A Mermaid Tear for Grace

Sea glass among the pebbles on our beach.

While walking along the beach the other afternoon, I saw something shiny green among the small pebbles.  I had found another piece of sea glass.  Though never a serious collector, I have over the years  found  twenty or so pieces along our beach.  My favorite is one that is green and embossed on what must have been the bottom of a bottle with “Made in” .  I assume “Canada”, but one never knows. 

Sea glass, often called mermaid tears, is glass found on beaches of oceans or large lakes that has been tumbled and smoothed by the waves, water and sand, creating smooth, frosted shards of glass. Combing shorelines for sea glass is a hobby for many beach-goers either who collect or craft it into jewelry.

The beaches of Nova Scotia are among the best places in the world to collect sea glass, and in particular, the beaches at Inverness where we were last week.  We didn’t have time to go searching for sea glass, but near our cabin at Beach Village we noticed an avid collector’s license plate, C GLASS.

A sea glass collector's license plate.

A few of Brenda Reichel's rare pieces of sea glass.

There is a beautiful collection of sea glass at Brenda Reichel’s  Tears of Glass Studio in Inverness (www.tearsofglass.ca)  Brenda has collected sea glass since the age of 15, and now she crafts the most stunning jewelry using these pieces of glass that have been “turned by waves, tumbled through rocks and polished by sand into multi-coloured jewels”.

For my ten-year-old granddaughter, Grace, I chose a beautiful little pendant fashioned from  a single green “mermaid teardrop” and embellished with a tiny Swarovski* crystal. Brenda called this one "Sea Jewel for a Princess" and I thought the name and the necklace very fitting.  I hope Grace is going to like this tiny jewel from the sea.

"Sea Jewel for a Princess" designed and crafted by Brenda Reichel.

*The Swarovski Company of Austria has made the finest, precisely-cut crystals for over 100 years. (www.swarovski.com).