does her fiancee really know her if she wears silver and he gets her a gold ring?" I didn't realise that you're MIL had picked it out too.) And besides...it's not the ring you're married to him, so in my thinking it's not some weird thing to change.
I completely admit to having some weird ideas.(Like if you love your husband, why would anyone ever consider changing their ring. But there are also people who don't believe in marriage, though they are partners in life, and I see nothing wrong with that.)
I'm glad you're getting the ring you'll be wearing a very long time to be what you want. And don't mind weirdos like me. :) We don't mean anything rude, at least I don't.
And who knows...I might have felt differently if the ring I got was some monstrosity...or anything picked out by my MIL! I think you're right to have what is right for you and your husband to be, not what your MIL picked out.
And as a side note...I don't care for mixing gold and silver jewelry either. :)

Alice,
I hope you didn't think I was being rude. In most cases I don't understand why people change their rings or get new ones either. I even thought that for a long time about my ring but things changed.

I do have to say that to my fiance' and his mother the color of jewelry does not mean a thing. They think it's all expensive and he's learning how wrong that is. It's cheaper to buy silver and I can have a nice birthstone ring for very little money if it's in silver because I have a cheap birthstone~a garnet. It's stuff she bred into him and I'm teaching him differently. She doesn't like it much but she doesn't like anything or anyone who goes against her thinking. I guess though he didn't want a totally "plain Jane" like his mother or he would be with one.

~Leslie~

Leslie,
No, I certainly didn't think you were rude. I was afraid I came off rude, which wasn't my intention. I really just meant to express that I wouldn't consider changing my ring.

My best friend bought herself a platinum "promise ring" for herself, which she has "up-graded" to one with a little larger stones. She also bought her imprisioned boyfriend a platinum ring which is lost. Her idea is to "up-grade" from promise ring to larger promise ring to possibly wedding ring some day to larger wedding ring someday. For her, it's a huge waste of money. And I don't understand her need for this jewelry to show they are a couple, and yet it means so little when it comes to trading-up for the next ring. That is what I find weird. Especially since with every up-grade she's basically giving away her old ring and just buying a whole new one.

I guess your husband should be glad that you like silver, which is less expensive and just as pretty as platinum.

I'm glad that youre happy together and with your ring. :)

Now, just don't mind your MIL, it seems so rare that they agree with their DIL. I'm lucky, I suppose, that mine has little interest in us. Infact, she preferred to show off her own ring when we told her we were engaged, rather than take more than a glance at mine. At least she's not trying to make decisions for us.

My husband and I picked out our rings together. I did get an engagement ring first and then the matching wedding ring.
After a few years of marriage, my husband wanted to buy me a bigger diamond. Like a fool, I listened to him and let him do it. I don't know why I let him do that. We traded my original rings in and got a different ring. He has bought me a couple of others since then, and luckily I still have them all... no more trades. He has been saving for about 13 years to buy me a bigger diamond, but now I really don't care to have a bigger one. I guess when you get older your priorities change. Anyway, I have been just sick for years that I let my original ring go like that. That was so special. I wonder where it is. On our 30th anniversary which is August 12, we are getting our vows renewed. He hasn't worn his ring for years, because shortly after we were married, he was playing basketball and jammed his finger and his knuckle got bigger and the ring wouldn't fit. I will probably buy him a new ring for our vow renewal.
I had a beautiful platinum square diamond ring from his grandmother and I buried it with my 19 year old daughter. She is my only daughter and it would have been hers someday, anyway. I also buried another very special ring with her. I never have been real materialistic and after she left us, nothing material mattered. I could have thrown away everything I owned.
Visit: www.angelfire.com/la2/OurAngel/ChristinCosby.html
Lu from Louisiana

Alice,
My mother tells me stories all the time of people trading up. Most of the jewelry stores offer that option these days and I think it's a horrible thing! Maybe if say you got a divorce and decided to trade that diamond in on another one or something it wouldn't be so bad but I can't imagine. Even then it's kind of cruel or a weird thing. Some people will continue to trade for years and years and years and still never be satisfied. It has me thinking now when I see ladies out in public with this huge rock on their hand. I wonder if their husband's really picked it in the beginning and could afford that or if someone did some trading.

My SIL's are probably some of the greatest at doing this stuff. My one SIL has been married for 8 years now and is on her 4th set of rings! The first set was simple, I was told, because they planned the wedding quikly and didn't have a lot of money. That set, SIL got mad and took off and threw out the window of the moving car. The second set, I guess was a little bigger but she misplaced them somewhere. Then about 3 years ago she got a huge one piece wrap thing. A few months ago she claimed the diamond fell out and she was having the ring fixed. When we saw her again, she had a huge platinum engagement ring and wedding band. Things seem to mean nothing to her and yet she was worried about getting rid of this crappy sectional couch they had for years because of it's sentimental value to her! LOL The other SIL got married 2 years ago. The day after her wedding she was saying about getting a wrap for her diamond for like their 5th wedding anniversary and later that day they were at the jewelry store buying one. Why even buy the dang bands and waste your money?

I remember years ago my mother wanted these diamond hoops so badly. It was my step father and her anniversary and they didn't have the money for the earrings. So my brother was about 15 and I was 18 and we told our step father to take the money out of our savings accounts. The earrings were on sale and with Mom's discount from working there, they were a little over a $100 so it wasn't that bad to split costs for us. I believe she had those earrings less than a year and she traded them up for the larger size! My brother didn't say much but I got on her case. I told her it was rude to do that with our gift. She wanted those earrings and we paid for them out of the kindness of her heart and they meant so much to her that she replaced them! I know she's traded a lot of her jewelry that my step father at the time bought her because she's re-married and didn't want to still have the memories but still some things you have to just get over and appreciate what you
have.

we found an antique ring but i was always taking it off so the filigree-work wouldn't get filthy (especially when gardening), plus i was worried about it wearing even thinner against my wedding band -- it was already thin on one side when we bought it, so now it sits in my jewelry box: 1) waiting for special occasions to be worn and i wear it on my finger first because it's also too big now and would fall off otherwise; and 2) waiting for DH to make me another titanium band (i lost the first one) because it looks really cool with the 18k white gold...and then i'll get it resized down ;o)

Oh my! Leslie, your story about your sister in law is exactly what I don't understand! Maybe some people just aren't ever satisfied, which makes me wonder about other aspects of their life if they can't settle on a ring.

My Mom has the same wedding ring from 33 years ago when they first got married. I can't remember it ever looking like anything but a gold band. They tell me it was originally gold with silver in little engravings. It sounded beautiful. My Mom can't wear it now because it's too thin to be sized any larger, and I think in this case my Dad should get an anniversary ring for her. (All she wears is a cheap gold colored band, and something special like that would mean a lot to her) But he says if he could find the same design as the original ring he would.

We were married 7 years ago and he bought me an engagement ring. I thought it was great, then when we went to get bands I had my grandmothers diamonds put on both bands. Now the only problem is that I have put on about 7 years of marriage weight and I don't think I can get it off so I guess I will have to like it. lol

When my DH and I married we were young and couldn't really afford a expensive ring. I am not that much into jewerly so it didn't matter. But the ring kept breaking, I would have it welded, then a year later it would break again.
After we were married 2 years, my grandmother passed away and left me a beautiful diamond ring that I really wanted to wear but it wouldn't fit any finger but my left one. I put my original ring up for my DD and replaced it with grandmother's ring. I wear two smaller gold bands on each side of it. I did lose one of the orginal bands that DH bought but he replaced it the same year on our anniversary.

littlebit

Well, I got my ring back the other day. It's so nice! I think it looks more expensive and the diamond shines better with the white gold, course I'm also more partial to silver and it's probably just an opinion of mine. My diamond also had a few deposits in it (see another thing my MIL had no care in the world about and didn't tell my fiance' to watch for) that were very noticeable with the yellow gold but they seem to blend in now.

I'm sure the family will all be talking about how my fiance' must have went out and blew our money on a new diamond ring for me. I only told his step mom what I was doing so far. I'll be the talk of the family and little will they know it's my same old diamond in my mother's old setting! It just looks like a whole new ring.

~Leslie~

I am so glad that my grandmother kept her engagement ring. After being married for more than 60 years, my grandfather passed away. And my grandmother recently gave me a pretty little necklace with a tiny little diamond in it. She had taken the diamond from her engagement ring and had it reset in a necklace many years ago. This is the most meaningful and most sentimental gift I have ever received. So while I can understand upgrading over the years to a bigger and prettier diamond as a couple can afford it, I can't tell how how much that first little diamond might mean to someone in the family many years down the road.

I don't have an engagement ring. Never wanted one. I felt that if I'm supposed to be in an egalitarian marriage, then either both of us should have engagement rings or none of us should. Since I'm cheap and it doesn't really matter to me anyway, we just skipped the engagement ring. We lived together for a decade or so anyway, so there really wasn't any official engagement. DH and I got nice matching wedding bands, though - three different colors of gold woven in a braid.

Besides, I don't really like my hands much anyway, so why call more attention to them?

DH and picked the ring out together, after we decided to get married (no suprises after 4 years). I sort of let him know in advance that I didn't want to be surprised since I knew we had different tastes. I would have been happy to use my mother's ring, but DH wanted our "own" beginning, just as well, mom and dad divorced! We had an artist in Maine make the ring after seeing her design in a window, it is pretty unique so I used it as my wedding ring too, since a band would look weird with it, now its the only ring I have and I wear it everyday, I do take it off swimming and cleaning.

My husband bought me an antique diamond ring as an engagement ring, and it is very unique so I never wanted to have anything added to it for a wedding band. That is what I wear and I can't imagine anything else...I fell in love with it the second I saw it.

Ironically though... we were on "vacation" when we got married in the Smokey mountians. I am normally a very particular eater and I don't eat much junk food...but on this trip we ate so much junk, chips and soda and chocolate, that I swelled up so I took my ring off. When the day came for our ceremony, I couldn't get my ring back on, so we went in to Gatlinburg and bought a 10 dollar silver plated band. My daughter was playing with it the other day...it still has some sentimental value, although I removed it as soon as my swelling went down. :)

I think if a woman really wants a diamond, that's great -- let her have a diamond. For myself however, I don't want one. And, I think I became most turned off to the idea when I heard co-workers talking about how they would not marry the men in their lives unless they "got a rock [read: very expensive] on their finger" One woman even took back her original ring (just a couple of days after getting it) and had her husband exchange it for something larger.

What does that symbolize?

Then, to add fuel to the fire, a local jeweler keeps airing commercials that say: when your wife tells you "no, I don't want a diamond, deep down, she really wants a diamond"

I've told my BF: if you must buy me something, then buy me something cool that I can use, like a nail gun 'cause I'd rather put that 2 months of salary into the 401k so we can retire 5 years earlier.

I'm weird, I guess - I rarely wear my ring.

DH and I were "shacking up" at the time, and one day I told him in no uncertain terms that if I was to keep living with him, I ought to at least have an engagement ring, for heaven's sake. He agreed. We were poor folks, and I had a credit card, so we shopped and put my engagement ring on my credit card. Romantic, huh? We bought the kind that fit into the wedding ring, which we bought at the same time, but he kept that in a box in his dresser. The engagement ring had one "big" diamond and one "small" diamond, and the wedding ring had the other "small" diamond to mirror the engagement ring. They're not worth more than $200 all together, but who cares? I'm not a materialistic person. We've got diamonds and rings.

About 2 years later, we had a modest, but very nice wedding. I got the two rings soldered together. We bought a plain gold band for him. He wears his every day, and after these 9 years, he can't take it off without a lot of effort and hasn't really tried. I got out of the habit of wearing mine during my 1st pregnancy when my hands swelled. I bought a plain gold band to wear instead, and would wear it as a wedding ring now (it'd have to be re-sized) but he says no, it's not our wedding ring. I find the diamond stuff gets in the way, and I only wear it when I go out somewhere special or care that people see that ring on my finger.

As I said, I'm not a materialistic person. We could afford to get bigger diamonds now, I guess, but who cares? Why spend all that money on a freakin' rock?