Apache Tears is the gemstone of the week

It was over 30 years ago when I saw my first Apache Tears stone and heard the legend of how it came to be called that. This stone has had a fascination for me ever since then.

Apache Tears is a type of obsidian which is a natural glass that forms from volcanic activity. It was first discovered in Ethiopia. Apache Tears are only one of eight types of obsidian. Obsidian is made from the same material as granite, but cools so quickly when exposed to air that the minerals don't have time to crystalize. It was highly prized during the Stone Age like flint, it could be fractured to make sharp arrowheads or blades. It has been used in surgical tools also. Well crafted surgical blades have a cutting edge many times sharper than high quality surgical steel scalpels.

Apache Tears are a deep, rich translucent brown color. The have a Moh scale rating of 5-5.5. Obsidian can be found in many places across the world, but Apache Tears comes only from Arizona. It is sometimes confused with Smokey Quartz because of the similarity of the color.

Obsidian is not a true mineral, although it is mineral-like. It is not crystalline and does not have a well defined chemical composition. It is usually at least 70% silicon dioxide.

The name, Apache Tears comes from an Apache legend. On what is now called Apache Leap Mountain, near Superior, Az., a small band of about 75 Apaches fought a large group of U.S. Calvary, in the 1870's. Rather than face defeat, the Apache warriors rode their horses off the mountain to their deaths. Their families cried when they heard the news and as their tears hit the ground, they turned into the gemstone, Apache Tears. The photo has some of the stones from my collection. 

On the metaphysical side, it is believed that Apache Tears can help alleviate grief. It is also believed to help with muscle spasms and twitches.

 

Amethyst is the gemstone of the week

Since Amethyst is the birthstone for February, I thought I would feature it as the stone of the week. In addition, it is also accepted as the gemstone for the sixth year of marriage. It is the most valuable variety of quartz. If it were not so widely found, it would be much more expensive. Amethyst is also seen in what are called Amethyst Cathedrals. These are huge geodes that have been cut in half to reveal Amethyst crystals. The pictures I found for them are copyrighted, so if you want to see some, just google them.

Amethyst comes in a wide range of shades from pale lavender to deep, almost black purple. Brazil is the largest producer of this gem. Amethyst from Uraguay produces a stone with a deep purplish blue color as does Amethyst found in Arizona. Siberian Amethyst which is still on the market, but no longer mined, has tints of red and blue. This type is hard to find and when you do find it, is very expensive. African Amethyst is a deep, rich purple. It is found all over Africa, but most commonly in Zambia. Smaller, deep purple Amethysts are also mined in Australia. On the Moh scale, it has a hardness of 7, so it is suitable for all types of jewelry. Some varities can fade is exposed to strong sunlight over a long period of time. This can be remedied by exposing it to X-ray radiation.

The name Amethyst comes from the Greek word “amethystos” which means “not drunken”. In this belief, many ancient wine goblets were carved from this gemstone. It has been found in ancient Egyptian tombs and graves in Anglo-Saxon England.

The most common enhancement for Amethyst is heat treating to deepen the color of the stone. If heated enough, it can produce Citrine and Prasiolite.

As far as the metaphysical properties are concerned, Amethyst is said to magnify right brain and psychic abilities, as well as strengthen immunities while energizing and purifying the blood. It is also believed that it can relieve headaches and improve blood sugar balance. Another belief is that if you place it under your pillow at night, it will give you a calm, peaceful sleep. It is considered a sacred stone in Tibet and rosaries are often made from it.

There are several legends surrounding Amethyst, but this is my favorite.

Dionysus was angered by an insult from a mere mortal, so he created fierce tigers to attack the next mortal who crossed his path. Along came a beautiful, unsuspecting maiden, Amethyst, who was on her way to pay tribute to the goddess Diana. To protect her, Diana turned her into a statue of beautiful crystalline quartz. When he saw this beautiful statue, Dionysus wept tears of wine in remorse, staining the statue purple and into the gemstone we know today.

 

Lovely, Luscious Labradorite

This week's gemstone feature is Labradorite.


This is a stone that has as much flash and sparkle as an opal and won't ding as easily if it gets knocked against something. Labradorite has a deep, mossy green or a dark gray base color with flashes of gold, violet, green, orange, red and a deep sky blue. It looks different from every angle depending on the light. These flashes of color come from internal fractures in the mineral reflecting the light. The technical term for this is schiller or labradorescence. This is where the fascination with the stone comes in. No matter how you look at it, it's always different. It comes from the Canadian province of Labrador and it is also found in Madagascar, the Ukraine, Australia, Mexico, Norway and the US. It is a sodium rich variety of the feldspar family. There is a variety from Finland that is called Spectrolite. It has a redder base color and labradorescence.

On the Moh hardness scale it is a 6-6.5. This makes it suitable for all types of jewelry as it will be fairly sturdy. Labradorite is one of the stones that is seldom enhanced.

There is an Eskimo legend that it's the Northern Lights trapped inside that give this stone it's wonderful color.

On the metaphysical side, it is said that Labradorite will detoxify the body and slow the aging process. It is also believed to promote strength of will. Another belief is that Labraodrite will heal mental confusion and indecision.

I have included some photos of a piece of Labradorite that I have. As you can see, it looks different from every angle. The 1st and 5th pictures are the front. Pictures 2, 3, and 4 are the back. The 5th picture is me holding it under my photography light. It shows the translucence of the stone and also, the fractures where the light reflects.

I have also included a link to Lovely, Luscious Labradorite, a Collection I have created on Artfire .

Some gemstone basics

I am going to be highlighting a different gemstone a week in my blog for the next several months, so I thought that before I make the first post, I would do kind of a breakdown on the basics of gemstones and some of the terms used. I know that not everybody who reads and follows my blog creates jewelry. To me, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so what may appear to be a mediocre looking stone to one person, is absolutely beautiful to another. I think it's all about the color and the pattern in each stone. As with all things created by Mother Nature, no two will ever look alike.

 

Stones are measured on the Moh scale of hardness. This is a scale that was developed in 1812 by mineralogist, Frederich Moh. In researching this series, I have seen his nationality listed as German, French and Austrian. It compares the hardness of one substance against another. It is the most commonly used measure today. Later, the sclerometer was invented and it measures absolute hardness. In the majority of stone listings, though, you will see the hardness as the Moh scale. In this scale, talc is a 1, and a diamond a 10.  The hardness of a stone is an important consideration when designing or purchasing stones. 

You need to be aware that the beautiful piece of coral in that ring is a 3-4 on the Moh scale, and to take care not to bang your hand up against something that could scratch or nick it.

Some of the most common mineral families of stones are beryl, feldspar, and quartz. There are a variety of colors among these families. These variations are caused by the different minerals that happen to be in the stone. For instance, the blue in turquoise is from copper.

Stones are treated in many different ways to enhance or stabilize them. For example, most turquoise on the market today is stabilized to give it more durability and improve the appearance. This is most commonly done with a resin of some sort and is often done with stones that are considered to be somewhat porous. Often stones are heat treated. There are many different way of doing this. It is done to bring out the depth of color. Some stones are irradiated, then heated to further deepen the color. Irradiation of gemstones in the US, is governed by the Nuclear Regulatory Agency to be sure the stones contain no residual radiation. A lot of gemstones are dyed to bring out or change the color, or to enhance the veining. Dyeing is usually followed by some sort of heat treatment to bond the dye with the stone so it won't wear off on the person wearing it. Black onyx is a prime example of dyeing because it does not exist in nature. More on that in another post. There's nothing wrong at all with stones that have been treated. Most sellers of stones or finished jewelry will state in their description that the stone is treated and how. Sometimes they don't know if a stone has been treated, so it's best to proceed on the assumption that it has, in some way, been enhanced.

There is a lot of glass being passed off as gemstones today. Among the most common of these are “opalite”. It's an opal looking glass. Fruity quartzes are another glass stone being passed off as a gemstone. Among these are blueberry and strawberry quartz. They all make lovely jewelry, but they aren't gemstones. If you see a stone or piece of finished jewelry you like, but aren't sure about the 

stone, google it to be sure. The vast majority of handcrafted jewelry makers, including myself, want you to be knowledgeable about your purchase and we want to be knowledgeable about what we sell.

So, it's another year already

I can't believe how fast last year flew by and how quickly the first month of this year has gone. I don't make too many resolutions for the new year-they are too hard to keep. I did make a couple, though.

One of them  was not to blog about all the etsy fails. Little did I know when I made that resloution, how much material they would be giving me to blog about. LOL! The very horrible cards that even got attention from CNN, doing away with search in the middle of the holiday shopping season and now, screwing around with the forums and making it "team like". I'm not getting that one at all, but if you sell over there, you might want to go read. Most of the stuff is in the Ideas section-the place where topics go to die.  That's all I'm going to say about that place.

Another one is to have more patience and not let the smaller things in life bother me. Before I get annoyed, I am going to ask myself "is this going to matter in 3 years time"? If the answer is no, and most things that annoy me fall into that answer, I will let it go. If the answer is yes, I will try and not get so annoyed that my blood pressure goes through the roof.

I am also (this is for you, Erin, if you are reading this), going to do more beaded loomwork. I'm not sure how much my muse is going to like that. She leans more toward a freestyle kind of work and feels loomwork is too structured. I'm also going to do some bead embroidery. Embroidery was  my first crafting love, so why not combine it with my love of beading, too? I once wanted to own every color floss DMC made-came close too, but they kept on coming out with new colors.  Now I have seed beads in nearly every floss color. LOL! I did a practice piece and really do like doing it, so you will be seeing some of that one of these days.

My arm is doing much better. Another steroid shot in the shoulder, along with more PT exercises and it will be as close to being as good as new as a shoulder can be at my age.

I also plan on trying to blog at least once a week. It may be just rambling, but it's a small goal I have set for myself.

I hope everybody has a good year.

A Handmade Christmas-Tree Ornaments

These handmade Christmas tree ornaments are unbreakable. As I mentioned in my last blog post, I'm going to show these and explain in brief detail how I made them. They are all simple and reasonably fast to make. A lot of them are created from repurposed materials and some are from kits. Kits are handy since they can save you time tracking down materials and you don't end up with a lot of leftover odds and ends when you are finished.

About 22 years ago, we were at a large charity yard sale. There was a beautiful crystal chandelier there for only $5. As soon as I saw it, I knew it would be wonderful to clean up, take apart and use the crystal beads and drops as tree ornaments.  The beads that gracefully draped over the armature of the light were joined together with thin gauge craft wire. We had dug up a small cedar tree to use as a Christmas tree that year and along with the crystal drops and some painted wooden ornaments from a kit, I tied some red, narrow satin ribbon on the ends of some of the cedar branches and the tree had a very Victorian look to it.

At another yard sale, a few years later, I found a book of counted cross stitch ornaments and worked up some of those for the tree. That year, I also did some crocheted stockings that are reversible and some crochets snowflakes. They are pictured here along with one of the wooden kit ornaments I mentioned in the first paragraph.

These little angels, I call Asthma Angels. When my son was young, he had asthma. For years, I looked at the plastic inhaler container, trying to figure out a way to craft with them. I came up with the angel idea. First, I spray painted the bases gold. The heads are wooden balls, painted for the faces. Their wings are stiffened scraps of lace. Before gluing the wooden balls to the asthma container with hot glue, I glued a 5 inch piece of ribbon on the insides of the container to use as a hanger. After gluing the ball on, I added some polyester batting for hair, then glued a small circle made from a glitter pipe cleaner to the head for the halo.

These are kid friendly projects and were done with my sons Cub Scout pack one year. This picture has ornaments made from some of the notched craft sticks I used for the train village. A simple snowflake embellished with paint, glitter paint and odds and ends that range from acrylic jewels to large sequins. On the left side of this picture is a glitter pipe cleaner stem icicle that was cut to a 6 inch length, then wrapped around a pencil. The hanger is a strand of metallic DMC embroidery floss. We had some cedar limbs in the yard, my husband cut them into discs and the Scouts decorated them with glitter and a lot of odds and ends. Ribbon is hot glued to the sides of the disc for the hanger.  If your kids are young, you should probably be the one in charge of the hot glue gun.

The clothespin reindeer was made by my son's preschool teacher. It's just 2 clothespins glued together, one turned upside down and glued to the others and some googley eyes and a ribbon added. The painted wooded heart was another Cub Scout project. The hearts were painted gold-or whatever color you want, with acrylic paints. When dry, they were embellished with glitter paints and whatever odds and end were on hand, including flat back, faceted, acrylic gemstones. Ribbon is glued to the sides of the heart for hangers. This beaded star is made from 6mm acrylic, faceted beads woven on craft wire.

At an after Christmas sale, I found a box of the satin thread ornaments for .25. I used scraps of lace, ribbon, glitter paint and the flat back gemstones for accents on them. Kids can do this project, too.

For these colorful ornaments, I used some Christmas fabric that I cut shapes out of. Then, I embroidered around some of the area with metallic DMC floss and lightly stuffed them with polyester 

fiberfill. I whip stitched the edges together and sewed ribbons ends together on the back for the hanger.

These are shoulder pad angels. This idea comes from Aileen-she used to have a craft show, magazine and lots of craft products on the market. She is the creator of Tacky Glue. These angels are probably about 16 or 17 years old.  I got some blouses with shoulder pads at a yard sale. Cut them off the blouses and covered them with fabric. I added some satin balls with faces painted on them by using fabric glue and decorated with glitter paint. Their wings are stiffened ribbon and lace and the hanging ribbon is glued between the body and the wings.

These felt ornaments are among my favorites. The penguins are from a kit, but I loved making them so much, I got more felt and made patterns for  the snowmen and the reindeer. The antler pattern is an applique pattern. I had a string of those little acrylic lightbulbs that I decided to add to them to the antlers. The snowmen are made from glitter felt. All are stuffed with polyester fiberfill. The reindeer eyes and snowman nose are embroidered on.

These icicle ornaments are made from a kit. One for the gold and one for the clear. They are acrylic snowflake beads and round acrylic beads on a chenille stem.

The clear tree in this picture is from a kit. It's 6mm acrylic beads woven on a thin gauge craft wire. I had some glass beads I wasn't going to use for anything, so I took the tree ornaments one step further and used those to make the tree ornaments with different color craft wire. I made an attempt to weave some snowflakes using acrylic beads but instead wound up with the freeform shape that is in this picture. I made a lot of those as it was a good way to use up leftover beads.

I hope these two blog posts about handmade decorations and ornaments have given you some ideas for this holiday season. Many of these are easy for kids to do, so what better way to have some good quality family time before Christmas and create some great holiday décor and some even better holiday memories.

If you would like to know more details about making any of these ornaments, just leave me a comment on my blog, along with your email address. All blog comments are moderated, so I will not publish your email address when I publish your comment.

A Handmade Christmas-Decorations

In the next few blog posts, I am going to show you some Christmas decorations and ornaments I have made throughout the years. As I was editing the photographs, I noticed how many of them are showing their age. That's fine-they have nice memories with that age. Many of them are made from recycled items partly to save the budget, partly to be “green”, and partly because that's what I had on hand to create with. I call the style Victorian Folk Art Eclectic.

It's safe to say that 99% of our holiday decorations are handmade. I started doing the handmade Christmas stuff when our son was 18 months old. He was quite mobile and I didn't want him to break any decorations and hurt himself, so for years, our house and tree decorations were unbreakable. It also cut down on the “no, don't touch” factor. Once I started, I couldn't seem to stop. I was a holiday craft magazine junkie for many years. Many of the things you will see in these posts are from magazines I no longer have. If I did, I would certainly give credit for the inspiration where credit is due. I modified a lot of the ideas to suit what I had on hand or what I was seeing the final outcome look like in my head. I laid in a good supply of glitter and glitter paint because of the things I have always loved best about Christmas is the color and sparkle.

The first picture is of Glitter Village. This has gone on the top of many different TV's over the years and is certainly showing it's age. It's lasted 23 years. I used empty cereal and cracker boxes to make it from a scaled down pattern of a gingerbread house. The centerpiece is on a piece of foil covered cardboard with cotton balls glued all around. The trees have 4 inch long trunks that are folded about an inch down and glued to the foil. The individual ones either filled out the top of the TV or wherever there was an empty space.

Next we have Mr. and Mrs. Claus. They are made from the tubes from plastic wrap and foil. I think those are sturdier than paper towel tubes. The outfit Mrs. Claus is wearing is a strip of dark red velvet that is glued to the tube with spray glue. Her apron is cut from a piece of lace table cloth and tied on with a piece of ribbon. Parts of her apron is highlighted with white glitter fabric paint that has yellowed over time. Her hat is simply a round piece of velvet that I made a yoyo out of. Santa is wearing a red sticky back felt suit with a black sticky back felt belt. A gold glitter fabric paint belt buckle adds a bit of sparkle. His feet were supposed to be a large wooden heart, but since I didn't have one of those, I cut a large heart shape out of corrugated cardboard and painted it black. His hat and arms have thin gauge craft wire in the sleeves so he can hold his candy canes. Mrs. Claus also has wire in her arms so she can hold her bell bouquet. She has no feet because her apron supports her. The faces are the bases of those satin thread ornament balls you see in the dollar stores. They have a smoother surface than regular styrofoam does and it's easier to paint. They both have hair made from polyester batting. They are about 18 years old.

The little polar bears that are all dressed up are those little honey bottles you see in the grocery. Getting those cleaned out is the hardest part of this project and getting the label off completely. To paint the inside, pour a little bit of white acrylic paint inside and swirl it around, trying to coat the insides completely. It will take 2 or 3 coats to do this. Be sure and let each coat of paint dry completely before adding the next one. If necessary, you can touch up inside with a small paintbrush. The part where the label was is painted like a gift with real ribbon glued on the package. The hats are made from small childrens' socks that have had the foot cut off. They are glued to the lip of the bottle. The top is tied tight with embroidery floss and glitter pompoms glued to the top. Ribbon scarves help their little necks warm. They have been around for about 16 years.

In one magazine, I saw pecans painted to look like penguins and fell in love with that idea. I didn't want them to be tree ornaments, so I painted some and made a wreath. I glued the small grapevine

wreaths together with hot glue (plain on the back and glitter glue sticks on the front) and wove ribbon through them to give them a bit more strength. This wreath has been around 16 or 17 years.

One year we grew some bottle gourds for birdhouses. These 3 were the last of the harvest and not really large enough for birdhouses, so I made a snow person family out of them. Prepping the gourds was the biggest part of this project. They sat for a year to dry out. After sitting that long, they has some mold spots on them, so they got soaked in a mild bleach and water solution, then sanded. Then, they got a coat of Kiltz primer as an additive prevention against the mold spots poking through the paint. Then they got a couple of coats of white. They have polymer clay faces and arms and Mama Snowman has a crocheted hat and Papa Snowman has a felt hat. All their hats have white glitter on top of them. The silver buttons are silver glitter paint. They are probably about 15 years old.
 

The craft sick houses go under the tree. I used to set up a model train under it and one year, decided it needed a village. I forget where I got the craft sticks, but they are the ones with notches in them and the house directions were included-along with a lot of other projects. painted the insides white and with the back and sides open at the top, you can smush small lights in there.  Painted with glitter paint of course.  There are more of the houses, but these 3 were on top in the chest I keep the house decorations in.

Some of the house decorations I have made over the years have not survived. Like the star wreath I made out of drywall mud. It was a great idea-spreading the mud out on wax paper and then when it got semi-dry, I cut out stars with a cookie cutter and let the mud finish drying. Spray painted them gold, then did a light brushing of metallic red paint over them. What didn't work was using it as a front door wreath. I wasn't thinking about drywall mud not weathering well here in the humid south.

If you think I have made a lot of house decorations, just wait until you see the next post-coming on Thursday. It's got the Christmas tree ornaments I have made over the years in it. I still have to finish taking some of those pictures. I have a bunch.

If you would like more details on how to make what I have made, just let me know and send me your email address. My blog comments are moderated and I won't publish it.