Monday, Dec, 21

I had a nice long weekend, but it's back to work tomorrow. Most of the day Saturday I spent cutting cabs. I did a pair of Mookaite Porcelain Jasper for earrings, a beautiful yellow/cream/grey lace agate, and my first turquoise. Didn't get photos done yet and probably won't until after the holidays.

Friday Dec. 17

I have a 4 day weekend - yay! The plan is to spend some time with my Genie. I got some turquoise at the gem & mineral club shop last week and I'm eager to see what it will become. Looks like a pretty blue with some interesting brown matrix.

My latest Etsy post is a Pastel Indian Jasper pendant. It's such a gorgeous stone! There are so many colors it was hard to pick a place to begin cutting. I have some of the slab left so I'll get to make more!

Pastel Indian Jasper

Dec. 14

It was a busy weekend. I went to the shop with a couple of rocks and cut some slabs from them. One is some kind of jasper - don't know the exact name - and has some really intriguing colors and patterns in it. The other is ruby zoisite, a small piece I got in Franklin NC last summer. Both should make some pretty cabochons.

I also spent a buch of time taking photos of some of my new pieces so I can put list them on Etsy. I have the photography thing down better these days. When I started doing this I had to Photoshop the heck out of them and still ended up with unnatural colors and glaring spots on the pictures. Now I only have to do a few quick corrections.

The pendant to the left is Biggs Landscape Jasper from Oregon. The other is Rosetta stone from Mexico.

Saturday Nov. 28

It's been a busy fall, with two festivals to prepare for and a big project at work. I've also been spending a lot of time cutting cabochons. It still amazes me that I can find such beautiful morsels inside rocks! There are so many that I want to cut I have a hard time choosing. I think I'm just going to do one or two and end up with a dozen or so. I'm building up quite a collection of slabs, though, so I have a lot to choose from.