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Newlywed Finds Lost Ring in Castle Rock Lake

  • from Madison (Wisconsin, United States)
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I am a Newlywed of last August, so my husband and I have been married roughly 11 months. We have been together for over seven years and are best friends. We relocated to the New Lisbon, WI area three years ago and are lucky to live on beautiful Castle Rock Lake. Over The Fourth of July weekend, we had our family visiting from out of town and went over to a little island in the middle of the lake; better known as “Alcatraz”. We were having a blast and hanging out in the water near the north side of the island. We were playing catch and I threw the ball to my sister. Little did I know that I had just flung my diamond ring into the water filled with tons of people and boats! A friend had said, ” I think you just lost your ring” and we all wondered who he was speaking to; until I realized it was me. I went from laughing to frantic as we all searched around the area. Fortunately, he had seen me do it and we knew the area to look around, but to my despair we came up with nothing after an hour. I felt so horrible that I had lost my ring that my husband worked hard for and that we didn’t have insurance. We talked about insuring it for a while and never seemed to get around to it. We ended up packing it up and heading to dinner. I felt like a part of me was missing! It wasn’t the materialism of the ring, but the symbol and thought behind the ring. My husband, Rich, also lost his ring at work a couple weeks before. I just keep thinking, now neither one of us has the ring we were actually married with.  The next day I decided I was going to rent a metal detector and go back out there to see if I could retrieve it. As I searched the sites, I saw that it was roughly $40 a day to rent or around $600 for a decent one, but then it hit me…I had no idea what to do even if I did get one.

I then thought…well Google, you basically have everything I ever would need to know; so maybe you  can tell me if I can hire someone. Bingo. After I plugged in the question a website popped up called; www.TheRingFinders.com. It gave me different people I could contact to help me find my ring and narrow it down by region of the world! Since I am basically an hour from any large city; I figured I would need to look for someone far from me. But, when I looked up areas in Wisconsin; there was a man in the Dells. I clicked on the link and came to Dan Roekle. He had other great success stories and also seemed like a very genuine guy. He also had found a ring in Baraboo with pretty much the same scenario. I was looking for pricing for him to come out; but he only wanted $25 for his expenses and reward if I could spare anything. I was ecstatic. I contacted Dan and within hours had responded and was asking lots of beneficial and professional questions. We went back and forth pretty much all day when he then said I can come out tomorrow if you are available. I couldn’t believe this kind man was giving me his Sunday, willing to drive from the Madison area and seemed so confident we could find it. He basically stated, we do it for the adventure and love helping others out!

The next morning Dan drove up to our lake house with his son Carter, 11, who is his right hand man during these “treasure hunts”. Not only were they very nice, I felt like I had known them for years. We all got on the boat and headed out to the island. My brother in-law met us out there and had the coordinates from his boat GPS that was so helpful to narrow down the area of where we were. It still was an area roughly 100 ft by 70 ft of water that was 3ft to 4 ft in depth. Carter would shift through the sand when Dan would let him now that the metal detector had detected something. They also switched and took turns listening and retrieving during the search which was awesome to see their teamwork. While they searched; Dan taught me about metal detecting as well. Things I would have never known! 1. You need a permit from the DNR in Wisconsin to search any bodies of water and need to let them know specifically what you are looking for. 2. The metal detector has different sensitivity levels that can search for things that are a few inches deep to 6 ft. depending on the setting. 3. Also that as soon as my ring had fallen off, it probably sunk 2 inches right away.

I am glad I didn’t spend money on a metal detector!  It wasn’t the sunniest day and the lake was kind of choppy. I felt so bad and asked if there was something I could do besides narrowing down the search area. Dan just replied no and kept looking. A little more time had passed and I was starting to think I wouldn’t see it again. Then Dan came walking back to me on the boat. I just thought to myself that he was coming to say he was cold and it was a lost cause. He said, “are you sure this is the area”? I said, yes and then he asked what it looked like again. As I started describing the ring…he said you mean like this? I saw my ring was on the tip of his pinky (I have tiny hands) and hugged him and smiled the largest I had in a long while! My husband, family and I were in complete awe! I had not only my ring back, but my faith in people and lost causes. I knew right then and there, this would be a story I tell for the rest of my life.

Dan and Carter were a God send to me. I still shake my head in disbelief at the miracle that they performed that day. They found a ring the size of a nickel in 14,000 acres of water, buried along with 20+ rusty bottle caps and pop tops!  I am so glad that I found him on www.TheRingFinders.com website and that people like him, even exist! So, if you have ever lost something that has been as important to you, put your faith in Dan to find it and you will be amazed as well.

Laura H.

 

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Lost Ring Found at Devil’s Lake State Park – Baraboo, WI

  • from Madison (Wisconsin, United States)
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Ring Found at Devil's Lake State Park

It was my 3 year anniversary, and my wife and I were celebrating at Devil’s Lake State Park in Baraboo, Wisconsin.   We hit the beach, and I decided to play some catch with a football.   I noticed that my tungsten carbide ring was a little loose on one of the throws, and I probably should have taken it off, but I didn’t.  On the very next throw I looked down and my ring was gone.  I wasn’t sure if it flew off on the throw, or fell off when I put my hand down.  I was sick to my stomach.  There were a number of people on the beach that day, so we rounded up 6-7 of them to help look for my ring.  However, after a long search, nothing turned up.  I thought for sure I would never see my ring again.

I called around trying to find a metal detector to rent that could be used in the water, but after calling a number of places … no luck.  I turned to Google and found the www.TheRingFinders.com website.  I contacted one of the members on the directory, but after a couple of emails back and forth, communication stopped and he didn’t seem interested in helping.  I then reached out to Dan, and he responded almost immediately.  Unfortunately, he was out of town on vacation, but he kept in touch and said he would help out if he could.  He lives in the Madison area, so I was impressed he was willing to drive close to an hour just to help me out. On Father’s Day weekend, he made the trip up to Devil’s Lake to search for my ring.

Dan asked tons of good questions to get an idea on the location, what I was doing at the time, how deep in the water I was, where I was standing and what my ring looked like.  He then performed the search on his own along with his 11 year old son, which I thought was cool.  He said after 2 hours, a handful of bottle caps, pop tops, $0.39 cents in change … he was about to give up and then got a promising hit on his metal detector – my ring.  Dan later called me and told me the entire story, I couldn’t believe it – he had found my ring.   Later that day we met at the park and he handed the ring back to me.  My wife and I both fought back tears, what am amazing feeling.  My wife and I can’t thank you enough Dan and Carter for finding and returning my ring!

Jonathan P.

06-14-2014

 

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Tungsten Carbide Ring                                              Devil’s Lake State Park Beach

 

 

 

 

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Lost Ring Posted on Madison Craigslist Website Found in Backyard

  • from Madison (Wisconsin, United States)
Contact:

Date: May 26, 2013

I had taken a week of vacation in order to complete various projects around the house, as well as tend to my gardening.  Midweek just as I was heading out the door to run some errands, I realized my wedding ring was not on my finger.  I quickly checked my pockets and it was not there, however I proceeded to run my errands.  Upon returning home, I looked in the two most likely places and unfortunately it was not in either spot.   I am a creature of habit and will put my ring in my pocket if I am putting on hand lotion, etc.  My husband quickly pointed out that the shorts I was wearing had a hole in one pocket.  We scoured the house for days looking high and low.  We even cleared out all of the closets to check the floors, but sadly we found nothing.  I was convinced I had lost my ring inside the house, but my husband thought it had fallen out of my pocket while I was gardening on my day off.  After a couple of days, we decided to post an ad in the “Lost and Found” section on www.Craigslist.com as a last resort.  That’s how we found Dan.  He quickly responded to the ad offering to help.  Since we had already searched the entire inside of the house, we thought it was worth a shot for Dan to come over and search our backyard with his metal detector.

I met Dan at our home on Saturday morning along with his young son.  He was very professional and it was clear that they had done this together many times.  I was impressed with the way he was using this task to teach his son the skills of metal detecting, as well as the importance of helping out others.  Together they swept the front yard and found quite a few coins, but no ring.  They did a very thorough search of both the front and the back yard, but initially did not find the ring.  The entire time they never gave up, and then suddenly Dan called me over … he had found my ring in the lawn along the side of the house.   I don’t know how many times we might have walked past it in the days since it was lost, but it was found.

I am very cautious when responding to an ad from Craigslist, but through the back and forth email with Dan to setup the appointment, I felt comfortable meeting him at our home on my own.  He was professional and very respectful of the fact that I had lost something very dear.  I cannot thank him enough and can only give him a glowing reference.

Thanks again,

Jean K.

 

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Lost Wedding Ring in Trophy Club, Tx while digging a trench in his yard!

  • from Dallas (Texas, United States)
Contact:

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On Sunday afternoon we got a call from a gentleman who had lost his wedding ring.  He had been working all day in his yard digging a trench to relieve some standing water.  After completing the several hour project he realized his wedding ring was gone.  He and his family search for 2 hours and had no luck.  He found “The Ring Finders” website and gave us a call.   We spent about 20 minutes covering the area which was crazy with signals due to a power line running under his backyard.  I decided to re-check the trench with full descrimination, looking only for gold.  I got a hit near the end of the 15ft trench about 6 inches down.  As  I bent down and used my pinpointer through the mud and water in the trench I saw a glint of GOLD in the hole.  The wedding ring was stuck in the wall of the trench about 4-6 inches down.  I turn and ask the homeowner,  I said, “I have a questions for you” “would you like to have this back and I handed him his ring“.

He and his wife were so excited they could not believe we found it… they kept saying “you guys are good, you guys are so good“.  The wife came out and gave us hug… it was another successful hunt for the “Dallas Ring Finders”.

Don & Ellen

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Gold Ring Found Edmonton, Alberta Canada

  • from Edmonton (Alberta, Canada)
Contact:

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Received a call yesterday afternoon from Matt in regards to finding his ring which was lost last November after his girlfriends chucked it over the fence into somebody’s back yard after having a disagreement, I asked Matt why it took him this long to try and find his ring he said since it had snowed that day his ring would be buried and it would be safe there until spring, yesterday he was searching on the internet and found me and the rest is history.

Matt told me he had permission from the owner to look for his ring. Made arrangement to meet this morning at the lactation, arrived in the back yard where there was around two feet of snow lucky for me the yard size was only 33’ x 50’ with a deck and fenced; Matt told me it was a heavy gold ring with his initials. Searched the area for about 30 minutes with no luck, then bingo ring found! Underneath the table on the deck somehow the ring must have bounced off something and ended up there as you can see by the picture the ring was very large. Mat & Sam was very happy to get the ring back once again. Thanks Matt for entrusting me and the TheRingFinders to search for your ring.

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Lost Ring Kemah, Texas (Recovered)

  • from Sugar Land (Texas, United States)
Contact:

  01/18/2014 I received the following e-mail

Subject: Missing Ring

 Hi my name is William and I lost a gold ring.  It is very dear to my family and I would like your help.  It is in Kemah.  Can you come by this week?

 Thanks

 WHT

 01/19/2014 William and I spoke on the phone and he outlined some of the details regarding his missing ring. William said he and several friends where at another friend’s house down in Kemah, Texas.  He said they were all out on the ground level deck visiting and enjoying the outdoors when his girlfriend dropped her 18kt ring.

 William said they heard the ring hit the deck; it bounced of his shoe and disappeared either into the grass or under the deck.  He said they search for the ring and later found www.theringfinders.com website and sent an e-mail.

 A few lesson learned on this search, I normally ask and get a pretty through “CAN” report which is an acronym for Conditions, Actions, and Needs (Firefighter Terminology).

 Gathering all relevant information as normal I scheduled a trip for Thursday 01/23/2014.

  I made the trip out to Kemah on Thursday as scheduled and met William at the location provided. As I arrived, I could see some time had been spent looking for the ring. The large wooden deck had been jacked up in one of its corners with a large bumper jack. (The point is coming), “the actions portion of the CAN report.”

 After introductions and a firsthand account of how the ring was lost, I began searching the grassy area around the deck and then began the process of crawling under the deck to find the lost ring. To be expected, the deck had its share of beer tabs and bottle tops, but no ring. I spent an hour working the areas around and under the deck with no positive result.

 It was at this point the decision was made to lower the jack and move it to the other side of the deck. The plan was to jack up the opposing corner of the deck and check the areas I could not reach. As I examined the jack, I thought to myself Williams a pretty sharp guy; he used the large steel water utility cover as a footing for the jack.  I started looking for something to use on the other side as a footing for the jack. I again ran my hand held around the edge of the cover checking for the ring, but no luck.

 It was at this point William grabbed the large steel utility cover off the ground (OK, will stop here with the story)

 William had brought the steel utility cover along with him to use as a footing for the jack. I couldn’t believe it; it looked like it belonged there, and had been there a long time.

 Well, I think we all know where the ring was found, under the cover WOW. William had put the large steel cover right over the ring.  I went around that darn cover 20 plus times; knowing in my mind, that the utility cover was their long before any of us. (wrong). This was where I failed in my CAN report, “Actions” what actions had been taken. 

 One can never ask enough questions. I am still laughing about this one.

 William was glad to get his girlfriend’s ring back, all in all a good day for everyone.

 

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 CTX 3030

Pin pointer Pro

Tylenol

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Lost Ring Found in Snow Bank – Middleton, WI

  • from Madison (Wisconsin, United States)
Contact:

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I got a call from Brian, who was referred to me from Jean, a woman I had helped out the previous year. She had lost her ring in her backyard while gardening. When she had heard that her friend Brian had lost his ring, she immediately told him to give me a call.   The day was January 6, 2014. The temperature was -17 degrees, with a -41 degree wind chill. Let’s just say it was cold. My son and daughter were home from school, due to the historically low wind chills. After I got off the phone with Brian, my wife said – “You’re not actually going to go look for it in this weather, are you”? Well, Brian was in Middleton, which is my home town, so it wasn’t much of a drive. She just shook her head. We brought our metal detector along, but it was simply too cold to do the hunt. We were able to get the story on how he lost his ring, as well as a general idea on the search area.

Earlier in the week, Brian was over at a neighbor’s house for dinner. Shortly afterwards, he became sick to his stomach and said he had to return home, which was about 4-5 houses away. Unfortunately, Brian did not make it home. He threw up shortly after leaving, stumbled and fell into a snow bank. He said the next thing he remembered is waking up in his own bed, but he had no idea how he got there. After he woke up, he asked where his wedding ring was – it was not on his finger. He figured someone had taken it off while helping him up to his bed. However, no one had removed the ring and no one knew where it was. He thought back to the night before and remembered that he was not wearing gloves when he walked over to his neighbor’s house. His best guess was that it had slipped off when he passed out in the snow bank.

The next day, Brian had attempted to shift through the snow himself looking for his ring, but had no luck. As a last resort, Brian like so many others, rented a metal detector with hopes of locating it. However, after hours of frustration he gave up. You see, using a metal detector isn’t overly difficult, but figuring out what all the beeps and tones mean is something that takes practice and a lot of patience. You wouldn’t believe all the metal junk that is buried in the ground.

Once the weather had warmed up a little (literally back up to 0 degrees – the winter in WI that year was one of the worst), my son and I returned to Brian’s neighborhood to begin our search. Brian had given us a general area to search. We could see the piles of snow that he had searched through already. After about an hour of searching, we had nothing.   It was cold, and we were about to call it quits when I told my son, “5 more minutes”. Well, it only took 2 and we had a strong signal. A couple scoops of snow and right there staring back at us was Brian’s shiny tungsten carbide wedding ring.

Carter and I got a quick picture with our find, and then handed it back to Brian. He still couldn’t believe that we found it, because he had search and searched on his own. He figured someone had picked it up and he would never see it again. Brian gave us a nice reward, which went toward two nice hot glasses of hot chocolate!

 

Brian S.

01-06-2014

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Tungsten Carbide Ring                                             Snow Bank

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Lost 3 Ring Wedding Set Raking Leaves in Backyard, in Cedar Hill,Tx

  • from Dallas (Texas, United States)
Contact:

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We received a call from Christine about 3pm on Sunday afternoon.  She got our name and number from a friend she had told that she had lost her wedding set of 3 rings.

Christine lives on about a acre of land, she had gone out to the back of the property to help her husband bag up some leaves that he had been raking together.  They worked together for about a hour and finished up and carried the bags of leaves up to the garage about a half acre away.   That was when she realized that her Wedding Set (3 rings) was missing.  In a panic, she and her husband looked all over the yard, they dumped the leaf bags out but did not see anything.  They spent several hours looking with no luck.   Later in the day while talking with her friend, she told her about the lost rings.  Her friend said, wait a minute I heard about this website of people who find rings.  She Googled and found “The Ring Finders” website and called Christine back and gave her our number.

It was about 3pm when Christine called and she lived 41 miles from us.  I told her we would be there in about and hour & a half.  We needed to hurry as I was concerned it would get dark and it was already quite cold, and the darkness would only make it colder.   We arrived and got our 2 Garrett AT Pros and Pinpointers out then Christine walked us to the back of the acre of property.  She showed us all the places she walked and was helping her husband with the leaves.   Ellen and I chatted about what area we would grid off visually and began to detect.   Within 10 minutes I hear Ellen say “Here’s One”,  I joined her as we looked through about 4-6 inches of leaves in a pile but nothing else rang up on the detectors.   I told Ellen to keep looking and I ask Christine to show me the bags of leaves, my thinking was that if one ring was in the pile of leaves that they had been bagging then it was likely the other rings would be in the bags of leaves near the garage.   I began to scan the full plastic bags of leaves with my detector and got 3 very light hits.   I kept scanning but nothing else hit so I backed up to the bag with something metal inside.   I tore a small hole in the bag and began to stick my Pinpointer into the bag.  As I got a signal, I used my hand to begin pulling out whatever the metal was.  1st hit was piece of wire, the second was a metal screw and the 3rd hit I could not see it.  Finally I saw a glint of Gold in the bag.  I began to smile but had to fight the leaves to find it, and finally the smallest of the 3 rings rings was found.   Christine was standing right beside me and could not believe I found it.  Now the only ring missing was the most expensive, the diamond solitaire with several small diamonds around the band.   After determining that nothing else was in the 4-5 bags of leaves, I walked back to the rear of the property and told Ellen that I had found one but that one was still missing.  She had been working out visual grid and I went back and started back over the grid working the opposite direction.   I made several passes checking every 2inch or less hit that I got regardless of the type of signal.  Then I got a shaky 44-46 hit that was very weak,  as I was checking everything I almost kept going but thank goodness I did not.  I reached down and moved the leaves and grass and there it was, the diamond solitaire twinkled at me.  I reached down and picked it up and ask Christine, “Would this make you Happy!”  She and her husband were so excited and grateful.  It is so much fun to see the reaction of our customers when we are successful.

So 3 rings, 1 in the leaf pile, 1 in a trash bag a 1/2 acre away and one in the grass 5-6 feet away from the 1st one.

Another successful hunt for “The Ring Finders”.

Don & Ellen Wilson – Dallas/Ft Worth

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Platinum Ring Lost in the Bush, Maungaraki, Wellington, New Zealand

  • from Wellington (New Zealand)
Contact:

Anna was putting up some Christmas lights on the handrail of their deck.  When finished she realized that her Platinum engagement ring was no longer on her finger.  There was a 2 – 3 metre drop into native bush below.

Anna with her Platinum engagement ring firmly secured by her wedding ring

Anna with her Platinum engagement ring firmly secured by her wedding ring

There was some heavy undergrowth to get through and when I started swinging the coil on the CTX3030 I was picking up trash all over the place.  I was also having problems with the standard size coil.  I was using the Propointer to eliminate as much junk as possible, but I had to bring out the good old AT Pro with the 6in coil just so I could maneuver around the vegetation.  I hit another trashy area and used the Propointer to clean it out.  Thought I had everything but gave the area another sweep and got a good clear signal with the right number.

When the leaves were brushed aside the ring was exposed

When the leaves were brushed aside the ring was exposed

I couldn’t see anything but the Propointer was telling me there was still something there.  I brushed away the leaves and Anna’s beautiful Platinum and diamond ring was just sitting there.  It is amazing how these rings manage to bury themselves so easily.

Well, the reaction from Anna was magic.  She was so excited and I think the smile in the photo says it all.

Lovely to meet you Anna and I appreciate the generous reward.

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Small Gold Ring Lost at Moa Pt, Wellington, New Zealand

  • from Wellington (New Zealand)
Contact:

From out of the ashes

Gisele had been to a bonfire party on the beach and during the night, while sitting on a log in front of the fire, she flicked her hand and lost a very small gold ring.  All her friends searched in the sand but they were unable to find it. She found out the next day that another group had moved in on their bonfire when they had left, and had shifted a lot of sand into piles to make a wind break and then covered the fire with sand when they had finished.

When my wife and I met up with Gisele she was able to show me an identical ring.  She had made both these rings herself from the gold of a friend’s mother’s ring.  They fitted on her little finger and were a very thin band with a small peridot stone mount. I have just bought a CTX 3030 and although I am very impressed with its abilities I was thinking this was going to be a difficult search.  I ran the coil over the ring’s twin and it showed a low reading, so at least I had a target reading.

Fire on the left. Mound to the right after I had spread some of the sand out.

Fire on the left. Mound to the right after I had spread some of the sand out.

A quick scan over the area just brought up lots of trash.  As I got closer to where the fire had been the sand was full of nails and it was apparent that they had been burning old wooden pallets. I then turned my attention to the windbreak mound.  As it was about 2 feet deep I knew I had to dismantle the mound shovel by shovel to make sure it wasn’t there.  Lots of nails and melted aluminum but no gold ring.

I then did another test with the other ring to see how deep I could pick it up.  With the ring on my plastic shovel I piled about 100mm (4ins) of sand on top and barely got a reading.  This was a bit worrying as this ring could easily be deeper than that.  I was moving sand a shovel full at a time and spreading it out and rechecking with the metal detector.

Gisele and my wife helped out by sifting through the ashes in the fire, with their fingers, to remove as many nails as they could find.  I then moved on to a small pile beside where the main fire had been.  It looked like something else had been burning there and a pile of sand had been thrown over the top of it.  It was full of nails but I started to spread it out and double checking each scoop before putting another scoop on top.  More nail signals and I was just about to put another shovel full on top when a got just a small beep in the right numbers.  I couldn’t get it to repeat because there were so many nails there but I could see the cursor on the screen occasionally flick down to that area.

Blackened gold ring after I brought it to the surface with the Pro Pointer

Blackened gold ring after I brought it to the surface with the Pro Pointer

It was one of my last chances so I got the pro pointer and started removing everything that set it off.  After about eight nails I lifted a blackened ring to the surface with the end of the pro pointer.

I don’t know who was more surprised – me or Gisele, when I told her to come over and have a look. She threw her arms around me and nearly knocked me over.  This is what makes the 2 hour search all worthwhile.  Certainly the hardest successful search I have done to date.

So it looks like the other party had shoveled some sand over the fire to put it out and the ring had gone into the fire with it.  It had been blackened by the fire but didn’t appear to be damaged so I am sure Gisele will be able to clean it up and get it back to original condition.

I am so glad I had the opportunity to find this ring for Gisele – it meant a lot to her.

Gisele holding her tiny ring

Gisele holding her tiny ring

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