[Kubilee]

I was going to have his name on me the first go around with the Unicorn, but at thelast minute I decided not to. I wanted to wait a little longer. So our deal was, if we are still married at 20 years, I will have it done. I looked and looked for a good year to find something I wanted to make it mean something.. and it just made sense, I am mostly Cherokee Indian, (and Irish) and I wanted to make it mean something.....

I found what I wanted, him and the Cherokee Roses, which I will post in a minute.. but these two things meant a great deal to me. I spent so long making it and then it hit me, while I wanted it to be a surprise, what would mean more than to have HIM, the man I loved and wanted to share this with, design it for me. So that's how it went.

Here is a brief bit of info on the Cherokee Rose.... and I think being with my husband for 23 yrs says enough of why his name went with it.

When gold was found in Georgia, the government forgot its treaties and drove the Cherokees to Oklahoma. One fourth of them died on the journey west. When the Trail of Tears started in 1838, the mothers of the Cherokee were grieving and crying so much, they were unable to help their children survive the journey. The elders prayed for a sign that would lift the mother’s spirits to give them strength. God, looking down from heaven, decided to commemorate the brave Cherokees and so, as the blood of the braves and the tears of the maidens dropped to the ground, he turned them into stone in the shape of a Cherokee Rose. The next day a beautiful rose began to grow where each of the mother’s tears fell. The rose is white for their tears; a gold center represents the gold taken from Cherokee lands, and seven leaves on each stem for the seven Cherokee clans. No better symbol exists of the pain and suffering of the "Trail Where They Cried" than the Cherokee Rose The wild Cherokee Rose grows along the route of the Trail of Tears into eastern Oklahoma today.

I have a pic somewhere of it, I'll see if I can locate it. It means so much to me.