They're sensitive to the UV light from the sun. Or from a "black light" or other UV source. I don't doubt you had one the size of a thumb nail, but chances are it was a man-made model, and there's nothing wrong with that either. It's the same identical chemicals/structure, and far more perfect. It's unusual to get one that big, natural that is. And they're known for having a lot of 'inclusions', stuff cluttering them up, not usually a "clean" stone. But, that's what sets the natural ones apart, all those inclusions. Yes, they're still expensive, the natural ones at least, retail is often $6,000/carat, but the man-made ones are pretty affordable, perhaps $40/carat where I buy them. They're really pretty and that's all that matters--that you like the way it looks. (The natural ones are a whole lot less if you know the Russian importer and buy from him/her at less than book wholesale. wink wink) Jan G. ----Original Message Follows---- From: "JACK CHILDERS" <jaxone1234@msn.com> Reply-To: BLACKSHEEP-CHAT-L@rootsweb.com To: BLACKSHEEP-CHAT-L@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [BSChat] Jewelry Date: Thu, 25 Apr 2002 15:22:59 -0500 Jan G, Alexandrite is my birthstone also. Aren't they beautiful ? But expensive for the real thing. I had one that I got when I was a teenager, a beautiful square cut, stone as big as your thumb nail. Someone stole it and I haven't had the money to replace it since then. It always fascinated me how they changed from green to red. Jack Childers in OKC ==== BLACKSHEEP-CHAT Mailing List ==== Creative use of your delete key is encouraged. If you disagree with the subject, CHANGE the subject. ============================== To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records, go to: http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237 _________________________________________________________________ Join the worlds largest e-mail service with MSN Hotmail. http://www.hotmail.com