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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think that people who spent £12,000 on an engagment ring are very silly and pretentious.?

138 replies

vio · 24/09/2008 23:14

Recently a very good friend of mine just got engaged, she was given the chance of choosing an engagnment ring at Cartier in London, with a budget up to £12.000 ..though at the end she chose one cost £8.500 but I thought that's a complete waste of money...on the other hand, I felt bad for judging people becos everyone has its own right to spend money right?

OP posts:
Twelvelegs · 25/09/2008 14:27

Mine is a pink sapphire (3 ct) with 6 diamonds (making 2 ct) half around the band. It's my second as considering how much DH was earning at the time (and spending on himself) I felt that the one before was an expensive lunch and not the thought and sacrifice it is supposed to resemble.

Megglevache · 25/09/2008 14:28

I bet it's a lovely ring.

Twiglett · 25/09/2008 14:29

www .. your fantasy ring is rather similar to my engagment ring [preens]

patently I think the OP is being unreasonable .. if it's a ring you're going to wear for your ENTIRE life you better be sure you love it .. and if what you love is a big fuck-off diamond in a simple platinum setting and you can afford it .. then you go for it (of course the insurance premium for the ring on it's own is sufficient karmic punishment)

LadySanders · 25/09/2008 14:30

www, my engagement ring from exh is similar to your 'want' one, but in the unlikely event my dp proposes properly (see thread...) i would love something exactly like the one you have...v pretty

handlemecarefully · 25/09/2008 14:43

I got told off on here once for wanting to spend a much more modest (but granted, not cheap) £3K on a ring to replace my wedding ring which kept shedding diamonds. Apparently I should only spend £1k and give the rest to charity about 12 posts up from my OP. I never did get that bloody ring!!!! (I think we probably decorated the sitting room instead )

Sh*t that was embarrassing, posted it on the wrong thread initially. Not sure it is interesting enough to bother to repeat it, lol

handlemecarefully · 25/09/2008 14:45

OOOps - and here is the thread

about 12 posts up

I'll get me coat.

MummyAnnabella · 25/09/2008 15:03

my ring was similar price to your friend and tbh i find it insulting that you would consider it silly and pretentious so imagine how much worse your "friend" would feel.

like others have said there is a hint of jealousy there. why ask why they went to london? i would just assume that it was part of their special experience and be happy for them.

i got mine in tiffanys new york where we were when he proposed and the memory will last me a lifetime. my ring is the best present i ever got in my life and it never leaves my finger. it is not silly as i will wear it very day for life and then pass to my dd one day and i am sure she will treasure it too.

WideWebWitch · 25/09/2008 15:03

Oh at your engagement rings!

Original poster
vio · 25/09/2008 15:15

I just want to say, the most important thing in my life isn't the ring, its my DS's lock of hair, it's in a little blue box with his name written on it. you cannot put any value to it, money cannot buy DS back, or health, that's my point. I was silly to use the word 'silly or pretentious' i supposed, it wasn't my intention to label anyone.

OP posts:
MorningTownRide · 25/09/2008 15:20

I wouldn't recognise a £12,000 ring if it stood up in my soup

Original poster
vio · 25/09/2008 15:27

and no i am not jealous...I have the best DH in the whole wide world even though he didn't buy me a £12K tiffany or cartier ring. The memory with DS though only 4/12 months...last me a life time too..that's true happiness in my opinion.

OP posts:
bloomingfedup · 25/09/2008 15:42

YABU. So what, their money and their lives. I would love a £12k ring. Are you jealous BTW?

imananny · 25/09/2008 16:09

i wear my rings all the time, have never taken off wedding ring since hubby put it on my finger

my engagement ring is a solitaire diamond,and I have a wishbone style wedding ring with 9 diamonds in it, so diamond can fit in middle of v

riven - do you have some kind of fund for the wheelchair you want to get - can i donate via paypal or just giving etc ?

Original poster
vio · 25/09/2008 16:10

their lives, their money.. true. perhaps i was being unreasonable. Anyway, i just can't justify it myself thats all.

OP posts:
mummypoppins · 25/09/2008 16:19

Riven I will help.....how can I donate ???

wannaBe · 25/09/2008 16:37

I would be afraid to wear a ring that cost that much. What if I lost it.

But

I would love to go into an expensive shop and try them on. Just because I could.

I do not have the advantage of being able to look in shop windows and think "blimy look at the size of that rock," so just once I would love to go into a reallly expensive shop and see just what a £12000 ring (or more if poss) actually looks like.

I did once try on a ring that was 6 grand. The woman in the shop didn't tell me what it cost until I had it on my finger - we were looking for a specific style of ring and she didn't ask cost, just brought one out and let me try it on. It was lovely. But suffice to say we didn't buy it. or anything remotely that expensive.

SaintRiven · 25/09/2008 17:21

just been telling DH about the price of rings. He said 'well you don't wear that ring (the £17 cubic zirconia engagement ring) anyway cos you say it catches in your clothes'
Umm, he's right there.
But I do have a eternity ring with the smallest diamonds in the world in. Its possible they are glass. Who'd know!? It was 60 quid.
Given no-one can tell how much they are, whats the point in uber-money when you can get something equally shiny and sparkly for less?
I'll start a different thread about dd's wheelchair bike.

imananny · 25/09/2008 17:58

excalty ST riven

the mums ring at school - worth £50K - I saw one almost the same in claire accessories for 7.99

nothing wrong with CZ

SaintRiven · 25/09/2008 18:10

did you buy it and go compare?

imananny · 25/09/2008 18:14

I used to wear a CZ on my right hand ring finger, and lots of friends admired it - cost £12.99

With engagement rings its not what it cost, but that the ring came from someone you love (and plan to marry and spend rest of your life with)

imananny · 25/09/2008 18:15

pink isnt my colour, so alas not - but her ring would pay off a HUGE chunk of my mortgage!!!

jasper · 25/09/2008 18:30

I agree with you.

wehaveallbeenthere · 25/09/2008 20:05

You do realize that you can get a perfect, colored if you prefer, lab grown diamond for much less the price of a mined diamond. Right?
There are jewelers that have bought up these lab grown diamonds and they are the bane of DeBeers because you cannot tell them from mined. They are grown from diamond crystals to 3 to 5 carats. Perfect. At a fraction of the equivalent size of a mined diamond.
I'm not talking about CZ, or any other substitute. They are real carbon base diamonds.
I read about it years ago in Wired magazine because they want to eventually make diamond chips for computers that will replace the silicone ones. They run hotter, faster and last longer.

staranise · 25/09/2008 20:19

my friend spent £10k on her wedding dress which I thought rather obscene for something you only wear once. But £10k wasn't that much to them, relative to their earnings. She is also now getting divorced.

Am grateful to be poor and happily married

pgwithnumber3 · 25/09/2008 20:43

It doesn't matter what your ring cost or is like, it is the state of your relationship which is the most important. I know of two women who have had 2.5 carat diamond rings worth a LOT of money, neither of them are still with their husbands. One of them ran off with an older man who could buy her bigger diamonds.

I didn't even have an engagement ring until we had been married 3 years and DH thought he would treat me as I had never even asked for one. We just decided to get married and never had an engagement as such.