Music Friday: The Light Inside of All of Us Is Like a Diamond, Sings Avril Lavigne

Welcome to Music Friday when we bring you uplifting songs with jewelry, gemstones or precious metals in the lyrics or title. Today, newly engaged Canadian recording artist Avril Lavigne performs “Fly,” a power ballad inspired by the athletes of the Special Olympics.

In this song about having the inner strength to overcome seemingly insurmountable challenges, Lavigne metaphorically states that “we were all meant to fly,” and compares the discovery of one’s special ability to unearthing a precious stone.

In the first verse, she sings, “There’s a light inside of all of us / It’s never hiding, you just have to light it / It’s the one thing that you gotta trust / It’s like a diamond, you just have to find it.”

Lavigne, who recently announced her engagement to fellow pop-punk rocker Mod Sun and shared a peek at her new 5-carat, heart-shaped diamond ring on Instagram, performed “Fly” live for the first time during the stirring opening ceremonies of the 2015 Special Olympics World Games in Los Angeles.

Proceeds from the song benefited the Special Olympics in association with The Avril Lavigne Foundation, a charity that provides support to children and youth living with serious illnesses or disabilities.

“This song means a lot to me personally,” Lavigne said at the time. “It is inspired by the many young people I’ve met throughout my work with my Foundation. They pursue their dreams no matter what obstacles they face.”

“Special Olympics’ mission is to unleash the human spirit through the transformative power and joy of sports,” she added, “so they’re a natural fit for this song.”

In 2014, Lavigne herself was faced with a daunting physical challenge when she was struck down with Lyme disease, a bacterial infection spread by ticks. The illness left her bedridden for five months.

“I felt like I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t talk and I couldn’t move," she said. "I thought I was dying.”

Lavigne was able to overcome her bout with Lyme disease and seemed to be in top form as she delivered a beautiful performance of “Fly” on July 25, 2015, in front of a stadium of onlookers and an international television audience.

Please check out the official video, below. The lyrics are are included if you'd like to sing along…

“Fly”
Written by Avril Lavigne, David Hodges and Chad Robert Kroeger. Performed by Avril Lavigne.

There’s a light inside of all of us
It’s never hiding, you just have to light it
It’s the one thing that you gotta trust
It’s like a diamond, you just have to find it

So if you ever feel like giving up
Yeah, just remember that.. we were all meant to fly

Spread your wings across the universe
It’s your time to—it’s your time to shine
There’s a light inside of all of us
Soon, you’ll find that it’s your time to fly
Your time to fly

A little help is all it ever takes
Somebody else to tell you it’s worth fighting
A single step becomes a leap of faith
That’s when you realize you started flying

So, don’t you ever say you’re giving up
No, there’s no looking back… ’cause we were all meant to fly

Spread your wings across the universe
It’s your time to—it’s your time to shine
There’s a light inside of all of us
Soon, you’ll find that it’s your time to fly
It’s your time to fly

Just reach up, don’t give up
Until you’ve touched the sky
Just reach up, don’t give up
Until you’ve realized…

That we were all meant to fly

Spread your wings across the universe
It’s your time to—it’s your time to shine
There’s a light inside of all of us
Soon, you’ll find that it’s your time to fly, fly

It’s your time to—it’s your time to shine, shine
Soon, you’ll find that it’s your time to fly

Spread your wings across the universe
It’s your time to—it’s your time to shine
There’s a light inside of all of us
Soon, you’ll find that it’s your time to fly

Credits: Photo by juliastavale, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Orange and Blue Sapphires, White Diamonds Tell Story of Astros' AL Championship

The Houston Astros’ colorful 2021 American League Championship rings tell the story of the team's impressive run to the World Series, where they narrowly lost to the Atlanta Braves in six games. The 10-karat white and yellow gold rings feature 104 round diamonds, 15 custom-cut diamonds, four princess-cut diamonds, 42 blue sapphires and eight orange sapphires for a total gemstone carat weight of 7.10 carats.

The Astros' players and coaches received their rings on Monday as they stood along the first base line at Minute Maid Park in an exciting ceremony prior to the team's 2022 home opener.

A beautiful design detail is the use of eight custom-cut orange sapphires to make up the star of the Houston Astros logo on the face of the ring. Rising above the orange star is the Houston "H" rendered in 15 intricately set custom-cut diamonds, symbolic of the Astros 15 franchise postseason appearances. The logo sits upon a background of 40 round pavé-set diamonds surrounded by a halo of 42 genuine blue sapphires.

Framing the logo in contrasting yellow gold — signifying the team’s 2021 American League Team Gold Glove award — are the words AMERICAN LEAGUE along the top and CHAMPIONS along the bottom. These words are accented with four princess-cut diamonds, two on each side of the ring face. These four diamonds represent the number of league pennants won throughout the franchise's history.

The ring's 104 round diamonds symbolize the 95 games won during the regular season and the team's nine post-season victories. The 60 diamonds accenting the perimeter of the ring top pay tribute to the Astros' 60th season in Major League Baseball.

The left side of the ring features the player’s name in capital letters, spelled out vertically in eye-catching yellow gold. To the right of the name is the player's jersey number rendered in diamonds. Completing the left side of the ring is an intricate rendering of the home of the Astros, Minute Maid Park.

The right side of the ring features the Astros wordmark logo accented with the championship year 2021. The American League Trophy in yellow gold stands out from the white gold background. A single diamond is set in the trophy, symbolizing the most recent American League championship won by the Astros. Four banners are set on either side of the trophy, each set with a single diamond representing the team's four trips to the World Series. These five total diamonds are representative of the Astros' current run of five consecutive ALCS appearances.

The interior of the ring reveals a bit of team history by featuring the Astros logo accented by four stars and the championship years of four league pennants. The palm side of the ring displays the team’s 2021 rally cry, “FOR THE H,” with the “H” being the Astros logo.

While the gemstone descriptions of the 2021 AL championship rings are impressive, they fall a bit short of the specs of the World Series rings awarded to the Astros on opening day 2018. Also designed by Jostens, those rings — the first World Series championship rings in franchise history — used 225 colorless diamonds, nine orange sapphires and 16 blue sapphires set in 14-karat white and yellow gold. Each ring weighed 90 grams and glittered with a total gem weight of 10.40 carats.

Credits: Images courtesy of Jostens.

Jon Batiste, Suleika Jaouad Tie the Knot Using Bread Ties for Wedding Rings

Jon Batiste, the musician who won big at the 2022 Grammys, revealed to CBS Sunday Morning that he and his bestselling author partner, Suleika Jaouad, secretly tied the knot in February — using bread ties as wedding rings — in a hastily arranged ceremony one day before her scheduled bone marrow transplant.

According to Jaouad, who is battling leukemia for a second time, her boyfriend had been planning a proposal for a long time, but hadn't popped the question because the ring was still in the works.

“He said to me, ‘I just want to be very clear, I’m not proposing to you because of this diagnosis. It’s taken me a year to design your ring. So, just know this timing has nothing to do with it. But what I do want you to know is that this diagnosis doesn’t change anything. It just makes it all the clearer to me that I want to commit to this and for us to be together.' But once we realized we had this tiny window before the bone marrow transplant, we decided to go for it," Jaouad said.

Jaouad described her wedding as a “tiny, beautiful, little ceremony” witnessed by a few members of the medical staff. She and Batiste pulled a few strings to get a marriage license right away and decided to use bread ties instead of formal wedding bands.

“And I’ll tell you, we walked into that bone marrow transplant unit on cloud nine," she said. "We were so happy, so brimming with love and positivity from this beautiful evening that we’d had. And I really believe that that carried us through."

Now, two months after their in-hospital ceremony, it seems as if Jaoaud did receive her proper rings.

During her interview with CBS Sunday Morning, the cameras offered a closeup of her ring finger, where she appeared to be wearing a three-stone emerald-cut diamond engagement ring, along with a bezel-set sapphire wedding band, both in yellow gold.

Batiste, 35, had been the star of this year's Grammy awards. He was nominated 11 times and took home five trophies, including the one for Album of the Year.

Jaouad became a New York Times bestselling author with her memoir, Between Two Kingdoms, which chronicled her diagnosis, treatment and recovery from her first bout with leukemia.

Batiste explained how their February wedding was an act of defiance.

"OK, this happened," Batiste said, "but this is not going to interrupt the plan that we had. This is just a bump in the road. The darkness will try to overtake you, but you just have to turn on the light, focus on the light, hold onto the light."

The 33-year-old Jaoaud shares the same positivity. The walker she uses is bedazzled with faux gemstones.

"Instead of looking at this walker and feeling a sense of dread," she said, "it kinda makes me happy."

Credits: Screen captures via cbsnews.com.