Spring has sprung!

I've been a bit lazy about posting and spring is here so I wanted to share some of my spring-y designs with you.  :)

Spring Garden - Artisan lampwork, Swarovski crystals and sterling silver

Lemon drops - Freshwater pearls, peridot and sterling silver

Minty Fresh - Artisan lampwork, prehnite, hessonite garnet, Swarovski crystals and sterling silver

Tucson - day 7!

Well our trip to Tucson is winding down.  We leave tomorrow night.  My other love is soccer and several MLS teams are training here in Tucson so I may have to stop by and check it out tomorrow.  Today we started at the Kino Electric Park show.  I always stop and visit Cindy, Jennifer and Jason at World Bead Mine (formerly Royal Quality Gems).  I got some lovely beads but I'm afraid they're already packed up so no pictures of those.  I did get a picture of Cindy and her son Jason.  Jennifer was feeling under the weather so she stayed at the hotel today.

There are always interesting things to see at the Kino show.  Here are some very cool carvings in antlers and bone made in Indonesia.

This metal javalina family and barrel cactus were just so cute!

And you can always find gemstone rough here.

Big chunks of azurite in quartz

After Kino we did a quick run through the Best Bead Show.  That was a bit disappointing since some of our favorite vendors are no longer there.  We next headed to the 22nd Street show.  We love to visit with David Otteson of Broken Arrow Mine.  I got a lovely earring/pendant cab set of ribbon turquoise (but those are packed away too :)  ).  Here's David.

We also saw some gorgeous sunstone from the Dust Devil Mine and they had this cool rock candy dispenser.  You just put your hand under it and some candy coated chocolate rocks drop down.  It was pretty good too!

And there are always cool gems, rocks and fossils to see at this show.  I thought these rows of tourmaline crystals looked pretty cool.

And this show always has fossils.

Our last stop was at the JG&M Simpson street show.  I owed Toyo Feng one of the cookies my hubby made and kept forgetting to take it to him so I had to visit him one last time.  I also ended up buying a few more beads :)  I found some fossil coral in a cool shape and some green turquoise for a friend in England.  Since I've forgotten to take a picture with Toyo I finally got one.

Tucson - day 6

Today we had a busy day.  We started at AGTA, then went across the street to GJX, then around the corner and under the freeway to the Pueblo show, we made a quick stop with my favorite turquoise guys and ended the day by having dinner with an old friend.  What is amazing is I remembered to take some pictures!

AGTA is always interesting with lectures, demonstrations, some seriously high end gems and jewelry and interesting exhibits.  I did forget to take picture of the exhibits.  This year they had some of gems and jewelry from the Smithsonian Institute.  The gorgeous and huge Logan sapphire was just one of the treasures in the exhibit.

We walked across the street to the GJX show.  There I visited some of my favorite cab cutters Donald K. Olson.  They're from my neck of the woods in Bonsall.  I went in search of some interesting cabs for a friend of mine in England and I found a couple including this cool black and white fossil coral.

Fossil coral

We wandered around the show ogling at all the GORGEOUS diamonds, emeralds, sapphires and a multitude of just about every fine gem imaginable.  We were totally amazed by the creations of Peter Mueller.  His sculptures are made completely out of gemstones.  That little quail in his hand has a dumortierite chest, onyx beak, white quartz ring around the neck and so much more!

Next up was the Pueblo Show at the Riverpark Inn.  I had to visit Yaushing Gems since they have very reasonably priced gemstone, half drilled drops.  Here are some of the drops.

 

And here are the wonderful people who helped me as I searched for drops for myself and a friend in Australia.

We then wandered around the show and saw these amazing gemstone things.

Humongous crystal

Bowls made out of semi-precious gemstones

My mom and a giant crystal

I stopped with another favorite vendor of mine, Thomas Schneider (another one from San Diego), to see if he had any Afghanistan aquamarine crystals that a friend of mine wanted.  I found hers and some pretty ones for me!

Tom Schneider and me with some of his gorgeous rough gems

Aquamarine

We made another visit to our favorite turquoise guys (Nevada Turquosie) to say hi to dad!  Since I didn't get a picture when we visited with Shellbone earlier in the week I took one today.

And that's all folks!  It's time for this chick to hit the sack.  Later gaters!

Tucson - yesterday

Last night I was just too tired to post anything.  My long days and short nights caught up with me so I went to bed about 3 hours earlier than normal.  But I'm back at it tonight.  :)  Last night we had dinner at Caruso's with some of my jewelry making/gem buying friend.  Good Italian food and good friends made for a good time.  Here are some of the gorgeous things I got yesterday in Gem Mall.  I just LOVE the chrysocolla with copper drops!!!  I have so much fun digging through the pairs of drops at Intrinsic Trading!

Copper in chrysocolla on the left, red creek jasper on the right

Bumblebee jasper on the left, sonoran dendritic jasper and red creek jasper on the right

 I also visited Jerry Chiu at New Prosperity Gems (friends of another one of my favorite vendors Toyo Feng!) and got some lovely beads.  Here are just a few.

From outside to inside, black onyx, pyrite (won't those lovely, overlapping beads look awesome with a gorgeous lampwork focal in a bracelet!) and yummy, carved smoky quartz

I also found these hand painted, ceramic beads from Peru at J.P. Imported.   The Westie beads drew me in and I liked the matte dog paw beads as well.  The cactus were just too cute to pass up.  :)

Fun ceramic beads!

Tucson - day 4

We did get our lights back on last night which was a good thing since it got pretty cold and having no heater would have been no fun. 

Yesterday we did go back to visit Black Hat Trading at the Miners Coop and I was able to get a picture of Jess and Jan Searcy!

We hit the Holidome today and we started off at 2 of my favorite vendors to visit - Intrinsic Trading and Trilogy. I got some wonderful melon shaped Red Creek jasper and dangle earring pairs in many different stones from Intrinsic.

I got these wonderful carved flowers from Trilogy.

We then headed out for lunch and tried the Ajo Cafe at the recommendation of another of my beady friends.  It was pretty good, though we got there too late to try the peach cobbler :( They ran out before we got there.

And I got these pretty pearls from Ta Pearls - another favorite vendor of mine :)

We did a bit more wandering up and down the aisles to see if anything jumped out and grabbed me - but nothing did.  Tomorrow we hit Gem Mall!

Tucson - in the dark...

Well we weren't in the dark today but we are tonight.  I can't take pictures of my new pretties since we're in the dark.  Interesting that the street lights are still on.  But I took a walk down the street and saw a cellphone light bobbing around and asked the person (a gal) attached to it if her power was also out.  She confirmed it was.  So I'm using my cell phone as a hotspot to write this post.  That's about it for tonight.  We hit Gem Mall and Holidome tomorrow so it will be a busy day!

The living room :)

Tucson - day 2!

Today we were able to go to 3 different shows.  We started at the GIGM Howard Johnson show.  We start our visit with Shellbone of Nevada Turquoise Co.  He always has something interesting.  This time I got some gorgeous Paiute, Blue Web, Turquoise Bonanza and Pilot Mountain beads.  Normally we get to visit with Shellbone and his dad but his dad hasn't arrived yet so we'll have to go back on another to give him a hug.  Here is some of the wonderful turquoise...

Paiute and Blue Web turquoise

We wandered around to see some of the other vendors.  There are always some great rough and crystal sellers at this show.  I bought this gorgeous aquamarine crystal in quartz.  I just loved the contrast of that beautiful aquamarine with the white quartz.

Aquamarine crystal in quartz

Once we finished wandering around the show we headed off to lunch and then our next venue.  We lunched at Las Margaritas for some delicious Mexican food and then headed back down Grant Rd to the Gem and Jewelry Show on Grant.  I first went into Robert Poley's room 2 years ago.  I just love the black jade beads he has in glossy and matte finish.  I also love the ivoryite (aka magnesite aka white buffalo aka white turquoise) beads that he has.  Here is Robert of Sweetwater backed up by some of the gorgeous beads he has.

Robert Poley, Sweetwater

 We also saw this GORGEOUS, polished petrified wood trunk.  Before it was polished it was 30% bigger.

Next on our list to visit was the Miner's Coop Rock Show  We also love to visit with Bob of Really Old Rocks.  Darn if he hadn't already closed up before we got there!  So we didn't get to visit with him but we did get to visit with many other wonderful people.  I spent most of my time with Jan and Jess of Black Hat Trading.  I first got attracted by some cabs that he had.  When I found out that they were from the Royston and Sleeping Beauty mines I had to sort through them to find some pairs for earrings.  Here are the pretties I picked out.

Sleeping Beauty and Royston turquoise cabs

After I finished up with the cabs I started looking at some of the bead strands hanging around.  When I asked where some of the turquoise strands came from I found that they were some old stock Morenci turquoise!  Shwing!  I love turquoise and I especially love turquoise from some of the older mines.  So I HAD to start looking at beads!  LOL!  They also had some old stock poppy/red jasper with some of the interesting colors that were in some poppy jasper beads my Aunt used in designs over 30 years ago.  Here are pics of my picks.

Morenci turquoise and poppy jasper

And once we finished up our visit with Jess our day of gem show hopping was over.  Tomorrow - probably some repeat visits and then JOGS!

It's a New Year and I'm back in Tucson!

Wow - I've been seriously neglecting my blog!  Well I'm back in Tucson for the gem shows so you'll be hearing from me for the next week.  :)  We arrived today and since we left San Diego before lunch and got here after lunch the first thing we did after getting the rental car was EAT!  We're staying in a cute, little, old house and it's very close to our favorite pizza and Oreo cheesecake places - Grimaldi's!  We had a salad, pizza and got some Oreo cheesecake to go.  We then did a quick stop/drop at our little house and headed over to the JG&M Simpson Street show to meet one of my favorite bead vendors Toyo Feng of Feng's Trading.  Here are some of the pretties I got this evening.

Turquoise! and a cape amethyst focal :)

Carved citrine in the center (carved with Chinese symbols that read Long Life), carved carnelian, bronzite and gorgeous, sparkly, twist faceted crystal quartz

A crappy picture with Sleeping Beauty turquoise in the center, the some diamond shaped angelite and finally some gorgeous and hard to find kyanite beads (they have a wonderful shimmer!)

More turquoise!

That was my fun for the day!  Stay tuned for more of our exciting adventures in Tucson.  I'll have more interesting pictures tomorrow since I'll remember to bring my camera!