Picture 020

The MOP Czech glass (available from C and R Loo) works very well as stringer decoration, keeping its satiny sheen even in fairly small stringer. Just pull it down and use it; but beware hot spots; the mica suspended in the glass can clump and leave clear spots in the stringer, which show up as gaps in your decoration. If I showed you the other side of the cone bead, you'd see a gap. it rakes nicely. The two beads at left are on a black core, the other is alexandrite that has struck for some reason to a deep rich magenta. This is why Heidi thinks it's tourmaline -- she says the alexandrite doesn't strike like that. It is too purply to be called red, but on the other hand it doesn't seem to burn or liver out and it provides very dense colour without losing clarity.