Charm Obsession

I boarded the Juicy Couture charm train late in the game. I don't even know how long Juicy Couture has been making these things, but it all started for me in May 2007. My friend M. and I had started hanging around the costume jewelry case at Bloomingdale's staring down at the vast array of Juicy charms. They're large, and many of them are very detailed, with little rhinestones, tiny writing, parts that move, and parts that open, revealing little details inside, like a heart box of "candy", only the "candies" are many multicolored rhinestones. There's a jewelry chest that open, revealing tiny gold chains and strands of pearls, and a mini snow globe that really works.

I bought her the starter charm bracelet and a charm for her birthday mostly because I was glad that she liked something yellow gold (the bracelet is gold plated). She's quite the little goth and the whole time I'd known her, which is about 5 years, she'd disliked yellow gold, preferring silver. I love yellow gold-- I love white gold, too, but yellow is most flattering on me. I always thought yellow gold would be most flattering on M, too, because as a child she had a lot of honey/gold tones in her hair (which is now a darker brown).

Some time later, our friend R. bought me a Juicy charm bracelet, too, and I began collecting charms. Recently I got R. a bracelet as well. Juicy makes several different bracelets, so ours are all different, and we each have different charms. M. and I love to discuss charms when we're bored, ranking the ones we like and dissing the ones we don't.

This one is actually my *second* Juicy charm bracelet! After I saw the movie Blood Tea and Red String, I started to love red, white and blue. Not in a patriotic, American flag way, but more in a French-y, nautical, classic way.

The blue swallow (sparrow?) was a Christmas gift from M. and the nautical heart was a recent "just beacause" gift from DD. The red heart came with the bracelet and is the only part that doesn't come off.

I'm on the hunt for a red, white and blue popsicle charm and a red and white life preserver charm. Both are discontinued and difficult to find.