Archive for November, 2008

Dan: What is unique jewelry?  Unique jewelry, in terms of my definition, is not something that is cranked through a factory.  Jewelry should not be an item that is made in dozens at one point in time on a production line.  Jewelry is unique when it is handcrafted artisan jewelry.  When you know that your jewelry is made by experienced hands who have a passion for what they’re doing, you know that you are receiving a quality product.

Either for yourself or for the hectic and fast approaching holiday season, a unique silverhandcrafted bracelet will be hot on the list.  However, when you go holiday shopping where do you go?  Do you go to the mall or perhaps a department store?  I guarantee you that you will not find an unique jewelry in these locations, let alone anything that is unique.  You will only be able to find great items such as silver sodalite jewelry online or at a personalized store.  Go from the heart and find something GREAT, UNIQUE, and WORTHWHILE for someone this holiday season.  You only have one shot a year to make an impression, this is your year.

Grace: In addition to being a unique piece of jewelry, this sterling silver sodalite bracelet is also extremely versatile and wearable.  Unique jewelry doesn’t always mean it has to be a stand-out piece that can only be worn once in a while and by itself.  I love jewelry that has multiple purposes and can be worn for any occasion.  Why would you buy a shirt that can only be worn at a certain event and with a certain outfit?  Same goes for jewelry.  With very simple and classic details, this bracelet can be worn at any time, but it’s also something that not everyone will have.  In short, it’s a great gift!

Dan: First semester of my sophomore year of college I took a class officially titled as, “ECON302 Banking and Monetary Policy.” That class ended up becoming the bread and butter of my life as it’s about all I do in college now.  However, my professor, when getting an exam back or when recognizing a great group effort at an attempt to analyze economic phenomena, such as the Japanese bond crisis or when interest rates in the United States were around 15%, she would hand out a special gift…thousands upon thousands of dollars of shredded money!

YOU’RE RICH!  Not really since its been destroyed, but various Federal Reserva Banks sell pretty packages of currency that has been taken out of circulation due to wear and tear.  Even though you wish you could glue it all back together again, it is a really neat gift idea.  You can use it for educational purposes, when teaching the true value of money.  It’s not the paper composite it’s printed out, but the value you can get in exchange for it.

Grace: This is a very unique gift idea, because at the heart of it, the gift is not so much about a physical object, but more about an important life lesson.  Lots of people, especially those from the younger generation, don’t understand the value of money, and then when they go off on their own, continue to practice bad spending and saving habits.  Although this might not seem to be the coolest gift ever, it’s certainly the most helpful in the long run.

Grace: In my never-ending quest to find new, unique earrings, I came across these beautiful, handcarved earrings.  They are incredibly unique; I’ve never seen anything like them before!  They are made from mate or carved gourd, an ancient South American tradition in which a gourd is hand carved with a hot tool (in the past it was a burning ember).  Since these earrings are hand carved, no two are exactly the same, even within a pair.  Not only is the center of these earrings handmade, but the silver detailing is also made completely by hand.

If you know someone who loves all sorts of handmade silver jewelry, I would highly recommend these earrings  They would make an especially great gift for someone who is interested in organic jewelry.  These handmade carved gourd earrings are a great addition to any woman’s jewelry collection.

Dan: Wow those handmade carved gourd earrings are really astonishing.  I have never heard of such a unique and interesting material before.  Given the amount of time to make the material alone before turning it into jewelry, it must be really valuable.  It makes for an excellent and rare gift!

Grace: I’ve been talking a lot about personalized gifts or gifts that have special meaning to the recipient.  One way to do this, is to literally give a personalized gift, such as a necklace with the recipient’s name engraved on it.  However, personalized gifts are not limited to jewelry; I found this great site that has a vast array of items that can be personalized.

The most obvious choice for a personalized gift is a piece of jewelry, such as a necklace or a bracelet.  However, this site also offers personalized clocks, pens, music boxes, and water globes.  An engraved music box or water globe would be the perfect gift for a younger girl, while an engraved clock or flask would be great for an older man.  I love the range of products provided (they even personalize pillows and blankets), and there is also a great selection of fonts for you to choose from.  This is definitely a great go-to site for a special gift!

Dan: Great idea, I can’t believe we did spot this great website earlier.  Personalized gifts are really the way to go if you want to add some additional extra meaning.  Inside jokes, or something meaningful for that significant other can read add value to any gift!

Dan: I am a college student, and even though I try as hard as possible to stay clean, neat, and organized, sometimes it simply does not happen for me.  Between all of my classes going into full overdrive, missing classes for economics team due to traveling, and socializing; carpet soaks and dusting do not make it in the schedule.  So, to take care of the problem I continually gift myself a bottle of febreze.  It is a great cleaning gift idea because it does not just mask smells that are embedded in clothes, bedding, and carpet but it lifts them out.

Proctor and Gamble has many different products out of the febreze line (there are febreze candles, detergent, spray, aerosal, etc.) and all of them help to freshen up your life a bit.  There has been some controversy as to the overall “wellness” factor associated with febreze.  Containing many artificially inseminated ingredients it is not exactly “green”.  If that is something important to you than do not buy febreze.

Grace: This is definitely a great gift idea for a college student.  My room gets so messy and whenever I want to clean it, I have to ask around and literally beg people to borrow their cleaning materials.  In addition to febreze products, I would definitely recommend either a broom, small vacuum cleaner, or a swiffer, and probably some anti-bacterial wipes.  Even though I don’t spend much time in my room anymore, it’s still nice to come back to a clean living space!

Grace: My dad recently went through a photo revitalization craze, where he scanned all our old slides using a digital converter and retouched them using Photoshop.  I thought the project was a little ambitious because we have so many slides, but in the end, it was a great idea because now we have those pictures digitally saved and revitalized.

However, not all our photos are slides and I know my dad would loves to find a way to preserve them too.  I found this great Digital Photo Converter that scans photos and uploads them onto your computer at a very high quality.  Of course, it’s possible just to take your regular scanner and scan photos, but they won’t be at the same quality.  This is a great gift for photo enthusiast or just someone who is determined to preserve the past in a digital form.

Dan: Hey Grace!  I would have to say that last year my parents went through the same revilatization process that your Dad did.  It took them an extremely long time to scan onto the computer and then re-touch everything using a photo program.  In the end they were not very happy with the quality and ended up buying something extremely similar to your gift recommendation to do the job over.  I would also look into converting your old videos, because those will also get destroyed the longer you let the tapes stand.

Dan: What is spondyllus?  Spondyllus is a shell that is collected off of the shore of Peru and possesses a rare and beautiful look and texture.  Mostly a tint of purple, they can be polished so that they are shining bright.  Ancient Peruvian royalty used to have the most experienced divers in their nations go into the deep to find these spiny shells because of their great beauty.  This shell, when combined with silver, can create some really great sterling silver jewelry.

One website features spondyllus shell jewelry that is combined with many other beautiful accents such as silver, huayruro seeds, opal, etc to create the finest handmade necklaces and jewelry.  One specific example that I would like to highlight is called the Silver Cascade Necklace; its title comes from its beautiful silver work that cascades over a flawless and rich rectangle of purple spondyllus.  I gave this necklace as a gift over the summer and they really adored it as one of their favorite peices of jewelry.  If you are looking for Peruvian spondyllus shell than you are also looking for the most esquisite and beautiful jewelry on the market.  Go check out spondyllus jewelry for your next gift!  The HOLIDAYS are approaching!

Grace: I also gave this necklace as a gift to someone this summer (my mother, actually) and she absolutely loves it.  It looks beautiful on the website and in person, but to see it actually on someone is completely different.  I was especially struck by the purple color of the shell.  I like purple as much as the next person, but it’s not my favorite color and I always find it really hard to wear, but the pendant on this necklace is just the right size and the purple is just the right vibrancy to really make it pop.  I would highly recommend this gift!

Dan: When I am here at school I will admit that I become home sick a good amount of the time towards the end of the semester.  A gift that I would really love to receive would be a mutli-photo picture frame of everything that makes me who I am from home.  Without any pictures or anything it is really hard sometimes to keep my head up when I am becoming swamped (like right now).  From class to extra-curricular activities and figuring out my summer junior year is becoming a bit hard to handle sometimes.

I would love a really memorable gift.  So if you know someone who is located at a home away from home you should really consider giving a gift from the heart.  Not all gifts have to be the newest and latest game or jewelry, but simply somthing meaningful.

Grace: I also think a memorable gift is a great idea, but I especially love the wall collage Dan recommended.  Multiple picture frames scattered around can look messy and I always manage to knock them over and stuff them somewhere where no one can see them.  A wall collage is a great way to display pictures and will make your room looks more organized.  It’s also a great gift for a new homeowner, or even your family members.

Grace: Earlier this week, Dan wrote about a beautiful, handmade huayruro bracelet.  I was playing around on that same site and found a handcrafted necklace that matches the bracelet.  What I love about this necklace is the little pop of color from the huayruro seeds.  The red contrasts beautifully with the silver pendant and the black chord.  This necklace is perfect if you want to add just a little touch of interest and color to an otherwise uninteresting outfit.

This huayruro necklace is also an interesting combination of organic and inorganic materials.  The red huayruro seeds not only contrast in color to the silver pendant, but the organic nature of the seeds and the cotton chord compliments the coldness of the silver, which is a very unique and interesting combination.  Sometimes, I find silver to be too distant and harsh, but the exotic touch of the huayruro seeds is what makes this necklace interesting.

If you really enjoy contrasting and complimenting elements in jewelry, I would highly recommend looking around the rest of the site.  Their beautiful, silver artisan jewelry is a great gift for any occasion, and it’s a great alternative way of thinking of jewelry.

Dan: You are right that this necklace is both beautiful and exotic.  Made by human hands and not from a factory you can really see from the website how intricately made it is.  Those intricacies and how work will most definitely come out in real life when your family and friends see it.  Not to mention the good luck that comes from the huayruro seeds that you told me about Grace!

Grace: Growing up, whenever I wanted to bake it would be a huge hassle for my mom because I could never find anything and I would always make a mess pulling out all the decorations and such.  Also, by the time I finished baking, there would be too many cookies or cupcakes and we wouldn’t know what to do with the rest of them.  It would have made life so much easier on both me and my mom if I had my own baking kit.

I recently found this great cupcake baking kit that would be a great gift for a little girl.  It comes with a mini baking pan, 200 paper baking cups, an icing decorator with interchangeable tips, and four recipes.  I love that everything is miniture so there’s no worry that your child will be bouncing off the wall because she ate one, giant cupcake.  Whenever I would bake when I was little, I would always get so frustrated because my decorations would never look nice, but the icing decorator helps create very beautiful and professional (or as professional as little kids can get) looking cupcakes.  Every little child wants to act like an adult, and this baking kit will definitely make them feel grown up.

Dan: I think this is a great gift idea for a child Grace!  This really reminds me of an easy bake oven that my sister had when we were younger.  She would consistently make mini cakes and cookies and force me to eat them (boy I was in trouble if I didn’t).  This is a really quality gift that I completely endorse!