major blingage

So I FINALLY have an engagement ring. Calloo! Callay! While I've been pretty online-chatty about the engagement, in person the only people who know are my Facebook friends and family because the moment you mention your engagement to a passive third-party, suddenly they're all straining their necks to take a glance at your left hand. And then I'm all "Well, I don't have a ring *yet*" which sounds like "Yeah, so my boyfriend mentioned possibly getting married and is just a browbeat away from caving in," when in reality I did get a real proposal, just not one accompanied with bling. So here it is! Set in platinum, and those two green thingies are peridot. There's also scrollwork (hard to see even in person) shaped like a stretched figure eight with a little spiral worked in. I like it!



Dano designed my ring and it's just lovely. Originally I wanted to avoid diamonds altogether because I think they're a rip-off. Then tradition got the best of me, and we briefly considered a synthesized diamond because they're about 1/3 the price of a natural one and we could afford a much nicer quality than otherwise, but even that was so expensive. Couple this with the fact that I'm not really a bling girl anyway, and I'd rather have a house than a $20k engagement ring. It'd be less weird paired with my gaudy costume jewelry. At the same time, I don't know that I could really bring myself to get a cubic zirconia because it loses its lustre after not too long and feels . . . apologetic.

So Dan found Sachs Jewelers in Shrewsbury who recommended Moissanite. Moissanite is a mineral similar to diamond, originally found in meteorites, but due to their extreme rarity in nature (usually as inclusions in diamonds and other stones) are now synthesized. The cool thing is that they are really not all that different from a diamond. On the hardness scale a diamond is at 10 and Moissanite is 8.5-9.25--similar enough to be sought after for industrial uses. So hardness is all well and good, but doesn't really affect the way my jewelry looks, right?



WELL, Moissanite also weighs in on the visual front. Its refractive index (a measure of "flashes" or how many times it sparkles) is about 10% higher (diamond = 2.417, moissanite ~ 2.670) so for every ten sparkles a diamond gets, my stone gets one more. What's SUPER cool, though is that the dispersion (a measure of how wide the color spectrum is bent by the stone) is more than twice that of a diamond (diamond = .044, moissanite = .104), so my stone throws off more than twice the color. So for all intents and purposes, it's a prettier stone! And unlike cubic zirconia, it'll last forever, just like a regular diamond.

Because it's synthesized, the clarity is excellent and there are no visible inclusions in the stone. The only limitation is that the stone itself is slightly off-white, though not visible in most light and probably not any more than ideal-cut diamonds might be anyway. I found information on this subject here.

Oh, did I mention that they're about a tenth of the price? Finally, it seems, that thrift gene has shone its head.

Super cool tidbit that came my way via my matron of honor.

DID YOU KNOW?

In the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, one can apply for a One Day Marriage Designation in lieu of a justice of the peace? It's true! You can have anyone you know officiate the ceremony. It costs $25 and requires a "letter of reference attesting to the applicant's high standard of character." Psh, yeah, right, like we know anybody ANYONE would attest to good character. Additional information kindly provided gratis by mass.gov

So this is SO super cool that I really can't pass it up, but unfortunately I don't have any good ideas on a candidate. I would prefer a family member, but I don't want someone from my wedding party, or parents or grandparents. And my attitude toward the family members I'm left with really highlights how my relationship with my extended family is awkward at best (and depraved at worst), though we're probably just average in terms of wild family craziness.

I have this cousin who lives nearby with whom I'm friendly, but we're still not bestest buds or anything, we just hang out occasionally. I have a few other cousins, but nobody really cut out for that kind of thing. My mom recommended considering my godparents, but my uncle is divorced from the family and I haven't seen him since his second wife's funeral, and my aunt has a . . . tumultuous history with my mom, though in her older age she's very nice and there haven't been any incidents in years.

I'll have to see if Groom has anyone in mind in his family. Worst case we can just find a good mutual friend, though those people tend to be the (small) wedding party. Too bad we don't know any comedians or clown school graduates.