Steph

Thank you!

Oh my gosh yes, so do I. And it's nice to have a big brother and little brother.

Oh gosh, I'm not even sure it was in the 80's when I was whining that day ... might have been ... but when I checked online the reading wasn't I was picturing ... which now makes me scared about how I'm going to take it next weekend when we hit the 90's. It's just that we don't have AC. So *whine*.

Nice breadth in today's offerings.

These are likely to have been made in Asia. The style which is sometimes called Imperial.

And that's cool too. Never crossed my mind to try to make it. I would surely prefer it fresh to canned. But now that I see the recipe -- and see you use the word "suet" -- I'm having second thoughts. I didn't know/remember that it had animal fat in it.

Cool.

The odds are very low that any confetti marbles that you'd find in the wild would be collectible. Very very very few Vitro confetti marbles were made. They weren't sold in stores. And then there are the Christensen Agate Guineas which some might think of as confetti marbles. But pretty much what you would find in the wild are from Mexico or Asia and not collectible.

I soooooo want to try that. Is that available here? Okay, I'm definitely putting it on the shopping list.

LOL ... that's a day to remember ...

Here are some photos of pontils: http://marbleconnection.com/topic/20970-pontils/ Machine-made marbles have "cutlines". They can be small points, little U's or V's, or longer lines. That's where the marble begins or ends ... where the glass was usually cleanly and simply snipped off before it dropped to the rollers. That's the little pucker that you are seeing here. Trying now to get some pics gathered up showing that effect.

A need as arisen of some more pics of the basic, simple cutlines that you can sometimes feel with your fingers but we know are just ordinary as-made spots and newbies think are maybe pontils. Anyone up for that?

This is the one he said Alley on? That's comforting, because my immediate first thought was Alley. Which one did he say CAC on? Did you get a picture of that one?

Pride & Prejudice & Zombies

You're welcome. Probably wouldn't be prudent for me to be receiving mail right now. Too much in flux here. Sorry about that.

Were you tempted to start hiking in and never turn around? I would be.

I wouldn't use the word "transitionals". Appreciate the extra shots. In my opinion, the reason you won't find them in the books is not because they're rare but because they aren't the kind that people find very collectible. It's pretty neat what you can see in marbles sometimes when you backlight them. However, keep in mind that if it takes a special light to see whatever was in the marble, then probably the maker of the marble didn't plan for it to be seen. There are some Mexican marbles which have dark surfaces and are covered with speckles. It's the speckles on the outside that are supposed to be seen. But sometimes, if you look really really hard, you can see cat's eye vanes inside. Weird things can happen inside the marbles. But if you have to work to see 'em, then they're curiosities, but probably not intentional. That's the best answer I have for you.

With all those colors, one of the Jabo or McCullough specials runs seem like a decent guess. In that last shot, looks like some ox.

Totally know what you mean

May you one day be so tested ....

That's what I'm sure I was hoping, but I can't remember if that idea was encouraged when I saw the marble posted. So you think so?

Old favorite ... auction pic, I'm pretty sure

lavender and yellow with the wedding cake white?

Hi again. We really need to see some photos in more natural light. By natural light I mean daylight or a flash. The light coming from behind makes it nearly impossible to identify the marbles. Sorry about that!