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Return of precious family heirloom brightens the holidays for Island woman

Lost family ring found atop the snow in Uplands Park on Christmas Day
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Oak Bay police hope to reunite a ring found near Uplands Park on Christmas Day with its rightful owner. (Oak Bay Police/Twitter)

Thea Nation credits a hawk-eyed woman walking in Uplands Park with her Christmas miracle.

“I’m still so very overwhelmed,” Nation told the Oak Bay News, less than an hour after picking up a priceless family heirloom from the Oak Bay Police Department.

Nation grew up in Oak Bay, near Windsor Park and not far from where her father grew up on Windsor Road. So it was a return home for her when her son headed east for the holidays, and Nation was left looking after the house and hounds near Uplands Park.

While the dogs had their own walker, she did get out for walks herself each day.

Nation figures in the kerfuffle of looking after pets and shovelling unexpected snow she didn’t realize she lost a valuable family heirloom – a wedding ring found among her great aunt’s jewelry after she died in 2017. Nation called ‘dibs’ as the aunt was also her godmother.

“It’s the only thing I have of my paternal grandmother,” Nation said. “I finally received it when my uncle died Boxing Day last year.”

She’s worn it every day since.

Back at her Victoria home on Dec. 29, she realized it was missing.

“I was beside myself and I thought OK that was the end of that.”

Nation called her son, asking him to look around the house on the off chance it was there.

He responded with an image of a ring he found online, after the Oak Bay Police Department posted a photo to its website and Twitter.

“I burst into tears and started to cry. I phoned the police station still in tears,” Nation said.

She described the ring and it’s engraving “For God. For King. For Audrey, which is the name of my grandmother.”

A walker found it atop the snow on Christmas Day, Nation explained, having spent a solid 10 minutes on the phone with the Good Samaritan who turned it into the police department.

“It’s a Christmas miracle for me,” she said. “As my mother would say, God is good.”

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christine.vanreeuwyk@blackpress.ca