Rock Review: Dendritic Quartz

"cosmos ring" on etsy

While researching for this article, I learned something totally new! For the longest time, I was under the impression that my beautiful dendritic quartz stones were marked with impressions of fossilized plant material. That is what I had been told by the gem dealer who first sold me the stone. Even the word dendrite comes from the Greek “dendron” meaning “tree.” I continued buying the stone because it has such beautiful patterns, and it is a good, hearty stone. It is not easily scratched or broken.

I started looking things up about dendritic stones (they come in more than just

quartz) I found out that I was totally wrong about how those beautiful patterns got in the stone! My apologies for any previous mis-information on the subject. As it turns out, the patterns in dendritic quartz are part of a fascinating geological process. Where a deposit of quartz in the ground may have tiny fissures running through it, mineral solutions flow through the rock fissures. Hot mineral solutions including manganese and iron are percolating through the quartz base, and when cooled quickly, they are solidified and frozen in time!

Frozen in Time Dendritic Quartz Pendant

I feel glad to have that cleared up. I learn something new every day. Do you have any favorite stones with fun patterns? Let me know, and I'll try to find out how the cool patterns got there!

ROCK REVIEW: GARNET

Happy New Year! With a new year comes a new month, and this month’s beautiful birthstone is GARNET. Typically a red/brown color, garnet can be found in ANY color except for blue. Personally, one of my favorite garnet hues is a lovely magenta color known as Rhodolite garnet (see picture at the end of the blog post.) Found in abundance in Africa, garnet is also harvested in North and South America as well as in various European countries.

Derived from the Latin word for pomegranite, garnet has been used for centuries for its beauty but also for its supposed “lethal” nature. North American Indians used red garnets as arrowheads, believing that they would seek blood and inflict a deadlier wound, while as recently as 1892 the Hunzas of Kasmir used garnets as bullets to fight the British believing that garnets were deadlier than lead.

Also used frequently by early Christians to symbolize Christ’s sacrifice, and even earlier as a symbol by one of the 12 tribes of Israel, the garnet’s roots in history are as deep as any gemstone. A beautiful stone to highlight during these recently SNOWY, WHITE days of another northeastern US winter! Happy birthday to all garnet babies out there!!

Find this piece @

http://www.etsy.com/listing/64337710/sweet-sparkle-garnet-january-birthstone

Rock Review: Labrodorite

As you may have guessed from my new series of blog posts "Rock Review" – I’m a bit of a nerd! I LOVE to know history and fun details about the materials I work with. It makes creating and designing with these incredible, naturally forming materials even more exciting! So, from time-to-time, I plan to enlighten myself (and hopefully my readers) with a bit of detailed research about ROCKS.

The next ROCK on my RADAR is the Labrodorite. Originally discovered on St. Paul Island in Labrador Canada in 1770, this rock ranges in color from a brilliant blue to grey and can sometimes include a rainbow of colors. It is one of the many stones classified in the feldspar family (nerd alert: feldspar family is defined as: a group of rock-forming minerals which make up as much as 60% of the Earth’s crust, per Wikipedia – and we know they don’t lie!)

Labrodorite is best known for its “shiller effect," or in layman’s terms its iridescent colors reflected at different angles. The scattering of light causes this effect from the thin layers in the stone, formed during the earth’s cooling process. This why the labordorite is so unique – depending on the angle from which it is viewed, a brilliant flash of different colors can be seen!

In addition to its country of origin, GEM QUAILITY labordorite can be found in Madagascar, Finland, Russia and most notably in India. Aside from its enchanting beauty, this stone also comes with an Eskimo legend! According to generations of Eskimo legend, labordorite holds the Northern Lights captive. A powerful Eskimo warrior found the Northern Lights captive in this rock and freed some of them with his spear. Not all of the lights escaped and that is why Labordorite displays an array beautiful colors today.

Another great example of beautiful labrodorite can be seen in these earrings at my ETSY shop:

www.etsy.com/listing/64331359/living-large-in-labrodorite-dangle

A little fascinating fact and a little folklore legend makes for a great ROCK to REVIEW. Till next time!

Rock Review: Chinese Writing stone

http://www.etsy.com/listing/64925250/chinese-writing-stone-cocktail-ring

Chinese writing stone is a naturally occurring gem that is actually mined in the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas in California. Those who discovered the stone felt that the white crystal structure against the black stone looked like Chinese characters, hence the name Chinese writing stone. The majority of the stone is limestone, and the white flecks are andalusite crystals. Porphory is a second name for the stone exists which is rarely used in trade, though perhaps it is more PC. This gem is a recent discovery as rocks go. It was discovered during highway construction in the 1960's. It's beauty and durability make it a fantastic stone for jewelry making. It is a 5-6 on the Moh's scale of hardness, which makes it a reasonably tough stone. It is thought that Chinese writing stone is helpful in making a person dream. Pretty cool! Try sleeping with this ring on!

Rock Review: Serpentine

Serpentine ( hydrated magnesium silicate)

More of a mineral than a rock, Serpentine is so named because of its green, yellow or brown hue which resembles the skin of a serpent. Handle serpentine with care because it is porous and relatively soft, ranging from 3 to 5 on the Moh’s scale of hardness (that’s out of 10). This means that it should not be cleaned with an abrasive and chemicals including perfume should be avoided.

Although you may not have heard of serpentine, it has been used for thousands of years. It was used in ancient Assyria to invoke special blessings from the gods. It has also been used as a healing stone to aid in stomach and kidney ailments when laid directly on the skin. Here is a link I found on how to alleviate back pain with serpentine: http://www.ehow.com/facts_6017079_serpentine-stone-back-pain.html

Serpentine is found in New Zealand, China, Afghanistan, South Africa, USA, England, and Italy. While it is pictured here in a striking yellow with flecks of black hematite, it is also found in many other colors. Red, green, brown-red, brown-yellow and white are other colors varieties of the same mineral substance.

Droid Review

I am not the first to get very excited about any new-fangled technology device, but something incredible happened, and I had to share it.

Yes, I am rockin a new DroidX thanks to my mother in law who took a look at my old pitiful phone, and just couldn't stand it. She got me a new phone, and a good phone that will last more than a day out of warrantee.

To tell you the truth, I thought that this phone was a little too big. It wasn't my first pick for looks, but I was planning on getting a phone compatible with squareup--a credit card merchant device for small business to automatically get authorization on credit cards. I can't wait until that get hooked up, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

I kept saying, "all i want to do is make phone calls." I'm sure you've thought the same thing. Unless you are one of the proud few who have discovered how fabulous it is to have a really smart phone. The latest Droid is fast. Very fast. and to make it faster, I installed "swype" an app that allows you to type a word by drawing a path between the letters on the keyboard, rather than tapping each letter individually. Swype is changing my phone experience completely. Between slow internet and slow typing on a glitchy touchscreen, e-mails didn't seem possible on my old phone. Now, I am writing e-mails, messages, notes to my self, notes in my google calendar and more.

That's not even the greatest part. When the voice command button is pressed, I can tell it to do anything! It goes way beyond the simple "call mom"....it responds impressively to commands like"navigate to...," "map of..."I get instant google searches for anything i say, and the prefix "note to self" sends my every word to my e-mail inbox.

Because the Droid is powered by google, every g-application is top notch. Gmail, for instance, is very easy to get to, fast, well organized, and because of my "swype" revolution in typing, easy to use.

Ironically, I tried to use the droid to post this, but for some reason I couldn't get the keyboard to appear in the text body block for blogspot. Lol, so I guess it falls short somewhere, but if you have any ideas for fixing that problem, I'd love to hear them :)

Wordless Wednesday!
Brand-New Series Unveiled:
"Brandy Bracelet" Line by LayneDesigns

These new interchangeable pieces can be worn as either a bracelet or pendant. The best of both worlds!