Rozalia Brown thinks everyone should take up rocks and gems as a hobby, and it is best to do it before they stop working.
“You have to start before you retire,” Brown explained Sunday, Aug. 15, as she and husband Robert from Chilliwack, along with friend Barbra Felton, a jewelry maker from Aldergrove, were setting up a table under a shade awning in the parking lot of the Royal Canadian Legion Aldergrove branch.
“If you don’t, it gets put on a back burner, then you suddenly retire and you have no hobby,” Rozalia warned.
The Browns got involved in their hobby 15 years before they retired.
“It is my life,” Rozalia enthused.
“You get outdoors and you get to meet great people.”
They were taking part in the very first tailgate event staged by the Aldergrove-based Fraser Valley Rock & Gem Club, as an outdoor alternative to their annual indoor event.
Close to 30 tables were set up from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Organizer Harley Waterson said the club decided to call off their yearly indoor September sale at the Aldergrove Old Age Pensioners (OAP) hall down the road.
“Due to COVID, we thought we’d just do an outdoor event,” Waterson told the Langley Advance Times.
Billed as a tailgate sale club members brought rough rocks, slab, finished jewelry pieces, mineral specimens, tools, beads, sculptures and more – “everything a rock hound would want,” as Waterson put it.
It was a first for the club, he said.
A second tailgate sale is set for Sept. 19.
READ ALSO: Rockhound’ club gets new digs in Aldergrove
There have been no in-person meetings of the club since it celebrated its 60th anniversary in September of 2019.
Since then, sessions and guest speakers have been taking place by videoconferencing
The club, which is devoted to the study, collecting, cutting, polishing and engraving of gemstones, minerals and rocks, started in 1959 with a core of enthusiasts who had taken night school courses together.
READ MORE: VIDEO: Rock and gem show a smashing good time in Aldergrove
It has more than 130 adult and 30 youth members from around the Lower Mainland.
The club is a member of the BC Lapidary Society (see http://www.bclapidary.com/) and also has a Facebook page (see https://www.facebook.com/FVRGCAldergrove).
More photos from the Sunday event can be seen online.
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