Jewerly Mission Success

Sorry for the marathon ring posts, but that's what I've been on my mind this week. I went to try on some wedding bands. It started off on the wrong foot, I was deflated that there wasn't anything remotely like the rings I had liked online at the store. I had the same sinking feeling I got walking into the racks at David's Bridal. They were very nice, but I didn't feel like they understood what I wanted.

They did show me one "contour band" (the kind with the dip in it to accommodate the stone on the engagement ring) that I liked. When I say I liked, I mean didn't dislike as mush as the others.

It was very similar to the band part of this set. What they suggested was to "special order" (that's me the special order bride) just the band, but to get two. That way I could surround my engagement ring with them and my emerald would still be the star of the show.

I shuffled next door pretty sure the first place had been a waste of my time. I started looking at emerald rings in the second store. There were about 5 to choice from and most were yellow gold anyway. I don't care for yellow gold I never have, but jewelers love to set emeralds (my favorite stone, duh) in it. They only had one I was interested in.

It was like this one only it had diamonds and emeralds. Kind of cool, definitely different and it had emeralds, but I was still only lukewarm here. On the plus side, I did find an amazing (and reasonably priced) necklace to go with my wedding dress. You see, I start out saying an all diamond band and pearls with my dress and it all turns to emeralds. Which is fine with me because I don't know how many occasions I'll have for pearls, but I know I'll wear this beautiful necklace again.

I left there not empty handed, but a little down trodden about the wedding ring situation. I was going to exit the mall entirely when I spotted the store where Mike's cousin and his bride had recently purchased theirs. One last look, what could it hurt I thought. They had an even smaller emerald selection than the second store. However, the sales lady had really fun eye shadow on and didn't bat an eyelash at odd ring requests. When I walked over to the case of diamond bands I saw it before I even came to a full stop. The one.

It's like the one above, but prettier and not an eternity band. Low and behold trying them on convinced me I don't actually care for the stones all the way around. I also learned how hard it is to match a custom engagement ring to any band. I also learned that there are levels of custom in the jewelry world. Most of them want to swap stones in an existing ring or something like that. To start from a sketch, make a mold than a setting and select stones isn't a request they seem to get a lot. Also, as expected it's not in the budget. Which doesn't matter because the ring that stopped me in my tracks and looked good with my engagement ring is well under my ring budget. I would have put a deposit down today, but Mike would've freaked out. Yay! I really love it and since I'm not doing an eternity band I can get it engraved! Squeal!

PS: Why is nothing on the jewelry store's websites in the store? Worse, why could I not find any of the rings I looked at today on their websites? Sigh...