Mother’s Day 2024 jewelry sales are expected to hit $7 billion, outperforming all other retail categories by a wide margin.
According to the annual survey released by the National Retail Federation (NRF) and Prosper Insights & Analytics, Special Outings are projected to come in second at $5.9 billion in sales, while Electronics should rank third at $3.5 billion.
Overall Mother’s Day spending is expected to reach $33.5 billion this year. That figure is the second highest in the history of the survey, following last year’s record $35.7 billion.
“Mother’s Day is a time to celebrate the women who play a meaningful role in our lives,” NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay said. “Retailers know the significant importance of this day and are ready to help their customers with a wide selection of meaningful gifts for loved ones to show their appreciation.”
Exactly 40% of respondents said they will be buying jewelry for their moms this year. That’s 8 percentage points higher than the tally achieved in 2014.
According to the NRF, 84% of US adults are expected to celebrate the holiday. Of that group, most (59%) will be purchasing gifts for a mother or stepmother, followed by a wife (22%) or daughter (12%).
On average, those celebrating plan to spend $254.04 on Mother’s Day gifts and celebrations, the second highest per-person figure in history. The biggest spenders are expected to be those between the ages of 35 and 44, who are budgeting $345.75.
As the leading authority and voice for the retail industry, NRF provides data on consumer behavior and spending for key periods such as holidays throughout the year. The Mother's Day spending survey of 8,213 U.S. adult consumers was conducted April 1-8 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 1.1 percentage points.
Credit: Image by Bigstockphoto.com.
Welcome to Music Friday when we bring you classic songs with jewelry, gemstones or precious metals in the title or lyrics. Today, we feature three-time Grammy winner Tim McGraw singing Billboard's #1 country hit of 1998, “Just to See You Smile.”
In this song about selflessness, unconditional love and heartbreak, McGraw portrays a hard-working Texas miner who is willing to do just about anything to make his girlfriend happy — and that includes delighting her with fine jewelry.
McGraw sings in the very first verse, “You always had an eye for things that glittered / But I was far from bein’ made of gold / I don’t know how but I scraped up the money / I just never could quite tell you no.”
The miner leaves his job in Amarillo to relocate with her to Tennessee, but the relationship quickly breaks down. The girlfriend finds a new lover and our hero graciously tells her that he’s happy for her.
“And given the chance I’d lie again,” he admits. “It’s worth all that’s lost / Just to see you smile.”
Released in August 1997, the song would go on to spend 42 weeks on the Billboard Country chart — the longest chart run for any country single in the 1990s.
“Just to See You Smile” was the third single from McGraw’s fourth studio album, Everywhere. Both the song and the album topped the Billboard Country charts.
The son of New York Mets star pitcher Tug McGraw, Samuel Timothy “Tim” McGraw was born in Delhi, LA, in 1967. Tim was brought up by his step-dad, Horace Smith, and didn’t know that the famous athlete was his biological father until he was 11. He signed his first record deal with Curb Records in 1990 and married country singer Faith Hill in 1996.
McGraw has sold more than 80 million records worldwide, and 25 of his singles have gone to score a #1 position on the Billboard U.S. Hot Country Songs chart. In addition to his three Grammy Awards, the artist has earned 14 Academy of Country Music awards, 11 Country Music Association (CMA) awards, 10 American Music Awards and three People’s Choice Awards.
He is currently embarking on his "Standing Room Only Tour '24," with 27 performances scheduled from coast to coast through June 29.
Please check out the audio track of McGraw’s performance of “Just to See You Smile.” The lyrics are below if you’d like to sing along…
“Just To See You Smile”
Written by Mark Nesler and Tony Martin. Performed by Tim McGraw.
You always had an eye for things that glittered
But I was far from bein’ made of gold
I don’t know how but I scraped up the money
I just never could quite tell you no
Just like when you were leavin’ Amarillo
To take that new job in Tennessee
And I quit mine so we could be together
I can’t forget the way you looked at me
Just to see you smile
I’d do anything
That you wanted me to
And all is said and done
I’d never count the cost
It’s worth all that’s lost
Just to see you smile
When you said time was all you really needed
I walked away and let you have your space
Cause leavin’ didn’t hurt me near as badly
As the tears I saw rollin’ down your face
And yesterday I knew just what you wanted
When you came walkin’ up to me with him
So I told you that I was happy for you
And given the chance I’d lie again
Just to see you smile
I’d do anything
That you wanted me to
And all is said and done
I’d never count the cost
It’s worth all that’s lost
Just to see you smile
Just to see you smile
I’d do anything
That you wanted me to
And all is said and done
I’d never count the cost
It’s worth all that’s lost
Just to see you smile
Credit: Image by 1035 WEZL, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
The 9.8mm natural quahog pearl at the center of the engagement ring Ken Steinkamp presented to Sandy Sikorski last summer continues to be a symbol of their love story. The couple just hosted a pearl-themed wedding at the famed Ocean House resort, high on the bluffs of Watch Hill, RI, and Inside Edition was on hand to chronicle the festivities.
Pearl and clam iconography abounded.
There were faux pearls affixed to the place settings, pearl beads decorating the champagne bottles and pearl-like candies streaming down the side of the wedding cake. At the top of the cake was an open clam revealing what appears to be a white meringue treat in the shape of a giant pearl. Guests also enjoyed clam-shaped cookies, and Sikorski's granddaughter got into the spirit by wearing pearls on her shoes.
The couple's pearl-themed adventure began in the winter of 2021.
While sharing a dozen quahogs (pronounced Kwo-hogs) at The Bridge Restaurant and Raw Bar in downtown Westerly, RI, the couple encountered a rare jewel that would forever change their lives.
In an interview with Providence NBC affiliate WJAR, Steinkamp described the scene as only one clam remained uneaten on the tray.
“No, no, no. You have it," Steinkamp said. "You really like these.”
When Sikorski attempted to slurp down the tender morsel, something was not quite right.
“I tasted this big, round thing in my mouth and I was thinking, ‘What the heck is this?” she recounted.
What Sikorski nearly consumed was a very rare natural pearl.
“What were the odds of a pearl being inside the shell?” Sikorski wondered out loud.
A local jeweler later told her that the odds of finding a natural pearl of that size in a perfectly symmetrical oval shape was one in a million.
On July 8, 2023, Steinkamp got down on one knee and proposed to his girlfriend of four years with a diamond-accented engagement ring featuring their special pearl at the center.
“We felt that [the pearl] was kind of a signal, or an odd bit of synchronicity,” Steinkamp told WJAR. “And we said, ‘This would be a great engagement ring.'”
The natural pearls found in clams are classified as non-nacreous and have a porcelain-like appearance. The cultured pearls grown in oysters present a deeper glow resulting from layers of nacre that refract the light.
A natural quahog pearl is very rare, and a single specimen — depending on the size, quality and shape — can be worth thousands of dollars.
“We’re both romantics and this is the perfect type of ring for that and the perfect place,” Sikorski told Inside Edition. “We feel it’s part of our life’s journey and it’s all come together for this.”
The couple will be honeymooning in Paris.
Credits: Screen captures via YouTube.com / Inside Edition.
During Thursday's installment of Today With Hoda & Jenna, co-host Jenna Bush Hager recounted how she nearly lost ALL of her fine jewelry — including her sapphire and diamond engagement ring — at JFK Airport in New York City.
The 42-year-old daughter of former President George W. Bush recalled how she lost track of a bag of jewelry as she was "racing to a shoot" while on assignment for the Today show.
Hager explained to co-host Hoda Kotb, "I don't have much nice jewelry, but everything I had was in there."
When Hager finally arrived at the shoot, she realized her precious keepsakes were nowhere to be found.
“I was stressed," she said. "I get to the shoot and I’m looking around. I’m like, ‘Oh no, I had a whole bag of jewelry.’”
Hager quickly reached out to Jack, a member of the NBC morning show's security team.
She explained: “I said, ‘Jack, I just took off at JFK. I know it’s gone, but can you just see what the airport says?’"
In a stroke of good fortune, a fellow traveler had spotted the unattended bag and did the right thing.
“Some lovely man who I’ve never met returned it to security,” she said.
Even though the story had a happy ending, Hager didn't share it with her husband of 15 years, Henry Chase Hager. He only learned about the incident on Thursday morning — at the same time as Kotb and the show's five million viewers.
“I couldn’t even tell Henry because if I lost our engagement ring, it’s priceless,” she said. “So, I harbored a secret from Henry, too, which was hard.”
Jenna and her twin sister, Barbara, were 20 years old when their dad, George W. Bush was inaugurated as President of the US in January of 2001. Henry popped the question to Jenna in 2007, and the couple tied the knot the following year. They have three children.
Credit: Photo by Moody College of Communication from Austin, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
For more than 2,000 years, the Golconda mines on the banks of the Krishna River in southern India produced virtually all the world's fine diamonds.
Many of history's most famous diamonds claimed a Golconda origin, and these included the 105-carat Koh-i-noor (replica, above), 45-carat Hope Diamond, 140-carat Regent Diamond, 189-carat Orlov and the 70-carat Idol's Eye.
During peak production between the 1600s and the 1800s, the Golconda mines supported a massive operation that employed 30,000 people at a time.
Golconda's mines produced an estimated 10 million carats of diamonds before the resources became exhausted in 1830. There were no more diamonds, but the legend carried on.
In the diamond trade, "Golconda" became synonymous with "superb quality." The Indian diamonds from that region had very few inclusions and contained little or no nitrogen. Today, those diamonds would be classified as Type IIa — the best of the best.
It was widely assumed that Golconda's alluvial diamonds originated in kimberlite pipes and were deposited downstream by ancient rivers. Until recently, the primary source of the gemstones remained a mystery.
Geoscientists at Savitribai Phule Pune University, near Mumbai, now believe the true origin of the Golconda diamonds is a volcanic outcrop nearly 200 miles upstream from the alluvial mines. Their findings were published recently in the Journal of Earth System Science.
The researchers utilized field geological studies and remote sensing tools to locate a long-dry ancient river channel that they believe was primarily responsible for the transportation of diamonds from the source rocks at the kimberlite fields of Wajrakarur to their final sites of recovery on the banks of the Krishna River.
The researchers noted that the movement of the precious stones in India is similar to the way the Orange River ferried precious diamonds from the center of South Africa westward all the way to the Atlantic coast in the Republic of Namibia.
That country currently produces more than 2.3 million carats each year. Most of those diamonds are extracted from the ocean floor by giant vacuum systems attached to massive production vessels.
Credit: Photo of Koh-i-Noor replica by aiva., CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Seven-time All Pro center Jason Kelce revealed on Wednesday that he lost his 2018 Super Bowl ring in a kiddie pool full of chili during the "Lombaby" Games on the campus of the University of Cincinnati (UC).
The Lombaby Games pit UC student-athletes against academics in goofy, Olympic-style games, including one where contestants searched two pools filled with Skyline Chili for Kelce's Super Bowl ring along with other decoy rings.
In the end, the decoys were found, but the authentic Philadelphia Eagles ring emblazoned with 219 diamonds and 17 green sapphires had disappeared.
"I legitimately lost my Super Bowl ring in this event," Jason Kelce said during Wednesday's episode of "New Heights," a podcast he hosts with his brother, Kansas City Chiefs star, Travis. "They could not find it."
The rings were hidden in socks and submerged in the chili. Jason Kelce feared that the sock containing his Super Bowl ring might have been kicked out of the inflatable pool and thrown away by mistake.
"What did you expect to happen?" Travis said. "You're such [an]… imbecile."
"So I think we safely assume that my Super Bowl ring is now in a landfill somewhere in the Cincinnati tri-state area," Jason told his brother.
Jason and Travis had served as referees and commentators for the UC event.
Jason had hoped that his support team might be able to use a metal detector to scan the chili after the event was over. As it turns out, Skyline Chili has trace amounts of iron in it, which rendered the metal detector useless, according to the recently retired 36-year-old center.
He has since submitted an insurance claim and hopes that the ring manufacturer, Jostens, can supply a replacement.
Each 10-karat championship ring boasted a gemstone total weight of 9.15 carats and contained symbols on every surface that told the story of an underdog team that overcame all obstacles to roll through the playoffs and eventually defeat the Tom Brady-led Patriots by a score of 41-33 in Super Bowl LII. It was the first time the Eagles raised the Vince Lombardi Trophy aloft in the team's 85-year history.
Jason, who is considered one of the best centers of all time, announced his retirement on March 4, 2024, after 13 NFL seasons with the Eagles. Younger brother, Travis, 34, just claimed his third Super Bowl ring as a tight end for the champion Kansas City Chiefs. He is famously linked romantically to pop princess Taylor Swift.
Credits: Jason Kelce image by Governor Tom Wolf from Harrisburg, PA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Super Bowl ring photo courtesy of Jostens.
Welcome to Music Friday when we like to shine the spotlight on inspirational songs with jewelry, gemstones or precious metals in the title or lyrics. Today, five-time Grammy nominee Brandon Heath seeks divine intervention in “Diamond,” his 2012 song about a young coal miner who "has only scratched the surface." He wants to be a better man, but needs God’s help to find the “diamond” buried deep inside.
He sings, “I got something down inside of me / That only You can see / Help me dig a little deeper now / And set that diamond free.”
For Heath, the diamond symbolizes the ability to bring his life to the next level — a life of clarity, not confusion, of compassion, not cruelty, of ambition, not excuses.
In the last lines of the song, Heath invites the Almighty to seek him out in the coal mine: “Come down with your old flashlight / Underground, black as night / No telling what you’re gonna find in me.”
“Diamond” is the fourth track on Heath’s fourth studio album, Blue Mountain. The album is unique because each song takes place in the Blue Mountains and is told from the point of view of a particular character. The real and fictional players featured in the songs include his grandfather, his mentor, a farmer, a coal miner and a death-row inmate. Each song weaves a message of hope, love and redemption.
When it was released in 2012, the album earned strong reviews and a #5 spot on Billboard‘s US Christian Albums chart. It also reached #97 on the Billboard 200 albums chart.
“[The songs] are all kind of telling my story a little bit,” Heath revealed to The Clarion-Ledger. “[They talk] about my own fears, and my own desires. As a songwriter, it was more fun to give someone else my own voice. I think the best way to describe a place is to describe its people. And so, all these characters tell a story about what Blue Mountain is and who lives there.”
Born in Nashville, TN, Brandon Heath Knell turns 45 in July. The son of a police officer dad and hairdresser mom, Heath received his first guitar as a Christmas gift when he was 13. In high school, he converted to Christianity and explored his spirituality by participating in faith missions to India and Ecuador. Those trips helped inspire a career in contemporary Christian music.
Please check out the audio track of Heath performing “Diamond.” The lyrics are below if you’d like to sing along…
“Diamond”
Written by Brandon Heath, Ross Copperman and Lee Thomas Miller. Performed by Brandon Heath.
My father’s father broke this ground
Daddy mined till we laid him down
Only God knows what they found beneath
Now here I stand in my own boots
Ax to grind and a point to prove
Tangled up in my own roots, it seems
I got treasure up in Heaven
I got dirt all over me
I have only scratched the surface
Of the man I’m meant to be
I got something down inside of me
That only You can see
Help me dig a little deeper now
And set that diamond free
Why do I do the things I do
All the things that I don’t want to
Act like I don’t fear You at all
Hard head and a heart of stone
Older now but I haven’t grown
Any riches that I have to show are small
I got treasure up in Heaven
I got dirt all over me
I have only scratched the surface
Of the man I’m meant to be
I got something down inside of me
That only You can see
Help me dig a little deeper now
And set that diamond free
Set it free
Set it free
Set it free
Set it free
Come down with your old flashlight
Underground, black as night
No telling what you’re gonna find in me
Set it free
Set it free
Lord, set it free
Set it free
Come set it free
Set it free
I got treasure up in heaven
Set it free
I got dirt all over me
Set it free
I got treasure up in heaven
Come dig a little deeper now
And set that diamond free
Credit: Photo by David Holzemer, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
With gold trading near an all-time high, it might be a great time to take a closer look at another undeniably elegant noble metal, platinum.
Gold was in the news last Friday as it hit $2,448 per ounce due to investors flocking to the precious metal as a hedge against inflation and international uncertainty. By contrast, an ounce of platinum was priced at $1,000 per ounce, about 41% of gold's value.
Historically, platinum has traded at a premium to gold. In January of 2014, for instance, one could purchase an ounce of platinum for $1,378, while an ounce of gold sold for $1,225. In January of 1990, platinum stood at $475 and gold stood at $404.
But, then at the beginning of 2011, gold started to overtake platinum.
This was an unsettling phenomenon because platinum always reflected a higher status overall. The record industry, for instance, awards a gold album at 500,000 units and a platinum album at 1 million units. The American Express Platinum Card offers far more benefits than its Gold Card.
King Louis XVI of France once said that platinum was the "only metal fit for kings." In the jewelry industry, platinum was always preferred over gold to secure the most valuable and famous gemstones in the world — including the 45.52-carat Hope Diamond.
The status of platinum in 2024 is not the first time it's been undervalued.
In the 1500s, platinum was belittled and cast aside by the Spanish conquistadors who encountered the material while mining for silver in Rio Pinto, Colombia. They named the curious metal “platina” or “little silver.” In one version of the story, the conquistadors threw the platinum nuggets back into the river hoping they would ripen into silver. (Silver is trading today at $28.45 per ounce).
Here are some additional fun facts about platinum…
Platinum is 30 times more rare than gold. If all the platinum ever mined was melted and poured into an Olympic-sized pool, the platinum would barely reach your ankles. All the mind gold, however, would fill three Olympic-sized pools.
Platinum is stronger than gold. When platinum is scratched, the material moves aside and no platinum is lost. When gold is scratched, tiny bits flake away. This is why gold rings that are worn for a long period of time often need to be re-shanked.
Platinum jewelry is typically 90% to 95% pure and includes markings in the band that say “PLATINUM, PLAT, PT, PT950, 950PT or 900PT.” Canadian quality marks can say “”platinum,” “plat.” or “platine.” In the UK, the platinum marks will say “850,” “900,” “950” or “999.” Gold purity, on the other hand, is measured in karats. Most commonly, 14-karat gold is 14/24th (58.3%) gold and alloyed with other metals. Eighteen-karat gold contains 75% precious metal.
Platinum is a true white metal. White gold, by comparison, is actually yellow gold that has been mixed with other white metals and then plated with rhodium to give a bright white appearance. That plating does wear off over time and requires re-plating.
Platinum is hypoallergenic and an excellent choice for people with sensitive skin or allergies to other metals.
Platinum is 60% more dense than 14-karat gold. It’s a difference you can actually feel.
Platinum typically occurs as small grains and crystals in certain layered igneous rocks. The extraordinarily rare platinum nugget, above, weighs 444.4 grams (just under 1 pound) and is so special that it’s on permanent exhibit at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC.
Credit: Photos by Chip Clark / Smithsonian.
Back in October of 2017, thousands of astronomers from around the globe joined together to confirm the first-ever sighting of two neutron stars colliding in space. In just one second, the “kilonova” located 130 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Hydra triggered the equivalent of 50 Earth masses of silver, 100 Earth masses of gold and 500 Earth masses of platinum.
The scientists estimated that the gold alone was worth more than $100 octillion. That’s $100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (1 followed by 29 zeroes).
The astronomers aimed their equipment at the super-dense kilonova, looking for the signatures of heavy metals. They recorded visible light, radio waves, X-rays and gamma rays. The data confirmed the birth of massive amounts of precious metals and seemed to put to rest the long-standing mystery of how these and other “heavy” elements are formed.
A newly published study, however, is challenging conventional wisdom and deepening the mystery.
Northwestern University researchers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to study a mammoth stellar collapse were stunned when they found absolutely no evidence of heavy elements.
The collapse, first registered on October 9, 2002, resulted in the brightest gamma-ray burst (GRB) ever recorded. Scientists gave it the nickname B.O.A.T. (“brightest of all time”).
“When we confirmed that the GRB was generated by the collapse of a massive star, that gave us the opportunity to test a hypothesis for how some of the heaviest elements in the universe are formed,” said Northwestern’s Peter Blanchard, who led the study.
“We did not see signatures of these heavy elements, suggesting that extremely energetic GRBs like the B.O.A.T. do not produce these elements. That doesn’t mean that all GRBs do not produce them, but it’s a key piece of information as we continue to understand where these heavy elements come from. Future observations with JWST will determine if the B.O.A.T.’s ‘normal’ cousins produce these elements.”
“This event is particularly exciting because some had hypothesized that a luminous gamma-ray burst like the B.O.A.T. could make a lot of heavy elements like gold and platinum,” added second author Ashley Villar of Harvard University and the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian. “If they were correct, the B.O.A.T. should have been a gold mine. It is really striking that we didn’t see any evidence for these heavy elements.”
The findings were published last week in the journal Nature Astronomy.
According to a Northwestern University press release, the powerful B.O.A.T. explosion occurred approximately 2 billion light-years from Earth, in the direction of the constellation Sagitta and lasted a few hundred seconds. It was so bright that it saturated most of the world’s gamma-ray detectors.
“The event produced some of the highest-energy photons ever recorded by satellites designed to detect gamma rays,” Blanchard said. “This was an event that Earth sees only once every 10,000 years. We are fortunate to live in a time when we have the technology to detect these bursts happening across the universe.”
Credit: Image by Aaron M. Geller / Northwestern / CIERA / IT Research Computing and Data Services.
Phillips is estimating that a magnificent 6.21-carat Fancy Vivid Pink diamond ring could fetch as much as $15 million as the star lot of its "Geneva Jewels Auction: TWO" on May 13.
Other baubles expected to turn heads at Hotel President Geneva include a 280.84-carat Colombian emerald and a super-rare 1.56-carat Fancy Red diamond.
In all, the meticulously curated sale of just over 100 lots will showcase signed jewels from illustrious houses such as Cartier, JAR, Sterlé, Suzanne Belperron, and Van Cleef & Arpels.
The property of an "important private collector," the 6.21-carat pink diamond boasts a VS1 clarity and a Type IIa classification reserved for diamonds of exceptional purity and transparency. The gem's Fancy Vivid rating sits at the top of the diamond color grading scale. The oval diamond is set in a ring between two kite-shaped diamonds.
The auction house set the estimated sales range at $10.5 million to $15 million.
Pink diamonds are in high demand and short supply since the November 2020 closure of Rio Tinto’s Argyle mine in Australia, which had been the world’s primary source of high-quality pink diamonds.
The “CTF Pink Star” still holds the record for any gem sold at auction. The 59.6-carat pink diamond sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong for $71.2 million in 2017.
Other auction highlights include the following:
An octagonal step-cut emerald weighing 280.84 carats, "The Amazon Queen" is expected to sell in the range of $1.5 million to $2.6 million. The gem measures 40mm x 35mm (about 1.5 inches square) and was sourced in Colombia.
"The Argyle Phoenix" is a brilliant-cut Fancy Red natural color diamond sourced from the now-depleted Argyle mine. Red is said to be the rarest diamond color in the world. "The Argyle Phoenix" is expected to fetch between $1 million and $1.5 million.
Set with pear-shaped Fancy Intense Yellow and Fancy Yellow diamonds weighing from 0.44 carats to 11.28 carats, and an oval Fancy Intense Yellow diamond weighing 5.44 carats, this Harry Winston-designed necklace is expected to sell in the range of $300,000 to $500,000.
A ring featuring a cut-cornered Fancy Intense Green diamond weighing 2.26 carats framed by circular-cut pink sapphires should yield from $260,000 to $380,000 based on Phillips' pre-sale estimate. The green diamond boasts a clarity of VS1.
Top lots from Geneva Jewels Auction: TWO will be traversing the continents before returning to Geneva for the auction. Tour stops will include New York, London, Taipei and Singapore before returning to Hotel President Geneva from May 8 until the sale on May 13.
Credits: Images courtesy of Phillips.