2006RUS

Everyone loves to take advantage of the reduced prices during the holiday sales. In fact, the best day to go looking for special offers is the day after the actual holiday is over.

Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving and it is the busiest shopping day of the year. You will find enormous savings, but you will have to get up early, be prepared to queue and jostle.

Another case in point is jewellery and St Valentine?s Day. Many men buy their wives or girlfriends jewellery during this period as a St Valentine?s Day gift. However, in the weeks after St Valentine?s Day, you can save a minimum of 30% on the very same pieces of jewellery that were being sold a week before. This is a clear indication that we are being hood-winked on these holiday occasions and that we should wait until the actual holiday is over.

OK, it may not seem so romantic to wait, but it must be better to be able to get 30% more gold for your money or to give the same present, but be able to go for a meal as well. If I were a woman, I know which option I would choose!

Or, instead of a nice silver or gold ring, you would be able to pay for gold instead of silver or white gold instead of yellow. You could get a gorgeous Celtic knot or a Claddagh ring instead of a plain band.

Striking Easter outfits are also expensive before Easter. However, why not buy the items you want after Easter and either make use of them next year or use them for parties, exceptional occasions or church? You can save a bundle of money in this way, just by using a little forward planning.

In order to help reduce how much money you spend on Christmas presents, why not try purchasing them all year long as and when you find something appropriate in the sales? How many times have you seen something in a sale and said to yourself: ‘that would be the perfect gift for so-and-so’? It is better to take advantage of these opportunities and keep the items aside for when the right event comes up.

Then there are those post Christmas sales too. The Boxing Day sales are a great opportunity to pick up items that you can give as presents later in the year. And why not buy something for yourself too while you are at it? You can save a lot on your favourite scents. Buy enough to last you the rest of the year!

You can make your funds go a lot further if you take advantage of the after holiday sales. Rely on serendipity. Buy opportunistically and you will not only save yourself a lot of money, but you will never be stuck for a present at the last minute either.

Owen Jones, the author of this article, writes on many topics, but is currently involved with theCeltic Knot wedding ring. If you have an interest in wedding rings too, please go to our website now at White Gold Claddagh Ring

All through The Great War, the slaughter over the fields of Flanders was on an awful scale with the majority of bodies never identified or recovered. On 11th November 1920, simultaneously ceremonies were held both in London and Paris to unveil tombs of unknown soldiers.

The tomb of the unknown soldier came to represent the loss sustained by the families of troops who died and their bodies were never identified or brought back. The unknown French soldier lies in the Arc de Triomphe in Paris while the unknown British soldier lies buried in Westminster Abbey between nobleman and statesmen.

The concept was initially thought of by a clergyman named Reverend David Railton. In 1916 in France, he had found a cross with the words “An Unknown British Soldier” written on it. 4 years later in 1920, Railton approached the Dean of Westminster indicating it may be acceptable to create a nationally recognised grave for an unknown soldier.

4 British servicemen were exhumed from Aisne, the Somme, Arras and Ypres and taken to a chapel at St Pol, close to Arras. Each body was covered in a Union flag then one was selected by Brigadier General L J Wyatt. Wyatt had no idea where the soldiers had been taken from or their rank. The point was that the unknown soldier may perhaps have been anyone from a Private to a Colonel, a colonial manual worker to the son of an Earl.

The soldiers casket was sent to London and was delivered to Westminster Abbey in a horse drawn gun carriage. The cortege was accompanied by King George V and members of the Royal family. At Westminster Abbey, it was flanked by a guard of 100 winners of the Victoria Cross.

The coffin was positioned and covered with soil taken from the battlefields of The First World War. It was capped with a slab of black marble from Belgium and it is the only tombstone in Westminster Abbey which it is forbidden to walk.

Since then, plenty of other nations have committed similar tombs such as Argentina, Australia, Canada, Germany, Iraq, Japan, Russia, Ukraine and the United States.

World War I was reduced to a bloody stalemate which saw so many lives wasted. Few families in Great Britain were left unaffected.

One’s wedding ring is often a person’s most essential item of jewellery, because of the huge significance that it has for its wearer. It is intended to denote the love that exists between two people. In most countries, the wedding ring is worn on the fourth finger of the left hand – the ring finger, although in Norway, Germany and Russia, it is worn on the fourth finger of the right hand.

It is usually a good idea to have your finger measured by an expert, before buying an expensive ring, because fingers swell and shrink over the course of a life span and a good jeweller will know how much slack to allow. If the change in the size of your finger is likely to be permanent, it is a good idea to have the ring resized, this is so that it will neither cut into you nor fall off your finger easily.

These days a lot of couples like to go shopping for wedding rings together, because they want to get a pair of identical rings that both of them likes. However, it does not have to be like that. In fact it never was, because the man bought the ring for his fiancee as a surprise. So, if you do not share the same tastes, do not worry about it.

There are hundreds of designs to choose from and several types and qualities of metal too. Yellow gold is still the most popular, but there is white gold and specialist golds too like Welsh gold, which is very rare. Besides gold, platinum and titanium are very popular too.

A fast developing trend is for a couple to design or have designed a unique pair of wedding rings. At first, you would think that this would be very expensive, but it is not necessarily so. If you keep your design moderate and the stones, if any, equally so, then the rings might only cost 10%-20% more than those off the shelf.

Gold is still the most popular metal for a wedding ring, but silver is starting to gain ground too, although it was always looked on as the poor cousin before. Likewise, diamonds are the still the number one stone of choice, but sapphires are also very popular nowadays. Or you could go for plain bands with something like a Celtic knot design.

Shopping for wedding rings can be fun, but it is easy to go over the top and spend much more than you planned to. You could decide how much you can afford and stick to it, not that that always works either. Count on to pay a lot more for the bride’s wedding ring than the groom’s. This is because the bride’s ring usually contains diamonds, whereas the groom’s is often a plain band of gold.

You could further personalize your wedding rings with a dedication and a date. Personalized, or unique wedding rings often get handed down through the generations. Maybe, yours will too. Or, if you want to wear your grandmother’s handed-down ring, you could personalize it in some way, so that it is both old and yet something of you as well.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on many topics, but is currently involved with Celtic Knot rings. If you have an interest in wedding rings too, please go to our website now at White Gold Claddagh Ring

The wedding dress is just about the most important item in the wedding ceremony except the vows and the rings. The bride wants to look her best and the groom wants to look his best too. A beautiful wedding dress will help the bride’s aspiration to look stunning come true.

Therefore, it is imperative to select the wedding dress with care, as every bride knows. However, there are a few items that are not as clear as the wedding dress just looking stunning and we will list the most significant of these below.

Besides individual taste in fashion, the most essential consideration has to be the time of the year. Which season are you going to get married in? What temperature is it likely to be? Could it rain? If it is likely to be cold, you should wear a heavier cloth than if it is likely to be hot. You might also permit the season to have an influence on the colours you wear, but that is a matter of personal taste. For example, winter colours could be slightly darker than summer colours.

Another important aspect when choosing the colour of the wedding dress is the skin colouration of the bride. This consideration is also true of the accessories. The bride will also need a head-dress, a veil, gloves and a bouquet, all of which should flatter the wedding dress and the bride’s hair and skin colouration.

Try to get a wedding dress that fits perfectly. This sounds obvious, but it is easy to think that you can make minor changes yourself later on. However, making alterations is not as easy as it sounds and you could end up making matters worse rather than better. In any case, you do not want to be worrying that a stitch you made will break or come undone at the wrong moment. It is far better to get a good fitting wedding dress than to get the precise colour that you want.

It is imperative to bear in mind the quality of the image of the wedding dress, if you are buying or hiring from a catalogue or website. You also should leave plenty of time to be able to return the dress if need be. The fact is that photographs are not always true to life and packers do make mistakes, so if your selection is not what you expected, when it arrives, you will need to have a couple of weeks to return it and obtain a new one. Allow at least three weeks for the exchange; longer if possible.

White has always been the most popular colour for first time brides, but it is not a rule. Off-white or pastel shades look very good too and they will set you aside from the norm. Apple white or blush pink are very effective colours for a wedding dress, but as I said before, everything should be colour co-ordinated with the colour of the bride’s skin and hair and the bouquet, if you are dead set on carrying a certain bouquet of flowers, like, say, gardenias.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is currently involved with Celtic Knot rings. If you have an interest in wedding rings too, please go to our website now at White Gold Claddagh Ring

The summer months of 1940 saw World War II reach the English skies as the Royal Air Force heroically fought off the endless attacks of Hitler’s Luftwaffe. After a phase known as the ‘Phoney War’, Hitler had ordered his forces to invade several other European countries and they met minimal resistance in Belgium, Holland or France.

Operation Dynamo had seen approximately 300,000 men of the BEF brought to safety by a flotilla of ships making the journey between England to Dunkirk over a number of days. So now Hitler had his sights on England. The white cliffs of Dover were clearly visible as the German High Command peered past the English Channel from Calais.

Nonetheless, unless the skies of England were under German command, Hitler couldn’t authorise Operation Sealion – the invasion of United Kingdom. With America being reluctant to participate in the war at this stage and her Allies overcome, Britain would need to face the Germans all alone.

Could Britain hold out until the summer was over when the weather would thwart the Germans from crossing the Channel? British hopes was in the hands of the brave pilots of the Royal Air Force, “The Few” as Churchill later referred to them. It wasn’t merely British airmen in the RAF, the Commonwealth was represented with pilots from an array of colonial outposts like as South Africa and Rhodesia as well as Poles and even a couple of Americans.

Hitler sent the Luftwaffe over to hammer UK into submission however crucially, their fighter escorts only had the fuel for only a few minutes combat before they would have to go back leaving the bombers unprotected. For the first time, the Luftwaffe came up against firm resistance and there was to be no repeat of their speedy victories on the Continent. Britain’s airfields in the south east were suffering a beating until one night in August 1940, a German bomber got lost and dumped its bombs over London before heading home. In retaliation, the RAF launched an air raid on Berlin.

Hitler was furious and instructed his aircraft to attack London and not the RAF airfields. This was a decisive turning point as it gave the RAF some much needed relief. The Luftwaffe failed to achieve the upper hand at any point and in mid September, Hitler indefinitely postponed Operation Sealion. The risk of attack was gone and Churchill spoke of the contribution of Fighter Command in a widely known speech “Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few”.

The number one fighter ace was Sgt Frantisek from the Czech Republic with a total of seventeen kills. He piloted a Hawker Hurricane which was the real workhorse of Fighter Command although almost everyone remembers the legendary Spitfire. Sgt Frantisek was killed in action in October 1940.

The Battle of Britain was the first occasion the Germans had sustained a military defeat during World War II.

Defeating Nazi Germany in the Battle of Britain meant that Britain and her Allies could carry on fighting World War II with Nazi Germany.

categories: world war II,britain,battle of britain,aircraft,military,war,reference,society,culture,history,humanities

On the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, many assumed it would be finished by Xmas. Devoted teenage men were eager to enlist in the army as soon as possible as they presumed they would miss out on the action. Suffice to say, history has confirmed that their positive outlook was misdirected as the war would not end till 1918. The German progress was halted at the First Battle of Marne and the drive for the sea developed as the Allies and Germans both dug in. It was the commencement of the trench warfare of the Western Front.

The outcome was lines of trenches running from the North Sea to Switzerland along a 440 mile front. The battle lines moved very little as a war of attrition broke out. Initial trenches weren’t well constructed and were liable to collapse. Even by trench warfare standards, 1914 was pretty lousy. As winter neared, the infantry on the front line realised that the war would not be all over by Xmas after all.

The Western Front ran through Belgium and France with infantry from France, Belgium and United Kingdom guarding a mixture of sectors. In some places, the German trenches were no greater than 30 yards away. Being in such close proximity allowed the soldiers to call to their opponents or even hold up signs. On the German belt buckles was the inscription “Gott Mitt Uns” (God is with us). The British reply was “We’ve got mittens too”. Some of the shouting matches were a bit more black humour. A volley of shots would draw the response “Missed” or “Right a bit”.

Nonetheless, it was these exchanges that laid the foundations of a few extraordinary moments across the Western Front on 24th December 1914. The Germans celebrate Christmas on the 24th as opposed to UK and France who celebrate on the 25th). The weather had improved and on the 24th, the voices from the German trenches were completely different. They began singing carols and set Christmas Trees on their trenches. Troops began calling to each other and inevitably, some embarked into no mans land where they spoke and swapped cigarettes, food and souvenirs. Stories of the truce may differ greatly as there were actually quite a few truces up and down the lines. They were predominantly in the sectors manned by the British as the Germans were occupying Belgium and French land so the Christmas spirit was less in evidence amongst these troops.

The Xmas Truce of 1914 was not official but as many as 100,000 men were believed to have been involved. As well as fraternisation, the chance was also taken to recover and bury the dead. One of the most famous parts of the truce was the football match between the British and Germans. There are a number of inconsistant accounts concerning the game with a number of finals scores. This would suggest there were various games at different places.

The duration the truce lasted also varied but generally, it was over on Xmas Day. By and large, the war resumed by mutual arrangement. In one case, on the morning of the 26th December 1914, Captain Stockwell of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers fired into the air and stood above the parapet. His opposite number in the German trench also stood up, they saluted and stepped down. Captain Stockwell heard the German fire a couple of shots into the air and World War I resumed. Never the less, the Xmas Truce was very much against the wishes of British commanders and in the following years, artillery barrages were ordered for Xmas Eve.

In 2008, a plaque to the Christmas Ceasefire on the Western Front was unveiled at the village on Frelinghen and was the 1st memorial to the incidents of Christmas 1914. The legacy the truce left behind is substantial with a variety of books being written and it was also the inspiration for a number of songs.

During the First World War, fighting on the Western Front was horrific yet despite this, British and German soldiers still found time to be human for a short time in December 1914.

categories: western front,history,culture,society,people,military,reference,britain,germany,football,soccer,christmas,xmas

There is a very large number of wedding rings to be had in the shops these days. In fact, you have the world of wedding rings to pick from. The high street shops in a large town have a pretty good assortment, but the Internet lays the best jewellers and the best styles out for your inspection.

So, it is very important that you take your time when choosing one. Maybe the enormous choice of wedding rings makes that more difficult not easier. Diamond wedding rings have been the most popular since ordinary working people could afford them, before that a plain band of gold had to suffice, for people who could afford that much.

Nowadays, Western people have become more adventurous and they are choosing other stones like the stunningly beautiful blue sapphire. Some even deciding not to have a stone at all, going back to tradition, so to speak. However, there are plenty of examples of not so simple bands of gold too.

There is the Irish Claddagh ring with its characteristic two hands holding a crowned heart symbolizing love, friendship and loyalty; and there is the Celtic Knot with its intricately interwoven strands twisting and turning without end, standing for eternity and eternal love despite the twists and turns and difficulties of daily life.

So, selecting a wedding ring is not just a question of choosing a beautiful wedding ring, you should be selecting one that says what you want it to say. You could look up on the Internet what the different metals and various stones mean traditionally. If you cannot find a ring that says what you want, consider having one made. It is not as expensive as you might think.

Tradition is a good thing when it comes to wedding rings. After all, you want your ring to express your eternal love and devotion for the person you are giving it to and your marriage could last fifty or sixty years, especially with people living longer these days. Hopefully, you will wear this ring for the rest of your life, so select a style that seems timeless to you.

Picking a wedding ring is not as straightforward as it looks, because you are going to be wearing your ring every day for the rest of your life, so it should be something that you will not get tired of in a couple years. You should look at and try on many rings in order to get one that feels comfortable. You will want a ring that does not look out of date in ten years time. The simplest method of doing that is to go for a traditional style, because those styles have already stood the test of time.

One last piece of advice is to ask the jeweller to attest to the total carat weight of the stones in the ring and the weight of each individual stone and the quality and weight of the metal (although it should be hallmarked) on paper, then if it gets lost or stolen you have something to show the insurance company.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is currently involved with the Celtic knot wedding ring. If you have an interest in gold rings, please go to our website now at White Gold Claddagh Ring

My friend has a store that sells glass artwork. My personal favourite glass artwork is paperweights and I have a lot of fun attending art auctions and buying art glass with her. We pay a lot of attention to what our friends and her clients like and dislike.

I often give people art glass paperweights that I find at art auctions for special birthdays and anniversaries. My mother turned seventy last August and I found a magnificent glass paperweight for her.

The art glass paperweight that I found for my mother was made by Baccarat and I was extremely lucky that this was one of the last items auctioned. A lot of people had already left the auction when this item went on the block. My mother really liked the rose motif because the rose is her favourite flower.

I have a Dutch friend from Den Bosch who loves effigies of frogs. She has managed to decorate her abode very stylishly with her favourite frogs. I have been on the lookout for an art glass paperweight for her for years. I finally found one at an art auction last year. The glass paperweight featured a frog sitting on a lily pad surrounded by blue water. It was really pretty and my friend began using it on her desk immediately.

I also have an aunt who collects art glass paperweights. She has asked me very often to find glass paperweights for her when I am attending art auctions. Of all of the pieces I have bought for her over the years, one sticks out in my memory more than any other.

The prettiest art glass paperweight I have ever won at an art auction has to be one that featured a blue and gold Macaw. Rick Ayotte was the artist that made it and it was even featured in a book of his work. He has created many lovely art glass paperweights.

There is no difficulty at all selling art glass paperweights made by Rick Ayotte. His work seems to draw a great deal of interest. My friend tries to win any auction she finds for art glass paperweights made by him. She won one not so long ago that looked like pink roses. They looked so fragile and sweet. I know that this art glass paperweight will sell quickly.

There have been some inquiries at the shop for art glass paperweights by Richard Marquis, although we have not found any in any of the art auctions we have attended recently.

I will keep looking out for art glass paperweights at the auctions I attend, but I will not be going way out of my way to track them down. I now buy every art glass paperweight I can find that was made by Rick Satava. My favorite has to be the coral orange jellyfish that I found at an art auction an hour from my home. It was really beautiful.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is currently involved with Waterford crystal vases. If you have an interest in Irish crystal or wedding rings, please go to our website now at White Gold Claddagh Ring

The practice of giving and wearing a wedding ring dates back thousands of years. A wedding ring symbolizes faithfulness and love between two people and are given on the day of a couple joining forces. Before the time that the knowledge of how to work metal became widely known, people used such things as plants, grass and even hair to ‘tie the knot’, which is what I think a wedding ring stands for.

These days a typical wedding ring might be made from precious metals such as gold, titanium, platinum or even white gold. Women’s wedding rings often hold a diamond, although sapphires are rapidly becoming more prevalent. Men’s wedding rings are frequently just a simple band of gold. There are many different styles of wedding rings, but the most popular for men is definitely the plain gold band.

For those who want something a bit more flamboyant, there are plenty of examples on the market. A man might want a more ostentatious wedding ring, because it is frequently the only piece of jewellery that a man wears. Some alternatives to the plain band of gold are the Celtic Knot and the Claddagh gold rings.

It is essential for men’s wedding rings to be made from a strong alloy of gold. Most men do manual labour of one sort or another, even if it is only gardening, so it is a lot to ask of a pure gold wedding ring to last thirty or forty years.

A 14 or 18 carat gold ring will probably do it, but a 22 carat ring would not. It would just wear away because it is too pure and consequently too soft. Platinum or titanium are much harder, although most people prefer gold.

In most countries tradition dictates that people wear their wedding ring on their left hand, although in a few countries such as Germany, Russia and Norway, people wear their wedding ring on the right hand.

Some couples would rather have a unique wedding ring and that is not so hard to accomplish as it might first seem. The easiest way to personalize your ring is to have an inscription like names and a date engraved on it.

Another way, would be to buy a precious stone separately and have the jeweller set it into the ring for you. The best option though is to find a jeweller you can trust and have him or her make up a pair of matching rings to your own design. I have done that and it is not a lot more expensive than a decent ring.

Wearing matching wedding rings is a notable experience. People notice that your ring is ’something different’ and many people ask, where you got them from. It all goes to help make that special day unforgettable for ever.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is currently involved with theCeltic Knot wedding ring. If you have an interest in wedding rings too, please go to our website now at White Gold Claddagh Ring

No one actually knows when stained glass was first invented because it occurred before people started recording history. However, some historians reckon that it was first used as an extravagance in the homes of affluent Romans in the first century AD. Stained glass was finally acclaimed as an art form in the fourth century as Christians started to worship candidly and to build intricate churches in which to observe their religion.

On the other hand, some historians show that there are remnants in ancient ruins that imply that pagans used stained glass in their ceremonies. Although we will most likely never really learn the origins of stained glass, it is pretty certain that the proliferation of Christianity is immediately related to the spread of use of stained glass.

The Gothic Era commenced in the 12th Century and stained glass windows became an essential element in the design of cathedrals. It really all started with the pioneering style of the St. Denis, France, where stained glass windows were used to convey light into the church itself and into the minds of its worshipers. Sadly, most of the stained glass in the St. Denis Cathedral was destroyed in the course of the French Revolution, but there are a few pieces left and even some complete windows on exhibit in Europe.

Gothic style stained glass was composed of strong lines, but these increasingly went out of style as the Renaissance began. During the Renaissance, artisans showed greater detail and more delicate colouring in order to add to the realism. Stained glass windows became more like paintings on glass than architectural features and some of the notable features such as lead lines vanished. Because of the problems in showing the great detail essential to the Renaissance era, the old style, which was true stained glass almost died out.

Since stained glass was used mostly by the Catholic Church, much of the work was destroyed during the reign of King Henry VIII after his break with the Pope. However, not only old stained glass windows were destroyed, but many of the glass making works were destroyed too. However, religious turmoil was not the only cause of the wane of stained glass.

The fashion of the Baroque era was for more detailed murals, which meant the use of clear glass. Therefore, many of the remaining stained glass windows were allowed to fall into disrepair, and furthermore not many new stained glass windows were produced. In the late 17th century, the public mood returned to the Gothic style of architecture, which produced a renewed fascination in stained glass windows.

Artisans continued to paint directly onto the glass at first, but later tried to imitate the old leaden frames of medieval times. However, since the original techniques had not been used for such a long time, they had become forgotten and the artisans of the period were unable to recreate the exact styles prevailing in Gothic stained glass.

In the 19th century, La Farge and Tiffany created new variations of stained glass. La Farge tended towards window designs, while Tiffany went into new areas like the Tiffany lamp shade.

Nowadays, stained glass artists are not limited by religious doctrines, although much of the work they do involves restoration. Modern stained glass is also used as the centre pane in front doors, especially uPVC doors, by rich and poor equally in the West.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is currently involved with Waterford crystal vases. If you have an interest in Irish crystal or wedding rings, please go to our website now at White Gold Claddagh Ring