Stretchy Bracelets

     I never made stretchy bracelets because of my love for the toggle look. Maybe I'm getting too old or too busy to be fumbling around with my jewelry---whatever the case, I am excited to wear these new pieces:

     I scored these beads last year on the last day of an estate sale and have not had the chance to wear them yet. I paid $4 (50% off) which is a total shame to admit. I knew I'd found a treasure the instant I picked them up...the heavy feel is one of pure grounding. I have not identified the two stone carved beads. They are cold to the touch, not super shiny like marble and have tiny mica flecks. Quartz? Ideas?

15mm Blue Coral, Rutilated Quartz, and Stone (You really should click on the photo and then click again to see detail)

     Our friend Travis and his family visited from Redwood City, CA over the Christmas break. As they were leaving I complimented his wife Veronica's pretty blue stacking stretchy bracelets and she took one off her wrist and insisted I keep it. I had never met her, so there was/is no way she could possibly know how many times I have done this very thing. I was so charmed I couldn't speak! (For God's sake, when I went to China I lined my backpack with leather bracelets for the sole purpose of giving them away. I still hope those bracelets connect me back to the people I met someday.)
    The bracelet Veronica gave me "holds" essential oils---and I have loved smelling whatever it was she had on it---maybe a tea tree? I intend to find out. Anyhow, I gathered the holding beads were porous lava stone and decided to make a few of my own. Now I just have to decide which ones to send back to California.... 

Apple/Tiger Coral, Lava Stone, Fossil Stone and Chalcedony

     The black and white stones (below) were part of a 25lb auction lot---the best purchase I made last year. I bought the lot shortly before the Excel incident. I remember sorting and cutting my way through the massive tangled mess one knot at a time---an active metaphor for what my brain was trying to comprehend. I remember spreading it out over half of the basement floor for weeks thinking, my family should be mad at me and why are they being so cool? (about the mess). Even now as I type, I get nauseous and sick to my stomach...memories come back...so much to process...still. That time really changed me forever; I am healed when I make something lasting/pretty from it all.
  A little something I read about black and white marble: "Zebra Stone is a dolomitic marble in which the banded appearance is actually foliation caused by the heat and pressure of metamorphism." Fitting.

Zebra Marble, Lava Stone (the blue reflection in silver is my fish tank!)