Today I would like to blog about a stone I have had a long time love affair with: quartz crystal. Let me start with my childhood, since that is where I first was introduced to this LOVELY shiney rock.
I spent part of my childhood in a town called Butte MT (please spare me the jokes about the name). Its nestled in the Rocky Mountains and its a lovely place to be. Butte is/was sort of a dying town but being up in the mountains, there were all sorts of mineral goodies to be found. I used to walk along the railroad tracks, much to my mother's dismay, and pick up shiney clear quartz crystal points on my way home from school. As I got older, my grandparents and aunts and uncles would take us camping up in the National parks. There was an entire park set aside just for the digging and finding of quartz crystals! I was in rock heaven.
We moved away from Butte when I was still in elementary school but we often go back to MT to visit family. And every year I go back I make sure to visit Crystal Park and dig for more shiny rocks. I bring them back to Kansas with me and do my wire wrapping magic on them.
Now, quartz comes in all sizes shapes and colors but the kind I want to focus on today is that clear, terminated variety, the crystal point. Crystals are more highly valued if they have what is known as a termination, or a naturally occuring point. Double terminated crystals have a point at each end and naturally double terminate crystals are very rare. Many companies and stone workers often grind the terminations onto a chunk of quartz crystal to increase its sale value.
Quartz crystals are often called the "Witch's stone" and are said to have many magical properties. It is supposed to clear the mind and allow for true visions. This is perhaps why the sterotypical gypsy fortune teller used a sphere made of clear quartz to looked into people's futures. It has even been used as a milk stone to cause more productive lactating in nursing mothers! Quartz crystals are most often used to balance the mind and body as well as increase psychic abilities.
No matter what your thoughts or beliefs on the quartz crystal are, they are a beautiful stone that I continue to mine myself and wrap.
I spent part of my childhood in a town called Butte MT (please spare me the jokes about the name). Its nestled in the Rocky Mountains and its a lovely place to be. Butte is/was sort of a dying town but being up in the mountains, there were all sorts of mineral goodies to be found. I used to walk along the railroad tracks, much to my mother's dismay, and pick up shiney clear quartz crystal points on my way home from school. As I got older, my grandparents and aunts and uncles would take us camping up in the National parks. There was an entire park set aside just for the digging and finding of quartz crystals! I was in rock heaven.
We moved away from Butte when I was still in elementary school but we often go back to MT to visit family. And every year I go back I make sure to visit Crystal Park and dig for more shiny rocks. I bring them back to Kansas with me and do my wire wrapping magic on them.
Now, quartz comes in all sizes shapes and colors but the kind I want to focus on today is that clear, terminated variety, the crystal point. Crystals are more highly valued if they have what is known as a termination, or a naturally occuring point. Double terminated crystals have a point at each end and naturally double terminate crystals are very rare. Many companies and stone workers often grind the terminations onto a chunk of quartz crystal to increase its sale value.
Quartz crystals are often called the "Witch's stone" and are said to have many magical properties. It is supposed to clear the mind and allow for true visions. This is perhaps why the sterotypical gypsy fortune teller used a sphere made of clear quartz to looked into people's futures. It has even been used as a milk stone to cause more productive lactating in nursing mothers! Quartz crystals are most often used to balance the mind and body as well as increase psychic abilities.
No matter what your thoughts or beliefs on the quartz crystal are, they are a beautiful stone that I continue to mine myself and wrap.
No comments:
Post a Comment