Wonderstone Focals from the Western US

Howdy Folks! I've been working making some lovely matte finish focal beads out of material called "Wonderstone" from the Great Basin region, mostly Utah. It's NOT a picture jasper and it's not a jasper at all. It's most likely a coarse grained rhyolite that is not very silicated (low quartz levels). I'll put some inquiries out onto the rockhound and lapidary lists I'm on to try and figure out more info on it. Because it's not very silicated it doesn't take a very good polish, so I put these through a 600 grit sanding to get a satin matte finish on them and then I oil them with hand lotion to fill the pores of the stones and deepen the color.

This first batch is called "Salina Wonderstone" I'm told, because it's from near Salina, Utah. It loks a lot like NW picture jaspers but with a dark night sky....

These other Wonderstones have wonderful banding and color in them and are from various, unknown locations in the Western United States...

Thanks for letting me share and I'll be cutting more focal beads and cabs in these materials soon! Feel free to check out my DVHdesigns store on eBay or like my DVHdesigns Custom Cut Beads page on Facebook if you want to follow what I'm doing!

Last of the Jelly Opal Beads!

Thanks for the feedback! I finally cut the LAST two beads out of the jelly opal rough I got last August! They are smaller, weighing in at only 16 and 22cts each, but they measure 44x9x6mm and 48x10x7mm respectively. One has a drill hole about 1.5mm and the other is about 1.7mm. Here are some pics... I actually sold every single one of the larger beads I've listed before. The BIG one with two drill holes sold on Christmas Morning to a new customer, which was a great thing to wake up to! So these are the last of that 3/4 pound chunk and when they're gone, they're gone!