This month, we celebrate a most beautiful birthstone, Aquamarine! Aquamarine is a color variety of the mineral Beryl. What’s fun about Beryl is that if it falls toward the BLUE color side, it’s AQUAMARINE, if it falls towards the GREEN side, it’s EMERALD, and if it’s PINK, it’s MORGANITE! They are all the same gemstones, just different colors!
Aquamarine Bead Bracelets that show the soft and varying shades of blue.
Fun Aquamarine Facts:
Mohs Hardness – 7.5 – 8
It gets its name from Latin “aqua marina” which means “sea water.”
The traditional gift for the 19th Wedding Anniversary
Mostly mined in Brazil, but also in many countries across the world, including Zambia, Nigeria, and Madagascar, as well as Pakistan and Mozambique
Considered a symbol of faithfulness, courage, and friendship
The Dom Pedro aquamarine is the world’s largest cut aquamarine gem. Weighs 10,363 carats.
Welcome to February! According to Punxsutawney Phil, spring is just around the corner (not that it’s been a terribly awful one here in Texas this year)!
Besides being the month of love and transition, February is also associated with the mineral Amethyst. Amethyst is a variety of Quartz and gets its iconic purple color from trace amounts of iron that have been naturally irradiated. It is found throughout the world, even here in the United States, but the most significant deposits are located in Brazil and Uruguay. Fantastic specimens weighing thousands of pounds have been found in the fractures of igneous rock there.
World’s largest Amethyst Geode. Almost 11 feet tall and weighs over 5,500 pounds!!
If you are interested in the history or spiritual side of Amethyst, this special mineral has been highlighted in religions for thousands of years. Amethyst was one of the stones in the Bible of the High Priest’s breastplate representing the 12 tribes of Israel. In ancient Egypt, Amethyst was worn by the Pharaohs to help ward off evil and misfortune. Amethyst derives from the Greek word “amethystos” which may be translated as “not drunken”. Ancient Greeks used it to ward off drunkenness. And modern crystal healers associate Amethyst with relieving stress, bringing inner peace, and clearing negativity.
WOW! Can you even believe the year is coming to an end?
It seems like only yesterday that our 62nd Annual DGMS Show was happening… but it happened… and it was FANTASTIC!!!! So many people, vendors, gems and minerals!! We have a special announcement from one of our Show Chairs:
On behalf of the Dallas Gem and Mineral Society, I would like to thank everyone that helped make our show great. This includes our many vendors that donated to our silent auction, the Hotel for helping with the space and the great food, our Club members for donating many of the rocks for the show and silent auction. I would like to send out a very Large Thank-You to our Volunteers – they are the very backbone of our show. They have spent many days and hours setting up, organizing, identifying specimens, loading and unloading the truck, and way too many things to list at this time. Looking forward to seeing all of you next year!
Sincerely, Lynn Couvillion
I’m looking to get some great pics from the show, but in the meantime here are a couple of the beautiful Fluorescent Display from this year! Unbelievable that nature produces such hidden beauties! Look so nondescript by day… but AMAZING under UV!!!
And can’t forget to let you know….
Our final 2019 club meeting (aka Party) is coming up soon! It will be held on Tuesday, December 17. Please bring a rock-related (gem, mineral, fossil, jewelry, lapidary, etc) wrapped gift valued at no more than $20. If you bring a gift, you will get a gift. There will be no ‘stealing’ of gifts, but feel free to exchange with each other after all gifts are opened.
We will also be having a pot luck dinner. The meat will be brisket made by Lynn Couvililon and a Turkey or Ham that will be paid for by the Club. We will need one volunteer to cook the turkey or ham. Please use the following link to sign up for the Pot Luck. Please review the list before adding your favorite recipe so we don’t end up with six green bean casseroles and no desserts.
Maybe think about topping your tree this year with Seraphinite!! If you don’t know it, it is a beautiful stone….
Seraphinite apparently acquired its name due to its resemblance to feathers due to its chatoyancy. Seraphinite is named after the biblical seraphs or seraphim angels.[1] With some specimens the resemblance is quite strong, with shorter down-like feathery growths leading into longer “flight feathers”; the resemblance even spurs fanciful marketing phrases like “silver plume seraphinite.” Seraphinite is generally dark green to gray in color, has chatoyancy, and has hardness between 2 and 4 on the Mohs scale of mineral hardness.
Check out this article on ScienceAlert.com It describes one of the most fantastic diamond finds ever!
“A new stone hauled from the belly of the Earth could very well be a first. The diamond itself is hollow – and inside is another diamond, freely moving around.”
Manage Cookie Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
