Chino Clothing Is A Balance of Comfort and Style

Clino clothing is the ideal balance of casual-smart, comfort, durability, and style. Right up my alley! The retailer tends to be pricey yet short of unaffordable. You may not buy all your clothes at Chino -- Uniqlo and Old Navy rock -- but you might splurge on special pieces that will remain staples in your wardrobe for years to come.

The retailer combines classic with a degree of edginess or fun in the best possible way. Its pieces are always fashionable and on trend, without following trends.

I also appreciate Chino’s light and breathable cotton twill fabric. A merchant who began by making fabrics for the military, Chio now offers some of the most stylish and flattering pieces for women. 

You have your choice of dress lengths with ultra-tasteful necklines and attention to details that flatter women of all ages. If you buy a dress in your 20s, with good care, you’ll still have it and be able to wear it in your 50s!

If you wait for sales and special promotions, you’ll find a piece you’ll enjoy wearing time and again.

You simply can’t pick a dress on this blog post that wouldn’t look good on women of any age, and as time rolls on, none will look dated!

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Pretty Rings At Harry Winston

Photo: Harry Winston

Fortunately, I'm not tempted to buy luxury handbags, shoes, or apparal despite appreciating the style and/or craftsmanship of many of the top designers. My luxury of choice has always been jewelry. So how does THAT make me fortunate? Well, luxury jewelry is so far beyond the means of a regular wage earner like me that I have no illusions of bringing pieces home! I can browse knowing  -- what I’m ogling over -- would put far too many zeros on my credit card, sending me deep into debt. I might covet, yet there is no temptation to buy. I know who I am, and it isn’t a high roller with deep pockets for beautiful yet ultimately impractical things.

That said, aren’t the 3 Harry Winston rings👆, a canary diamond with white diamonds, an emerald with diamonds, and a sapphire with diamonds, gorgeous! Yes, siree, Bob!

If you love gemstones and admire jewelry design, you love seeing high-end jewelry for inspiration. First a dreamer, then a realist is my motto. Take it in, then find something similar ... the design, the vibe, the size, within your budget. You can follow the same practice if you love designer bags, shoes, apparel, or art, whatever your hot button temptation is. I mean, we don’t have to deprive ourselves of enjoying the apex of quality by ignoring it. Try your temptation on if you get the chance, then search for something more budget-friendly that gives you the same effect as a big-ticket item. No need to go without completely. Deprivation is not a virtue!

Pretty rings at Macy’s, more affordable commercial-grade gemstones, including sapphires with diamonds, an emerald with diamonds, and canary diamonds with white diamonds.😊

Jewelry is a luxury buy, just like all other designer goods, so it is more of a want than a need, but we can justify owning a few pieces to add sparkle to outfits. If your splurge is a ring, you can enjoy looking at it all day long!

Finally, remember that lab-grown gemstones are physically, chemically, and optically identical to earth-grown gemstones, making large precious stones -- emeralds, rubies, sapphires, and diamonds -- far more affordable. 

Photo: Harry Winston

Harry Winston's rings look to be as thin as lower-cost vendors’ rings at Macy’s. The HW gemstones are better quality, but for the money, Harry Winston could make the bands of his lovely, yet extremely pricey, rings thicker. Don’t you agree?!?

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Photo: Geology.in: Click to go to the website to learn more about garnets. Usually the Hessonite hue is more of a cinnamon orange.

Gemstone durability is a blend of 3 major characteristics: Hardness, toughness, and strength. Hardness is its resistance to scratches. Toughness stops breaking, cracking, and chipping. How tightly a gemstone's atoms are packed together determines its toughness. A gemstone's strength measures its resistance to shattering under pressure (i.e., how hard it is to crush).

Spessartite Garnet

If you're looking for everyday jewelry that will endure, the following 3 gemstones always top the lists of jewelry insiders. Two of the 3 gemstones are so under the public's radar, and thus less in demand, they are also good value for the money.

I. Jewelry experts consider garnet a wildly underrated gemstone. The jewel is a whole family of minerals that comes in a wide array of intense colors. With a 7.5 rating on Mohl’s Scale of Hardness, a garnet is hard enough for everyday rings. But that’s not the whole story; a garnet has no cleavage, giving it excellent toughness. A vivid green garnet, known as tsavorite, is far cheaper, cleaner, and tougher than emeralds, with none of an emerald’s fragility for chipping, cracking, or breaking. Unlike emeralds, garnets do not need oiling to hide industry-accepted inclusions. Rodolite (a combination of pink, red, and purple) exudes a raspberry hue. Spessartite is a fiery orange, and Demantoid sparkles more than diamonds.

Wikepedia

II. Another hard, tough, strong, and underrated gemstone is spinel, with an 8 in hardness. Spinel (MgAl2O4) grows in the same mines as rubies and, for centuries, was mistaken for a ruby (Al2O3). The only reason spinel is overlooked is that it lacks the marketing push of diamonds. Collectors understand the beauty, durability, and true value of spinel. Insiders predict that once the public catches on, the price of spinels will skyrocket. 

Photo: GIA

III. The last, most durable gemstone for everyday wear is the priciest of the 3 but worth considering as an alternative gemstone for engagement rings: Corundum has a 9 hardness rating. Rubies (red corundum is more expensive because red gemstones in nature are rarer). All other colors of corundum are sapphires. Corundum is a more durable gemstone than diamonds. They are often selected by royalty (Diana and Catherine of Wales, the York princesses) for their engagement rings, and jewelers buy them for their own family. I met a jeweler at Tiffany's who bought herself a 3.5-carat blue sapphire ring, and a jeweler at Effy who bought a sapphire ring for his daughter that will last forever!

Jewlery isn't cheap, so it pays to know which gemstones have the best combination of durability. 

💍💎💍💎

A blue spinel

Other gemstones insiders cite for durability include Alexandrite (a 9.5 in hardness), Moissanite (9.5), and Jade (6 - 7). The coveats with them are: Alexandrite is rare and thus super expensive. Moissanite is very affordable, but always lab-grown. Jade, the softest on the list, can be scratched if careless, so durable yet not to be banged around, set in rings.

Which of the durable gemstones appeals to you? I wish I owned blue and red spinels. Vietnam grows vivid blue ones.

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The Bavarian Ruby and Spinel Diadem

Wikimedia Commons

The Bavarian Ruby and Spinel Diadem was commissioned in 1830 by King Ludwig I of Bavaria as a gift for his wife, Queen Therese. Designed by court jeweler Caspar Rielander, it's a colossal-sized headpiece of gold intricately set with diamonds, rubies, and red spinels in a floral and vine motif. The tiara was so heavy and uncomfortable it gave Queen Therese headaches to wear it, so she rarely did, favoring lighter and smaller tiaras.

The diadem, which is part of a parure of jewels that includes a grand necklace, 2 cuff bracelets, and drop earrings, mostly sat idle in the royal vaults for close to a century until Crown Princess Antonia (Antoinette of Luxembourg) selected it to wear in her official photographs after marrying Crown Prince Rupprecht in 1921. In the era of royalty, monarchs owned and adorned elaborate jewelry to signify status, power, legitimacy, and divinity. To their subjects, royal jewels projected wealth, greatness, continuity, pomp, and national heritage. Today, we value them for their beauty and as relics of the grandeur of a bygone era.

Photo: Franz Grainer

 Bavaria’s royal family is from the house of Wittelsbach -- they ruled in Bavaria beginning in 1180 -- and what ensued is a bit of sad history. During the occupation of the Nazis, the family was part of a resistance plot and had to flee to Italy and Hungary. Prince Rupprecht remained underground in Italy to fight the fascists who took over his country. Meanwhile, after Hungary fell to Germany, on Hitler's personal orders, Princess Antonia and her children were arrested by the Gestapo and sent to concentration camps. She was manourished, tortured for information about her husband, and contracted typhus. Crown Princess Antonia never broke and survived, but was in ill health for the rest of her life. After being liberated in 1945 by the Americans, she never set foot in Germany again. Her children also lived. She died in 1954 at the age of 54.

Nowadays, the Bavarian parure sits on display in the Schatzkammer (meaning treasury) at Residenz in Munich, Germany. Here’s a lovely front view of it. 

Munich is the capital of the federal state of Bavaria, in Southern Germany. It is famous for hosting Oktoberfest, a yearly celebration to the present day that first began on October 12, 1810, to honor the marriage of then Crown Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen, the very same couple who left us the Bavarian Ruby and Spinel parure! The Citizens of Munich were invited to a 3-day celebration of the royal union in the fields outside the city gates. The location was christened Theresienwiese (Therese’s Meadow) after the bride. The big after-party was so much fun, it became an annual event which Münchners affectionately dub, the Wiese, as in, "Auf geht’s zur Wiesen!"🥨🍺

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Short-or-Cap-Sleeved Summer Dresses Are Back!

Style & Co at Macy's

As soon as summer weather arrives, I switch from wearing leggings to dresses. My legs don’t get covered again until autumn, when the days start to get nippy.

Style & Co and Jones New York at Macy’s

During the last decade, sleeveless dresses dominated summers. Understandably, with heat and humidity ... and yet, I missed what I mostly wore during my teenage and 20s,  short sleeves. Cap-sleeved is an abbreviated length of short-sleeved and is also perfect for summer when you just want fabric covering your shoulders and the top of your arms. 

Lands’ End

What I appreciate about short-or cap-sleeved dresses is that I rarely have to carry a cover-up, such as a cardigan or shawl. That little bit of extra material on the top of my arms gives me the warmth I need for indoor air conditioning. What’s more, it shields my shoulders and arms from too much sun. I also think short-or-cap-sleeves give a dress a little extra versatility when perhaps cloaking more skin is desired for certain occasions. Years ago, when tourists entered churches in Rome, they were required out of respect to cover their bare shoulders.

Old Navy’s Swing Dresses

There was a 10-year period when dresses with short sleeves seemed to have disappeared. You could find long-sleeved or sleeveless, but not much in between. For the versatility of having both short-sleeved and sleeveless options in a wardrobe, I'm happy to see short sleeves on summer dresses back in fashion!

Style & Co at Macy's

My fabric preferences for summer dresses are cotton, linen, or silk. I don’t mind 1 or 2 rayon dresses since rayon is light and cool, but rayon isn’t as durable as the natural fabrics. Macy’s has a variety of dresses with short sleeves, which include polyester (a fabric I don't buy). For this post, I featured cotton and linen dresses from Macy’s and Lands’ End. Old Navy’s swing dresses are rayon. I have some Old Navy rayon swing dresses from summers’ past ... yes, sleeveless!  The retailer puts their dresses on sale for $7, $10, $12 so you get enough wear out of them for the little you spend. They are machine washable, and customers look amazingly polished for $7 bucks!

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What Makes Green Diamonds?

From Instagram - The Aurora

After writing last Thursday's blog, I got curious about green diamonds. I don’t recall ever seeing one. This might be because they make up less than 0.1% of all fancy-colored diamonds on earth. After red, green diamonds are the 2nd rarest diamonds. Unlike most diamonds that get their colors from chemical impurities entering their atomic structure, green diamonds get their color from natural radiation. Over millions of years, alpha and beta rays emitted by radioactive minerals knock carbon atoms out of place in the crystal structure, changing how the stone absorbs light. In other words, radiation exposure creates carbon atom vacancies. This vacancy defect, also known as the GR1 center in a diamond, causes the green color.

According to Only National Diamonds, radiation from alpha particles usually only penetrates a few micrometers deep, leaving a shallow green "skin" on rough stones. Diamond cutters must plan and facet the gem with expert precision to evenly distribute this color throughout the stone. It may explain why we see more radiant cuts in this fancy colored gemstone. The radiant cut’s faceting maximizes light reflection, which intensifies and saturates the color of the stone, making it appear more vivid.

A very few green diamonds are also colored by more complex defects involving nitrogen, hydrogen, or nickel.

The world’s natural green diamonds come from South America and Africa. Nowadays, laboratory irradiation can also produce green diamonds. It’s challenging to tell natural-grown and lab-grown green diamonds apart. Both are real diamonds. It’s unlawful to sell lab-grown diamonds without transparency.

The scarcity of green diamonds makes them very pricey. Just like other colored gemstones, color is the most important of the fancy diamond Cs (followed by cut, carat, and clarity) in determining value. As their color becomes more saturated and vibrant, prices rise dramatically. Based on their GIA color intensity grade for a 1-carat stone, a Fancy Green color costs from $50,000 - $100,000; a Fancy Intense Green costs between $150,000 - $200,000, and a Fancy Vivid Green costs $300,000+.

Photo: Wikipedia
The Dresden Green Diamond

The Dresden Green, a 41-carat diamond originating from India’s Golconda mines, is the largest and most famous natural green diamond in the world. It is a chemically pure IIa diamond with VS1 clarity. Frederick Augustus II, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, paid 400,000 thalers for the diamond in 1741. Perhaps someone should have told Diespach, the court jeweler of Saxony, that fads come and go before, in 1768, he mounted the Dresden Green as an elaborate hat ornament surrounded by 411 white diamonds.😁 Today, it is on display in the Green Vault at Dresden Castle in Germany. The renowned green diamond survived the Seven Years’ War, the Napoleonic Wars, World Wars I and II, its confiscation by the Soviets, who returned it to Dresden in 1958, and the 2019 Dresden Museum heist of royal jewels. Thankfully, at the time of the theft, the Dresden Green was on loan to the Metropolitan Museum in Manhattan.

The Aurora Green (👆top image) is a 5.02 carat Fancy Vivid Green rectangular radiant cut diamond with VS2 clarity. The Aurora Green is surrounded by pink diamonds set in a ring. Found in Brazil, it sold for a wooping $16.8 million, the most expensive price ever paid for a green diamond, at Christie’s Hong Kong in 2016. Chow Tai Fook Jewellery bought it. Without fluorescence, its GIA-rated Fancy Green color is one of a kind!

Photo: Jewelry Point

Personally, I’d rather pay less money to get a bigger, more common white (clear) diamond. Other jewelry lovers may covet uniqueness over size. 

Ultra-rare fancy-colored diamonds are so wildly expensive that customers fork over a ton of moola for a tiny stone, so I wouldn’t buy, but visit them at Tiffany’s New York flagship store or the museums around the world that house them. First a dreamer, then a realist ... and perhaps an adventurous traveler is the way to get more bang for your buck!💚

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Gemstone Brittleness And Cleavage

These are Macy’s commercial-grade gemstones - amethyst, garnet, fancy colored sapphires, citrine, ruby, and emerald.

Earrings, necklaces, and bracelets take fewer knocks, but if you splurge on a ring, for durability, you might want to consider a gemstone's brittleness and cleavage, along with its hardness.

Princess Grace's ring

Hardness refers to a gemstone's rating from 1 (softest) to 10 (hardest) on Mohs' Hardness Scale, which reflects its resistance to surface scratching. While a diamond rates a 10 for hardness, it's actually a brittle gemstone that, upon impact, will crack more easily than other gemstones.

Queen Camila's ring

Cleavage is the gemstone's grain. Just like with beef or wood, a crystalline structure (meaning its atomic arrangement) is internally symmetrical. Cleavage refers to natural, predictable planes of weakness within a gemstone's structure where its atomic bonds are frail. These are the areas where a crystal is more likely to shatter.

Wallis Simpson's ring

Brittleness describes how easily a stone breaks or chips if struck. All faceted gemstones are considered brittle, yet how brittle they are depends on their cleavage. A gemstone's cleavage is a major factor in its brittleness and significantly lowers its toughness.

Queen Marguritta II's ring

So what is toughness? If a stone has excellent cleavage (like a diamond or topaz), hitting it at the exact right angle along that plane can cause it to split cleanly in two. Toughness describes a gemstone's resistance to breaking, chipping, or cracking when a heavy blow is applied. As it happens, diamonds have perfect cleavage planes in 4 directions, giving them relatively poor toughness. Despite being the hardest stone on Earth, a perfectly placed hit can cause diamonds to split along their planes (i.e., grains) just like a piece of wood.

Queen Victoria's ring

A cutter of gemstones uses this knowledge to determine how to cut a gemstone. Customers can use it to buy safer and more durable gemstones for everyday wear.

Some gemstones, such as sapphires and rubies, have no cleavage. Their tightly packed atomic structures resist breaking, making them far less brittle and giving them much higher toughness over diamonds to wear as daily rings.

Emeralds have imperfect cleavage in one direction (basal cleavage). Their cleavage and natural internal inclusions (jardins) make them brittle and prone to chipping.

Josephine Beauharnais' ring

Tough Gemstones For Daily Rings are:

Corundum (ruby and sapphire), spinel, alexandrite, moissanites, quartz (amethyst, citrine, agate, jasper), jade (both types), garnets, and turquoise.

High Risk Gemstones for Daily Rings include:

Emerald, topaz, tanzanite, moonstone, sunstone, labradorite, kuzite, and diamond.

Queen Maxima’s ring

Still, if you love the higher-risk gemstones and yearn to wear them as everyday rings, you can do so by selecting protective bezel or halo settings; remove them when you work or wash your hands; and (less desirable) only wear them for special occasions. In other words, be mindful and prepared to baby them. 

jardins in an emerald 

Frankly, I think we should never work or wash our hands with soap without removing all our gemstone rings. I keep a ring holder by the kitchen sink and take off my rings whenever cleaning. Jewelry is never cheap, so why take unnecessary risks? You always want to keep gemstones pristine and sparkling! 

 Queen Alexandra (Alix of Denmark), Queen Letizia of Spain, Diana & Catherine of Wales rings

Famous royal engagement rings are featured throughout today's blog, but no one needs to be engaged to wear a ring!

Ring holder with my fun to wear, inexpensive white sapphire ring

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Dresses For My Senior Mom

It seems every spring I order my senior Mother a few dresses, and this spring is no different. She was a stylish dresser as a younger woman, and she still cares about her appearance.

Old Navy put a summer dress on promotion for $10, which she likely wouldn’t have chosen for herself, fearing it was too youthful, but I think it will look adorable on her when temperatures are boiling.

She was never a sun worshiper and has lovely skin with no noticeable age spots, so why must she stay all covered up just because she’s elderly during the hottest months of the year?

Mom is wearing this cozy t-shirt dress in pink that I bought for her last spring. Pink and red are her favorite colors. I don’t think her new dresses will bunch up like her t-shirt dress when she sits. Here we are years ago, enjoying a summer day.

The dress is 100% cotton with hidden pockets! After reading all the reviews, the word mini doesn’t worry me; women of all ages stated the length was just right. None mentioned it being too short. At 5'7", I might’ve ordered tall for myself to be safe. My Mom is petite in stature. The drop skirt is super cute, and the loose fit will make the dress easy to manage for all necessary functions during the day, including sitting in a transport wheelchair for outings. The scoop neck is high up enough and classic, and the back doesn’t dip too low. Also, the straps are substantial enough and far from spaghetti-thin. We can always carry a shawl or sweater to drape over her shoulders.

During the sale, I got her 3 dresses (the colors you see in the post).  They were a bargain! I bought her a t-shirt (for pants) and 2 layering tanks, also, which she wears under clothing and to bed. All are soft and machine washable. Free shipping to boot!

My Mom is styling in her new Old Navy dress.

I have as much fun dressing my Mom now as I did dressing my dolls back in the day.🌞

How did I do?

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