Hats, Hearts and Jewels

I decided to create my website around hats. They seem to fit so many personalities from fun and casual to alluring and seductive. A woman has to be confident to wear them, and love herself enough to pull them off. After a photoshoot begins, it ends with edits. As I peruse photos for the perfect picture of my jewelry designs, there, in each photo, is the forever flaw of my chest scar… a remanent from a long and hard battle from breast cancer.

I stop and think… a photograph may capture a glimpse of our personality, but it’s never the whole picture. I’m a real person behind Duck River Pearls, and you need to know me by my authentic self, imperfections and all. The truth is, we can always photoshop away our external flaws, but unless we learn to love ourselves with the same confidence from whom we were designed after, we fool no one. No matter how beautiful and ageless we wish to look, our appeal emanates from within.

Our character, and the full jewelry box of life experiences are like hats, and women wear many of them; from youth to womanhood, to single and/or married, child to childless, and often a selfless caregiver to the end. In our lifetime of snapshots, we become a different individuals with each decade of our limited existence. Through all our hats we wear, we carry the same satisfactions and disappointments of life under the brim, and it’s not often visualized in a photograph.

I want each of us to experience abundant love, and give ourselves (and one another) full grace and mercy. Each of our journeys are valuable; they are the jewels we wear closely in our hearts. I wish for us a lifetime of laughter, the power of good character, true happiness, habitual gratefulness, and a courageous spirit. I encourage you to delight in life, and wear every kind of hat that expresses your authentic self. Grow well, my friend, grow beautifully, and grow in confidence knowing that you are adored from above. You are a jewel, scars and all.