concentrating...

...very hard, this is ex Dubliner Tony member of the local Lapidary Club working on a ring he is creating as a surprise for his 'bride' of some forty years or so.

I wandered into their rooms this morning expecting to find the annual Exhibition and Display of all things rock hounding. The show has been going for may decades (and the club even longer) and was a firm fixture on our family calendar when the lads would go with pocket money clutched in hot little hands seeking a treasure.
Bags of slices and tumbled agates and pebbles for sale and even better geodes (those mysterious globes of rock sometimes filled with crystals) which were sliced open in front of them.
Oooo the expectation of a glittering prize!

Today's glittering prize was an invitation to wander through the rooms and peek in on the silversmiths hard at work with ribbons of silver and cabochons a plenty.

Tony has an emerald to place in the ring...perfect for someone from the Emerald Isle.