Trollbeads information that can inspire your creativity with your own Trollbeads collection. Share your thoughts, be involved and please leave comments!

This is a question I was just asked by a social marketer working with Trollbeads. This was after he realized I didn’t really want to talk about Facebook, Twitter or my Pinterest page. I work with those social sites but I only wanted to talk about the forum. There’s a big international Trollbeads event next month and I was asked to speak to him.  He will be talking to the Trollbeads distributors from around the world and to the U.S. dealers during this event and he wanted to talk to some dealers about their efforts.  Thinking about the answer brought me to thinking about how it started and why I knew the Trollbeads collectors wanted and really needed the forum.   I had Trollbeads Gallery, my Trollbead website for more than 3 years and I was overwhelmed communicating with collectors directly and trying to help them with information through emails and on the phone. For the sake of being more effective it seemed a better way had to be out there.  I needed to find a platform on the internet where everyone could meet and discuss the passion they so obviously wanted to share.  It had to be a give and share situation for all of us.  Sharing photos was definitely a tool it had to have.  It took a little research to find Ning and it seemed like a good fit.  I developed the account and worked on the design and declared it open.  The first day we had our first small group of members and we were off and running.  By the end of the first year we had 1000 members, end of two years 2000 members and now we have reached our third year at 3000 members.  The Forum is unique in that I'm a dealer and though I promote my own website I also remind my members to seek out their local dealers as well. My store is in a small  town and I know the importance of doing business locally.  I remember a comment made on a blog in Europe negatively saying I was “self-promoting” … well I should hope so(!) as I am in business and for this to succeed  I need to have it work out financially and I let people know I am a dealer.  The cost of keeping this forum is more than $1000.00 out of pocket each year and if we all still want it to keep going promoting my site important.

Watching over the Trollbeads Gallery Forum from a dealer’s point of view has me acting as manager but I still feel a part of the forum's family. I don’t count the hours spent monitoring the site because in the process I have met hundreds of Troll friends from all over the world and I wouldn’t give it up for anything.  When you have a passion to collect you need to trust the people involved in what you collect.  Being an authorized dealer brings with it trust as our legal agreements with Trollbeads assures it and my reputation promises it.  My position has been to keep information correct, to the best of my knowledge and to provide a supportive and positive place for collectors to gather.

To make the Forum's description less one sided I have asked a few of our members to give a brief comment from their point of view. I have only included where they are from and have omitted their names for privacy reasons. I will be including more in the next blog.

Wyoming: "The forum has been a great place to make friends who share my passion for Trollbeads.  Everyone is upbeat and encouraging.  There is none of the negativity that I have found on other foums.  I send my Trollbeads customers to the forum so that they can connect with other Trollies around the world.  We are one big family!"

New York: "This forum is important in reminding me that there are other people besides me who go gaga for little pieces of glass - that they're more than glass, but art! It's a little slice of heaven. I love being in such good company! I enjoy going to the forum to see all the wonderful creations of others and get some inspiration for my own!"

England: "I love this forum because it is a warm and friendly place, where many interesting things can be discussed. Louise has a very light hand on the helm, enabling a true  freedom of expression I have not found on other forums. The member's pictures are a constant inspiration to me. There are a number of  groups available to join, and the chatroom feature is unique to this forum, a brilliant place to be.

Pennsylvania:Trollbeads Gallery Forum gives me a chance to make new friends from all over the world.  I love sharing ideas & photos with people who love Trollbeads as much as I do and speak "Trolleese". Having secret partner gift exchanges is a blast, too.  I also love Trollbeads Fest--where you can meet and party with friends from the forum.  There are also talented artists and designers from Trollbeads.  It's a weekend of "Troll Bliss" hosted by Louise and her staff in a beautiful seaport town.

Tennessee: I live in an area where the closest TB shop is over an hour away and though it's nice, it's a small shop with not a huge selection or knowledgeable sales people  so my TB education has been solely here on this Forum.  I came to TBGallery Forum because I was captivated by the beautiful Trollbeads, but it wasn't long before I was captivated by the Forum members themselves who are such a great group of interesting, kind, fun and creative people and some have become my friends in the truest sense of the word.  This Forum means a lot to me....it's a unique place I can escape to where I can lose myself completely among the photos and share my thoughts with friends with whom I share a number of interests.

The photo above came from the photographs our members have shared on the Forum. There are over 18,000 photos to be inspired by.

To join us go to Trollbeads Gallery Forum !

Think about the first collections you were consumed by. If you were lucky, as I was, it was young in life. You had someone in your family or in your group of friends who showed you a collection and you became enthralled with the idea of having something to collect. That is how it happened with me. I can still remember every collection I was ever shown and I can tell you everything I ever collected and I remember with fondness the innocence of my desire to “collect”, not so much to own but to have an interesting group of one thing, a collection. It gave me a sense of pride and it formed a thirst to hunt down whatever it was I was collecting. What better way to teach a child about themselves and about the value of what they choose to collect. The most serious collection I had was collecting stamps. I would take my allowance to the old stamp store and buy a package carefully encased in a wax paper envelope and run home to see if I was lucky enough to find one my stamp book was missing. It gave me the sense of amassing, of working to earn something and I began to understand the value of money. How many young children do you know today have this in their lives? One of the benefits of being a Trollbeads retailer is being able to see children and see their minds working as they pick out their first beads.

     We once had a 3 year old who took shopping with Nana as a very serious endeavor. Cate would get up on our step stool and do her own choosing. No matter what Nana showed her she always had her own idea. Think about the memories both child and grandmother will always have. Cate never takes the bracelet off. She is shown in this photograph with her Trollbeads bracelet.

The idea of earning the beads comes later and girls and boys around the age of 7 to 8 do understand the concept of money and will work for allowances to purchase their own beads. These collectors have their own story books with the beads they want circled and starred. There are so many benefits of having young people collect something they are fascinated with. Beyond the value of the money, they learn what they can do without to add to their collection. They learn to take care of their collection,polish it, protect it and watch it grow. Trollbeads tell a story and who enjoys stories better than anyone?  Children! Are there young children in your life that could benefit from collecting Trollbeads?

With the introduction of the Spring 2011, Trollbeads also released a limited Edition at the same time.  The Limited Edition was Agate beads, in Pink and in Turquoise.  These beads were very unlike the Crazy Lace Agate Trollbeads released in 2010 so the release was brand new and totally unexpected.  These Trollbead stones are finished with a very high polish and are very smooth and have similar outlines to the Jasper and Picasso Jasper Trollbeads.  No facets just smooth rock.  The two colors also came in 2 choices, solid and striped.  While the solid Agate Trollbeads offer you a very drenched color, the striped Agates add pattern and intrigue to your jewelry.  Once again a hard choice to make and my advice would be to choose what you like and decide where you will use them later.  Photo below and the set at the end of this post shows a solid Pink Agate and the set at the top shows the solid Turquoise set.

Collecting Trollbeads is always about choices but making decision based on what other beads you have to use it with will stifle your collection.  Think about your Trollbeads collection as a painter’s palette, one you have all the colors spread across, and start from scratch designing new creations.  Ok, now think about the beads you said no to because they just didn’t work with what you had?  Your palette would be boring and you chance at self-exploration would once again leave you once again at the boredom door.  Is this where you want to be?  No, I know you don’t because if you did you’d be collecting some other bead brand!  So go back to your local dealer or back to the website of your choice and choose the wildest of the Agate Stripes and know your collection will always lead you to exciting places where you can reinvent yourself through Trollbeads!

The striped Agate has a very interesting story behind its development.  Like many of the interesting varieties of stones, Agates are formed from volcanic activity.  There are nodules or cavities within volcanic rocks that have had layers of silica type materials have form in regular spaces and some are thin and others wide.  These agates when cut opposite to the grain, or transversely, shows the layers as they occurred in time and it is these layers that give our Striped Agate, its name.  Hold the striped beads up to the light and you will see the light through the bead.  (Notice the bead to the right.)

The lighter silica striations go from white to a cloudy but light clear. Sometimes called banded Agate, it is the most exciting to me as a Trollbeads dealer and collector.  When you look at these new Trollbeads remember to purchase for its beauty and then be concerned as to how you might use it.  Don’t give up the chance to own something so strikingly beautiful because you are afraid of its use.

 For interesting ideas of what to use your Agate LE Trollbeads with join us on Trollbeads Gallery Forum and see what collectors are doing!

Also join us on Facebook and continue your Trollbeads journey by learning and seeing what the rest of the world is doing with their Trollbeads! http://www.facebook.com/TrollbeadsGallery

At  the time of this writing Trollbeads has released a total of 11 Precious Stone beads.  Our last Trollbeads Gallery Blog article was all about Labradorite and this article will be about Aventurine.

Of all the green Trollbeads , Aventurine is the richest and the most variable in respect to color and translucency.  From the picture I have featured here you can see the wide variety of tones which makes it a fun Trollbead to hunt for.  I am personally collecting as many tones of Aventurine Trollbeads as I can and I plan on using them on a bracelet starting with the lightest to the darkest.  When you read more about the stone, I’m sure you’ll want more than one because as far as folklore and features, there isn’t much it can’t do.

While Trollbeads only uses green Aventurine, it actually exists in a fairly large assortment of colors and within each color, a large assortment of tones.  Besides the green and blue-greens, Aventurine comes in blue, brown, yellow, orange and red.   Because Aventurine can have semi-transparent tendencies  if you look close in the right light, an Aventurine Trollbead will sparkle deep within the stone. (see photograph) The sparkle effect, called aventurescence, is due to small particles of reflective minerals such as mica, which is silvery.  Our darker toned beads tend to show it more but that is due to the contrasting tones between the silver mica and the deep emerald green.  The hardness on the Moh’s scale is very similar to Labradorite, at 6.5.  Aventurine has been mined from all over the world.

The name “Aventurine” comes from the Italian phrase “per avventura”, which translate to “by chance”.  The story is that in the 18^th century  glass workers in Venice were working with molten glass when by accident some copper shavings fell into the vat of glass.  The effect was beautiful as the copper sparkled within the glass and this all happened “by chance”.  The aventurine stone looks just like this glass, so the stone was assigned this name.  I love the connections that occur within the Trollbeads world and this stone’s very name has a direct connection to Italian glass and so many Trollbeads are made from Italian glass. 

Due to its lengthy history and worldwide availability, Aventurine has filtered into many cultures and like many stones has centuries of folklore and benefits attributed to it.  I have compiled a list of some of the stones attributes.  Like I said before, apparently there isn’t much this stone can’t do and I am very glad I am making a whole bracelet out of it.

• Tibetan Folklore says that aventurine cures myopia and invigorates creativity.
• Aventurine brings prosperity into your life.  A talisman for fortune.
• A general good luck stone, it has been used in games to the holder the extra power to win.
• Provides emotional well being by reducing stress .
• It helps you to see past the roadblocks in your life by helping you to recognize solutions.
• For centuries it has been used as a fertility charm whether it be for a child or a fresh idea.
• Is used for success in goals involving wealth, strength and independence.
• Assists in helping you give up old fears that hold you back from success.
• Will help you heal from emotional trauma and the wounds left behind.
• Has been said to lower cholesterol and blood pressure.
• Relieves allergies and migraines, calm the nervous system and strengthen the heart.
• Placing it your garden and in your home will proteck you from geopathic stress caused by underground water and fault lines.
• If you wear this stone it will protect you from environmental pollution.
• Protects the heart chakra.
• Very good for your lower back (sciatica). 
• Decisiveness: - Assists one in making the "right" decisions.

I have a unique perspective from a Trollbeads collectors point of view and this has helped me understand something.  Not only am I a Troll collector, I have a Trollbeads store , I am a seller of Retired Trollbeads, a Trollbeads Gallery Forum moderator and manager, a Trollbeads website manager and that's just the tipof the iceberg.

My perspective is one of experience, research and personal friendships to the largest and most enthusiastic collectors of Trollbeads around the world.  Some of these personal collections rival the inventories of many authorized Trollbeads stores. But these collections aren't created by greed or by the  "have to have more than so and so" thoughts, they are created by a depth of passion that goes way beyond many of the "collectables" of recent decades. Compare it to other subsequent beads lines, all of todays bead line are subsequent to Trollbeads so pick any of them and make a comparison.  There is none.  No other line has the depth of colors and materials Trollbeads has not do the silver and gold beads have the fine artistic quality to them.  There just isn't another bead that can muster this much passion and when one starts collecting them  they just can't and won't stop.  There are over 500 beads in todays offerings but that doesn't even begin to describe the color families of glass or the color families of jade, pearls, aventurines, you name it.  The best part of this unparalleled selection is that collectors join in the creative process and design bracelets, many of them, based on themes,color ways, personal meanings and eras of the beads themselves.  When there is 35 years of Trollbead history, there are plenty of eras from which to create and to draw from for the many ideas you may have.

When working on your Ocean or water themed Troll bracelets make sure you visit our Retired Trollbeads Gallery to see the Flounder bead! Hurry before he gets away!  Or when you start working on your pale blue themed Trollbeads bracelet check out the Light Blue Stripe.

So don't ever consider your bracelet finished if your chain is full, it is only the beginning of your Trollbeads Journey.