Wearable memories

With each new day, comes new memories to hold and treasure; birth of a new baby, child's first steps, going to school, graduation etc. In the early months of a baby it seems that every day is a new memory we want to capture and hold forever.

Our emotional memory bank feels overflowing in those first few years. But what if you could capture one or two as real, tangible items?

When I started Sand Dollar Silver I thought I would love to make finger/hand and foot prints forever. My boys were still little and their toes and fingers were a wonder still me and so darn cute.

Seven years on I still proudly wear their fingerprints around my neck, firstly in awe of how little they once were and secondly to symbolise the growth in them and also me. As mothers we go through as much personal growth as the children do physically in the those first years – sometimes it feels more!

As the boys have grown, so has my business; with new products evolving that I couldn't even imagine in those early days. As we as a family hadn't yet reached those milestones, so neither had the business.

Handwriting has been added (for more than one reason), drawings and artwork. Like a baby scan, a child's drawing is something only that special person can see; and to that special person it means everything.

I feel over the years that the business has grown with my own children but also has been shaped a lot by our wonderful customers who enter into new stages of their lives.

As I mentioned earlier, handwriting pieces are becoming more popular and requested when a loved one passes away. We use a photograph of the handwriting on a card or note and are then able to reduce the piece and engrave it into a piece of silver jewellery or a key chain.

Fingerprints too are requested more for families whose loved one is slipping away. We offer a moulding compound which is quick, easy and non-intrusive to take the fingerprint imprint.

This has been a unexpected side of the business but something I feel incredibly proud to be asked to make. Until recently, I hadn't really advertised this option as I felt uncomfortable with how it would be perceived. Then a good friend of mine said something that made me see this in a different light - “you are able to make amazing keepsakes and are doing a disservice if you don't offer them”. So now we proudly offer memorial jewellery and keepsakes. Though not new to us, a new offering to our business.

Sand Dollar Silver is not about creating the next trend in jewellery, but creating wearable memories, A necklace for a new mom to wear when she returns to work after maternity leave; a charm to add to a bracelet for a proud grandmother who lives away, a key chain for a son whose father has passed away.

For whatever memory you want to capture, we are hear to listen, assist with and make your keepsake, which will be a reminder of that special time or person.