Dreamtime Lightning

The focal on this piece was found as a bit of rock in the desert surrounding Ayer's Rock, a sacred place for the Australian Native folk we call aboriginine. A friend picked it up, brought it back, and when polishing it, found these lightning streaks of opal running throughout the face. None of it had showed when he picked up what looked like a brown rock, but he felt that he just had to have it.

Back in the USA, I was visiting their gem and rock shop, getting to know them to the point where I was the person selected to watch over their shop while they went on vacation or to a show for the weekend. This stone called to me over and over, and I would take it out and hold it when there were no customers.

My friends gifted me with the rock, in exchange for the gift of my time.

Opal is supposed to be 'bad luck' if you are not born in October, or if it is not a gift. As I am a February baby, it is most fortunate that it was a gift to me, and I have treasured it as such.

For years, I didn't know what to do with it, except keep it with my other crystals and such. Thanks to Harry (Sharon Solly), I learned to use the TTT- Terrifically Tacky Tape- to cab around it, letting light shine through the opal bits from the back, and turn it into this happy piece!

The rope is Kumibeado (yes, there is another tut with better pics and easier-to-see bead colors, done in pdf format, in the works) and was finished over a 4 hour period, while listening to Dave Barry's 'Talks Back', ready by Artey Johnson on CD. Cackling madly from time to time, was I!

I wanted a more organic-looking end than either just a bead cap, or a peyote beaded end with traditional toggle shape would have given, so just went with beading over the end tightly enough to hold the peyote on (with a few stitches back and forth through the kumi for good measure), then adding a loop at one end, closing tightly at the other. It stays quite nicely, and but is easy to remove. Doubleclick on the pic to see it up close and personal.

Kumibeado- gotta love it!

Now I have to figure out a stringing for the Cellini look.....