I got in a nice gemstone, and decided to share some pictures. It is a very clean genstone, and pastel pink. I put a wheat penny I found in pocket change, next to this stone for perspective: The color is

Have you ever found a rare rock? :)

I just finished a 10.007km cycling that lasted about 0hh:35mm:12ss ! Had to pop out to the rockhound shop for some fresh dop wax -- figured I should get some exercise while at it. Miserably out of shape

In early November, we picked up another massive collection. In the collection was this ugly green rock. After careful examination though, I noticed fine crystals, cleavages, and blue Chalcedony. Here is

Well, it's been another crazy few weeks.. Now I've got a few stories to post if I can find the time. We've picked up several collections And I will try to post a little of each over the next blogs. Just

I collect silver, coins and bullion....but I also really like collecting rocks! I was looking through some of the rocks we found last summer, for any that would be good for polishing. These were some of

This is Earth's natural purple, with a tint of Indigo Blue streaks in it. This was a rough chunk of Holy Blue Oregon Agate I cut and polished. It was definitely a practice piece with using all the polishing

Our store just got a new batch of hand knapped knives. It may be the last from this gentleman. I don't normally post about new inventory but these were just too cool not to. They made by a gentleman who

Another Friday, another opal! This is a Mexican Fire Opal, also known as Mexican Jelly Opal. This is one of my favorite opals. The colors put me in a positive state of mind when I look at it and so I have

Now that the Play and the Holidays are over, we can focus on cleaning our disaster area. The following are pics of the lapidary/ Storage room. The latter being more the case. Slowly, over the year we acquired

As you may have noticed from previous posts, we get quite a few strange if not downright ugly rocks in our store. But even the ugly rocks have a story that can be interesting. We have a whole shelf section

Along with the last ugly rock that I posted about: this piece was brought in. To the naked eye, it again just looks like an ugly rock. Most people would just walk on by and not give it a second look. But

I had some more strange/ ugly rocks brought int our store this week . This is a close up of a rock that is strikingly similar to the ones I did six and seven posts ago. Again, to the naked eye these are

I'm still finding interesting rocks going through the inventory. This little batch was in with some Amazonite and Chrysocola. At first glance, I thought they were broken shards of slag glass. The shears

While I was going through another flat of rocks I purchased, I discovered yet another unique and interest mineral. Unfortunately the camera doesn't do it justice. It actually looks fuzzy and green. But

I received a comment on my last post from @ludmila.kariokou. She sees a dog in the first photo. After a close look I saw it too. This inspired me to do a short post about what you can see in rocks. We

I've had a couple people ask if I knew what kind of rock in my last post was. I believe it is a hematite aggregate. I found a larger version which I now post. It is massively larger than the last rock.

We recently had another street purchase that yielded yet another ugly but interesting rock. It was not very appealing and I told the person I wasn't interested. He asked if I knew what it was and I told

We used to sell Trinitite at our store. As the picture shows; it is fused sand from the first atomic test blast in Trinity New Mexico. We had quite a bit of it, but in 2017 we had a run of customers buying

Before we begin, I want to give a little background on my own cutting, so this will give some context to the tips and pointers I am going to offer below. I use a Lortone Rock Rascal 6-inch lapidary saw.