This Is A Custom Widget

This Sliding Bar can be switched on or off in theme options, and can take any widget you throw at it or even fill it with your custom HTML Code. Its perfect for grabbing the attention of your viewers. Choose between 1, 2, 3 or 4 columns, set the background color, widget divider color, activate transparency, a top border or fully disable it on desktop and mobile.

This Is A Custom Widget

This Sliding Bar can be switched on or off in theme options, and can take any widget you throw at it or even fill it with your custom HTML Code. Its perfect for grabbing the attention of your viewers. Choose between 1, 2, 3 or 4 columns, set the background color, widget divider color, activate transparency, a top border or fully disable it on desktop and mobile.

This Is A Custom Widget

This Sliding Bar can be switched on or off in theme options, and can take any widget you throw at it or even fill it with your custom HTML Code. Its perfect for grabbing the attention of your viewers. Choose between 1, 2, 3 or 4 columns, set the background color, widget divider color, activate transparency, a top border or fully disable it on desktop and mobile.

This Is A Custom Widget

This Sliding Bar can be switched on or off in theme options, and can take any widget you throw at it or even fill it with your custom HTML Code. Its perfect for grabbing the attention of your viewers. Choose between 1, 2, 3 or 4 columns, set the background color, widget divider color, activate transparency, a top border or fully disable it on desktop and mobile.

About souvenirsoflove

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So far souvenirsoflove has created 8 blog entries.
306, 2014

The best job – Dad or Grandpa?

By |June 3rd, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

Dad Keychain Grandpa Keychain

Dad vs. Grandfather … is there any question which is better?

We conducted an exhaustive survey and the results certainly won’t surprise you.

Grandad … Granddad … Grandpa won!

Let’s think real hard about this.  Why do we think this is the case?

Could it be study bias?  nah?

Being a grandfather is just a better gig.  Think about it.

You don’t have to worry about curfews, school meetings, PTA stuff, work stress, job stress, other sibling stress.   There’s no thinking about how you are going to pay for school supplies, school clothes, or even pay for school for that matter.   You can leave behind your worries about getting into drugs, the kid’s friends getting into drugs, or even doing drugs yourself.   Wht about making the house childproof, about adding teenage drivers to the insurance.  Who cares!  No worrying about changing diapers in the middle of the night, burping kids, throwing up toddlers, child.

No siree … that is all someone else’s job.

All you have to do is go fishing and know the best place for ice cream.

And man, being a Father is one tough job.  What nut would do that?

(Someone who wants to be a grandpa some day, that’s who)

And here’s a keychain to remind you of your exalted status as grandpa and the hard work you did to earn that.

2005, 2014

Ring Around the Collar Stays?

By |May 20th, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

Collar Stays - Father's Day

 

 

Ring around the collar?

How about some love ’round the collar?

Whatever to get a man for  Father’s Day?   It’s coming up …

How about collar stays?

Huh?

well, Dad does wear shirts with collars.  So, hmm, he must need collar stays.

Oh yeah, collar stays!

Wait, what is a collar stay?

It is a nifty invention that keeps the collar flat so it looks nice even if you take a nap under your desk or in your car (just kidding, of course…well, not really).

There is a small pocket on the underside of the collar that allows easy insertion of the collar stay which is usually made of metal or plastic.

Also known as a collar stiffener or collar sticks, bones or tabs.   These Collar Accessories are believed to be developed in England in the 19th century.  Way back then, before the invention,  of plastic the collar stay was made of bone, wood, sterling, mother of pearl or even whalebone.  fancy!

Back to Father’s Day and Collar Stays (kinda rhymes, kinda cute)

How ’bout getting Dad  custom collar stays so that lose who love him can be with him all day long (safely tucked under his collar).

Personalize the collar stays with Dad’s favorite missive (or yours).  Put your kids’ names.  Or your dog’s name.  Or even the cat’s.

Anyone who loves Dad.  (and wants him to have neat, perfect collars).

1804, 2014

Love Found in the Strangest of Places

By |April 18th, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

Love in Strange Places

We are fond of saying that the best part of love is that occurs everywhere, every day.  It can be the smile of a stranger or the warm hello of a well known friend.  And often those are the best loves.  The ones that occur in the nooks and crannies of life!
Even more interesting than the simple places are the strange places, the icky places, the scary places.  Is it possible to find love there?

Love where?

Is it possible to find love in snakes, trash, even fingers running against the blackboard.   All the things that make our faces cringe, our hair curl, our eyes roll.
I’m going out on a limb and saying  “yes”…

Absolutely.

Love can be found in really strange places.

Well how do we do that?  I mean some things aren’t meant to be loved.   While we might not like these things they can still represent love; love to someone else.
The snake we so despise has a mom.  How did he (or she) snake get here.  And like all moms, she  loves her child snake.  And the trash?  At some point that was someone’s trash.   Even the blackboard … those fingernails belong to someone.  Someone who has the energy and health to be able to drag their fingernails across said blackboard.
You see if you can turn things upside and find love everywhere.   They might not be things you like or care to have in your life.  And that’s ok.  The real beauty comes from recognizing that these items still have some element of love.  That’s all that is important.

Try this.

Practice this exercise when you catch yourself getting upset, disgusted or frustrated.   I think you will surprised at how it changes your perception and even your mood!

503, 2014

Close to the Heart on Your Wedding Day

By |March 5th, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

Wedding Day Kiss

Next to fathers, mothers are the most important person in a girl’s life, and on her wedding day, a girl wants her mother right by her side.

Since her mother can’t be at her wedding, Jennifer – whose mother passed away when she was 13 years old – is making sure her mom will be there by attaching a charm with a picture of the two of them to her wedding bouquet, which will also be wrapped in a piece of tulle from her mother’s wedding dress.

And so that her mother stays close to her heart, Jennifer will have a small heart of tulle from her mother’s dress sewn into her own dress over her heart along with a heart of lace from her step-mother’s wedding dress, a little blue heart button that Jennifer picked out with her mother when she was a little girl, and finally, a little pink elephant button from matching sweatshirts that her mother made for the two of them.

buttons in dress crop

Jennifer says these are all “simple ways for her to be with me.”

601, 2014

Graduation – Keep on Learning

By |January 6th, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

Graduation Cap

Graduation!

Hats in the air, diplomas in hand and cheers from the stand.

It’s graduation!  An exhilarating time for students and parents alike.  Time to step into your future, pursue your dreams and begin the journey of discovering who you are and accomplishing your goals.

And graduation is a time for bittersweet memories.

A time to reflect back on all the memories that you have accumulated.  The good times with friends.  The hard times.  The difficult times.  The challenges and successes.

And maybe it is time for you to move on and you can’t wait.  It’s been tough and your future is a lot better.

Or maybe you’ve had the time of your life in school and what’s next is really uncertain.

Both are fine.

and both help us grow.

Some of these people will moving on with you.  More often than not you are going on separate paths to pursue your dreams.

And that is ok.  Because forever in your heart you will carry all the good times, the tough times, the laughter, the tears, the hopes & the dreams.  Those never go away no matter how far you away you go or how far graduation recedes in time.

For now enjoy the revelry, the freshness of the new experiences and know that forever in your heart you will have the goodness of your experiences.

And even for those of us who are not graduating we can still learn lessons of embracing the future even if it is scary or exciting and cherishing the past no matter how grand or difficult it may be.

Move forward.  Always keep moving forward.

601, 2014

Walking Down the Aisle

By |January 6th, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

Custom Photo Wedding Bouquet Charm

The guest list is … one of the single most important elements of your wedding.

Sure there are fights about the guest list and even guest list disagreements have broken up engagements. A few people don’t make the guest list even though we would give our eye teeth if they could attend.

Many brides wonder how they can make those departed an important party of their wedding.

The custom photo wedding bouquet charm is an item many brides choose for their bouquet.  Using a picture of someone loved who can not attend.  It is a touching way to honor someone.  This way someone who can not be there in physically can be there in spirit.

We create so many of these wedding bouquet charms and we are honored when someone chooses to have us make one.

601, 2014

Love is all around ….

By |January 6th, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

BirdsLove is all around … and while sometimes it doesn’t seem so, it is so! Love is here to stay. Even though we go through rough patches we have to remember that love will get us through them.

The great aspect of love is that it come from anywhere. So often we associate love with romance and family. And those are two wonderful sources of love. Remember not all love comes from those places and nor should it. For some these are dangerous sources whether because it fuels addiction or because of past abuse. Yet, we can find love in the smallest of places and let that fuel us.

Love can come from a pet
it can come from a beautiful sunset
a thank you at your coffee shop
a smile from the bus driver
a wave from the mack truck that let you in
the birds chirping or cats meowing
it can be a satisfying episode of your favorite tv show
the feeling of sleeping in really late
a bite of your favorite meal
or a sip of a delicious cup of tea
it can a pair of earrings given to you by your best friend
or the necklace handed to you by your grandmother
the book you read that changed your life

so many places, objects, sights include love
let it into your life.

201, 2014

Why Love?

By |January 2nd, 2014|Categories: Uncategorized|0 Comments

Blue FlowersWhy love?

Why chronicle love?

The answer is quite simple, we need more of it.

Everyday we are bombarded with stories of bloodshed, corruption, war, guns, infidelity, discrimination and general snarkiness.   Unfortunately the news often shows us the worse of human kind.

And while we are not discounting the importance of this news.  We firmly believe it is critical to be aware of what is occurring in the world.  If only to let the world know of injustice and to spur change.

However it can also present a skewed version of humanity.  It’s easy to slip into discontent and view the world as a difficult place.

A different view

In our studio we are surrounded by love because of the nature of the jewelry we make.  Sometimes it is bittersweet and sometimes touched with sadness.  It always presents the best of how humans feel about each other.

While we do make jewelry, we create so much more than that.   The jewelry we make represents the love, the sentiment, the heartfelt feelings that one human has for another.   And the stories, the emotions, the depth of pathos are beautiful.  Sometimes the stories are heartwarming, sometimes they are silly and yet sometimes they bring a tear to our eyes.  Even so they represent a much different side of our humanity than that which we see in the headlines.

That sentiment is beautiful.

And It’s too beautiful not to share with the world.

So begins our journey to share the best of what we see with you.

To share and showcase love with the world.

And that is our mission.