It's the letter "I" today for the Blogging A-Z Challenge

Today’s topic starts with the letter “I”. 

A sapphire blue or maybe it’s a blue-violet or even a light blue gemstone is the choice for today.  Iolite is a see through gemstone variant of cordierite. 

Its name comes from the Greek word “ios” which means violet.  It has also been called water sapphire due to a similarity to the blue sapphire. 

Iolite has a strong pleochroism which means that the gem can appear to be different colors depending on the angles that it is being observed at especially with polarized light.  Because of this, Iolite is a difficult stone to cut because it must be cut in a certain direction to take advantage of the best color.  

It is commonly dyed to enhance its appearance.   

It can be found in Australia, Brazil, India, Canada, United States, and Sri Lanka with the largest crystal (24,000 carats) found in Wyoming. 

There is a Norse legend that says that the Vikings used thin slices of iolite as polarizing filters in order to view the sun and navigate when they were away from land.  It is supposed that the Vikings mined iolite in Greenland and Norway.

Iolite was popular in jewelry in the 1700s and is regaining its popularity.  It can be used as an inexpensive substitute for sapphires. 

Thanks for stopping by.  Be sure to come back again tomorrow and see what the letter "J" will be.

Carolyn

Information was gathered from Wikepedia and other websites.

It's the letter "H" for the Blogging from A - Z Challenge

Today’s topic starts with the letter “H”. 

Hematite (blood ore) from Michigan

Hematite (Iron ore) is a very common mineral.  It is found in the US, Canada, Europe, and Brazil.  It is a silver-grey metallic color but can be found in other colors.  Gray hematite can be found in places that have had standing water or mineral hot springs such as those at Yellowstone National Park.  It can also be the result of volcanic activity.  Hematite has been found in the waste dumps of iron mines and is being extracted through a magnetation process. 

It can also be found as clay which occurs when soil is weathered and along with other iron oxides is responsible for the red color of many tropical weathered soils.  Hematite can also be used as a pigment as the natural color is red.  

It is heavier than most beads but can be brittle.  It is comes in many different bead sizes and shapes.  It was very popular in Victorian times.  There is also a magnetic variety because of it being an iron based ore. 

Cypro-Minoan cylinder seal approximately 14th century BC

It was once the most used stone in the ancient world.  It is a valuable commodity in the industrial world. 

Real hematite is becoming less common in bead form and being replaced by a synthetic substitute called hematine. 

Image from the Mars Exploration Rover Microscopic Imager

It is possibly the only mineral found on another planet.  Several spacecraft in orbit around Mars used infrared spectrometry to view the mineral at two sites.

Thanks for stopping by and hope to see you again tomorrow when the letter is "I".

Pictures are from Wikepedia.

Carolyn

Today is the letter "G" for the Blogging A - Z Challenge

Today’s topic starts with the letter “G”. 

Goldstone is a manmade “gemstone” which can be a reddish brown color, as pictured, or blue or purple.  I believe there is even a green goldstone. 

The initial production of this “gemstone” was most likely a happy accident back in the 1600s. Legend has it that a monk accidently spilled a tray of copper shavings into a vat of molten glass and liked the result.  The Miotti family of Venice was granted an exclusive license to produce goldstone.  It is made up of silica, copper oxide, and other metal oxides.  It is made in a low-oxygen reducing atmosphere in huge vats.  Depending on the type of ingredients, you can get a blue, purple, or green coloring along with the original reddish brown.  

Even though it is a manufactured “gemstone” it can be mistaken for or misrepresented as a semiprecious stone.  It can be carved into beads or figurines. 

Reddish brown and blue goldstone beads

Goldstone necklace that I made

Blue goldstone necklace that I made

It can also be called Aventurine glass based on the original Italian name avventurina which means adventure or chance. 

Thanks for stopping by and hope to see you again tomorrow when I present the letter "H".

Carolyn

Today's letter is "F"

Today’s topic starts with the letter “F”.

Fluorite is the choice for today.  Fluorite is a colorful mineral and can range in color from blue, green, yellow, brown, purple and rainbow which have bands of differing hues.  The colors depend upon several factors including any impurities, exposure to radiation and the size of the color centers.  (Color centers are created when the mineral crystal is exposed to heat and the ions rearrange themselves leaving behind some electrons.  I think I have that right.  I am not a chemist or biologist or anyone that works with minerals.) Many stones are fluorescent which means that they glow when exposed to ultraviolet light. 

Fluorescing fluorite from Boltsburn Mine Weardale, North Pennines, County Durham, England, UK.

Fluorite is mined in Australia, South America, China, Europe, and North America.  It is the state mineral of Illinois and was made such when the state was the largest producer in the United States.  The last mine there closed in 1995. 

This is a soft stone and has to be treated with care or it will break. 

Fluorite crystals on display at the Cullen Hall of Gems and Minerals, Houston Museum of Natural Science

Fluorite is a major source of hydrogen fluoride which is used to produce a wide range of materials.  A low grade of fluorite is used as a flux to lower the melting point of raw materials in steel production to aid in the removal of impurities.  A medium grade is used in making opalescent glass, enamels, and cooking utensils.  High grade fluorite is used to make hydrogen fluoride and hydrofluoric acid.

I hope you are enjoying learning about these gemstones and minerals.  I still have more coming up for the next nineteen days.  Stop by and see if I can make it all the way through the alphabet.

Carolyn

The Color of Dreams blog hop

The Design Challenge:

Feel free to create in any way you wish, using your bead as inspiration for your colorway, theme, technique. You are welcome to use additional Color of Dreams beads in your design, as well as artisan beads and gems and anything you like. You are not limited to jewelry.

You may share a dream that has come true, one you are working on now, or one you hope for in the future. The one goal of the hop: we'll focus on our dreams as entirely possible, with the idea, "If we can dream it, we can achieve it." So, try creating "from the end" -- as if your dream has already come true -- using your jewelry design to do so.



My bead is the first one in the thrid row



Here is the bead that I was given to use to create my Color of Dreams piece.  I love the colors which are unusual for me as I tend towards the fall/autumn colors.  So this will stretch my skills. 

The piece I designed uses all the colors in this bead and makes me think of a tropical vacation.  I hope one day to travel to Australia on a cruise ship with stops along the way in Hawaii, Fiji, and other tropical islands.  I will have to build my wardrobe around these colors. 

Here are some of the colors I pulled out to see if they would fit with the bead.  I did not end up using all the colors that I had pulled out.  Some of them just did not go with the bead once I started working on the piece.

A work in progress.  This is still not the end result but is really close.

These were unusual colors for me but I love how the piece turned out.  I am looking forward to wearing the piece once the weather warms up which might be this Monday.



Thanks for stopping by and be sure to stop by to visit the other participants: 

Honorary Artist: Patricia Handschuh  The artist that made our special bead
Patricia's blog:            The Color of Dreams      
Patricia’s Etsy:             The Color of Dreams

Hostess: TJ                Jewel School Friends
Carolyn Lawson           Carolyn's Creations  You are here

Kay Thomerson           KayzKreationz
Audrey Belanger          Toki No Hourousha

Alicia Marinache          All the Pretty Things
Terry Carter                TappingFlamingo
Lori Schneider             Bead Addict
Jenny Kyrlach             Wonder and Whimsy
Asri Wahyuingsih         Asri's Beadwork
Dini Bruinsma              Angaza by Changes
Karla Morgan              Texas Pepper Jams
Debbie Rasmussen        A Little of This, A Little of That
Veralynne Malone          Designed by Vera
Kathy Stemke               Vintage Memories Jewelry Design
Mowse Doyle               Mowse Made This
Heather Richter             Desert Jewelry Designs
Lori Poppe                   Adventures in Creativity with LorilliJean
Jayne Capps                Mama's Got To Doodle
Andrea Glick                Zenith Jade Creations
Kathleen Breeding         99 Bottles of Beads on the Wall
Becky Pancake             Becky Pancake Bead Designs
Karin Martinez              Fairies Market
Miranda Ackerley          Mirandack
Penny Houghton           Smelly Nelly
Carolyn Lawson           Carolyn's Creations
Chris Eisenberg            Wanderware
Christie Murrow          Charis Designs Jewelry
Monique Urquhart        A Half-Baked Notion
Eve Shelby                  Raindrop Creations Jewelry by Evelyn
Cryss Thain                 Here Bead Dragons
Jasvanti Patel               Jewelry By Jasvanti
Nan Smith                   NanMade Handmade Jewelry
Sue Kennedy               SueBeads
Jean Yates                   Snap Out of It, Jean! There's Beading to be Done!
Debbie Rogers             Debbies Treasures
Marybeth Rich             A Few Words From Within the Pines
Shirley Moore              Beads and Bread
Shaia Williams             Shaiha's Ramblings
Kathy Lindemer           Bay Moon Design
Linda Anderson           From the Bead Board
Judy Turner               Silver Rains
Gloria Allen                Gloria Allen Designs
Regina Wood              Ginas-Design
Robin Reed                Artistry HCBD
Mary Goovars            MLH Jewelry Designs
Marlene Cupo             Amazing Designs
CJ Bauschka              4 His Glory Creations
Robin Showstack        The Crazy Bead Hoarder
Cynthia O'Toole          Sparkles and Sweets
Jael Thorp                 Jael's Art Jewels
Renetha Stanziano      Lamplight Crafts



The letter "E" for the Blogging from A-Z Challenge

Welcome to the Blogging A to Z Challenge.  The idea behind this challenge is to blog for 30 days with Sundays off and using the letters of the alphabet as the inspiration for your subject.  For instance on day one of the challenge you blog about something that starts with the letter “A”.  Day two you blog about something that starts with the letter “B”, etc. until you get to the end of April and the letter “Z”.

I am a jewelry designer and maker and I chose the subject of gemstones and related subjects.  Hopefully I will be able to come up with 26 related topics from “A” to “Z”.  Right now I have a couple of letters that I still need to get a topic for.

It is the May birthstone and the traditional gemstone for Taurus and Gemini astrological signs.  Today’s topic is Emeralds.  Emeralds are gemstones and a variety of beryl.  It gets its green color, ranging from light to dark green, from the presence of chromium and sometimes vanadium.  Emeralds usually have lots of inclusion so they are inclined to be very breakable.  Very clear stones are very hard to find and are very expensive and can be more expensive than diamonds.  They can range in cost from $300 a carat for commerical stones to a high of $90,800 per carat for Extra Fine stones.

They are usually treated in some way to enhance their appearance with cedar oil being the accepted practice.  They can be found in South America, Africa Australia, Austria, and the US.  Columbia mines and produces the most emeralds accounting for 70-90% of the market.  

Emeralds can be purchased in bead form but are rare and not always of a high quality.  Emeralds are usually cut into cabochons rather than faceted shapes.  Faceted emeralds are using cut into an oval shape or the traditional “Emerald” cut which is a rectangle with facets around the top edge. 

Spanish-made emerald and gold pendant exhibited at Victoria and Albert Museum.

Emeralds can also be yellow or blue. 

Emerald was the Pantone color of the year for 2013.

 

The Gachala Emerald is one of the largest gem emeralds in the world, at 858 carats (171.6 g). This stone was found in 1967 at La Vega de San Juan mine in Gachalá, Colombia. It is housed at the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope to see you again as I continue to blog the alphabet.

Carolyn



Today is the letter "D" for the Blogging from A - Z Challenge

Welcome to the Blogging A to Z Challenge.  The idea behind this challenge is to blog for 30 days with Sundays off and using the letters of the alphabet as the inspiration for your subject.  For instance on day one of the challenge you blog about something that starts with the letter “A”.  Day two you blog about something that starts with the letter “B”, etc. until you get to the end of April and the letter “Z”.

I am a jewelry designer and maker and I chose the subject of gemstones and related subjects.  Hopefully I will be able to come up with 26 related topics from “A” to “Z”.  Right now I have a couple of letters that I still need to get a topic for.

Today’s topic starts with the letter “D”.  Druzy or druse is the choice for today.  It is a coating of fine crystals on a rock fracture surface, vein or within a vug or geode.  It occurs worldwide and the quartz druzy is the most common.

  

Druse of uvarovite from the Urals

Pink dolomite druse with yellow calcite crystals
from Lawrence County Arkansas

Pictures and some of the information were gathered from Wikepedia.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you continue to read my blog as I work through the alphabet.

Carolyn