Raise your hand if you grew up in the 90s? Okay. Now raise your hand if you went home after school and sat on ICQ (or MSN Messenger or AOL Instant Messenger) for hours upon hours? That’s what we thought.

Our first introduction to the “emoticon” started around then –we can still hear and mimic their signature “Uh oh!” and “You’ve got mail,” respectively. It felt like our lives were documented through those tiny symbols that perfectly described our inner mood and feelings, (better than any mood ring, of course), which then, consequentially, led to endless hours spent decoding each and every one of them. By the time we moved into the BBM era, everyone knew the golden rule that a :) at the end of a sentence meant “Just kidding. But, no, in all seriousness, I mean it.” It was like the perfect way to say something really rude or snarky to someone and then get away with it… kind of like how Regina George complimented that girl on her “vintage skirt.” Admit it; you’ve done it! And when your friend couldn’t go out because she was – cough, cough – “too sick,” you put a :( face as if you were so upset, when in reality you were just like, “Yes! Thank god she’s not coming!” Eventually the :) and :( turned into :D and :p and ;) and a :*( and :o and anything else you could possibly make with a slew of symbolic code.

… and then came Emoji, which basically replaced the entire human language. In fact, there should be a Webster’s dictionary for the amount of decoding you need to do on your iPhone with those. Just ask GIRLS’ Ray, who’s all like what does a “panda next to a gun next to a wrapped gift” even mean. “It makes no sense!"

The emoticon trend has even found it’s way into fashion, naturally. And of course, our own Coveteurs’ closets. We’ve seen pieces from Lorraine Schwartz’s “2BHappy” collection in both Jen Atkin and Lola Rykiel’s jewelry drawers. The collection, which came from an epiphany Schwartz had while on a business trip, sparked a smiley face revolution.

Aside from Topshop’s :) and :( earrings, necklaces and even cufflinks for the Emoji-loving man, we fell hard for Alison Lou’s inaugural collection featuring GIRLS’ Jemima Kirke. Whatever your mood, there’s an emoticon jewelry for that. And when there are no words, you can always use Emojis.

So even on the days when you’re feeling blue, you can rock a smiley face to fake it. And you know what they – okay, Louis Armstrong – once said, “When you’re smiling, the whole world smiles with you!”