Diamonds in the Library

A brief hiatus.

March 9, 2015

Good morning, my darlings!

Sometimes it gets a little overwhelming to prepare three blog posts a week while also working full time, but I always manage it. I’m not complaining – I love this blog, and it’s always worth the time it takes.

However, with the addition of wedding planning on top of day job + blog, it’s gotten harder to balance everything. I’m in the wedding home stretch now (less than three months!!!) and I need to take a little bit of extra time this week to double-check addresses, compare color swatches, and order tassel garlands.

Well, and I also to make sure I have Friday free to celebrate my birthday – very important business.

I’ll be back next week with pretties galore. Have a lovely week, my dears.

xoxo,
Becky

Treat yourself: standout silver under $300.

March 6, 2015

Yellow gold is such a wonderful metal: warm, buttery, sunny against the skin. But you know what else is great? Good old sterling silver. It’s bright, it’s fresh, and it can shine like nobody’s business.

Today’s edition of Treat Yourself is all about stunning silver under $300.

Katherine Jetter silver River Fern ring with amethyst or tsavorite garnet in rhodium plated sterling silver ($300). At Stone and Strand.

Jane Diaz Hexagon Filigree Amulet Necklace in sterling silver ($1 10).

Workhorse jewelry Sloane dagger earrings in turquoise and silver ($154).

All images and info in this post is thanks to the seller of each individual item. Please see descriptions above for links to original listings. This post contains affiliate links.

Pairing Books and Bling (a Book Riot cross-post).

March 4, 2015

Good morning, darlings!

I thought it was time about for another Book Riot cross-post. This piece originally ran on Book Riot on January 26th, 2015.

It is my personal opinion that books and jewelry have a lot in common: they’re both art forms that take small, separate elements and combine them into something new with beauty and meaning.

They are also pretty much tied for my All Time Favorite Inanimate Objects. In fact, I spend so much time looking at and thinking about one or the other that I inevitably start to draw connections between particular books and pieces of jewelry.

Here are a few books and bling pairings that I thought worked especially well.

Victorian cuff bracelet with “Dinna forget” inscription: Outlander by by Diana Gabaldon.

I’m going to tell you right up front that this glorious gold, pearl, diamond, and turquoise cuff is a historically inaccurate choice for Outlander. It’s Victorian, so it’s not from Claire’s or Jamie’s native century. But the inscription on the back, with its Jamie-esque diction and heartfelt “Dinna Forget” message, is just so perfect that I couldn’t resist it.

Anthony Lent’s Vulcana earrings in 18k gold with diamonds: The Child Eater by Rachel Pollack.

If you’ve read The Child Eater, I don’t need to explain this choice to you. These are by Anthony Lent, a gifted and charismatic sculptor-turned-jeweler with imaginative vision. This pair of luminous golden faces with diamond eyes has such an eerie presence that it isn’t hard to picture them dispensing questionable advice to aspiring wizards.

Here’s a closer look:

You see my point? I’ve read far too much fantasy not to be extremely suspicious of this earring. It obviously has at least one or two supernatural powers.