WHEN I FIRST STARTED BUILDING MY OWN CRYSTAL TOOLS I did a lot of experimenting with different materials and different glues and fasteners. As you can imagine, some pieces turned out beautifully and some not so perfectly as I had imagined in my mind’s eye. Learning to build crystal tools is a creative process that may take a bit of time and effort, though one doesn’t have to be an artistic genius to build beautiful and useful crystal tools. Persistence is the key, along with experimentation, that will help each person find his or her own special techniques in building crystal tools. It also never hurts to have a bit of guidance along the way in order to avoid a few pitfalls and possible small disasters.

If you are a bit of a pack rat you may already have a number of the supplies necessary to build crystal tools. Some of the basic supplies include E6000 or Household Goop adhesive, good scissors, a tapestry needle, linen sinew, toothpicks, paper towels and clear packing tape or transparent tape. Depending on what you are building you may also require lengths of chain, wire (round nosed, flat nosed, needle nosed pliers and a good pair of wire nippers may come in handy with metals and chains), leather lacing, leather or fabric scrap, stones, beads, shells, feathers, copper tubing and metal glue, sticks, driftwood, etc. If you have not already collected any special components, you can certainly go out and have an adventure finding exactly the perfect elements to use in creating a beautiful and serviceable crystal tool.

Wands

Creating your own crystal wand can be a very simple or complex endeavor. For some a wand consists of a length of wood or a metal tube with a crystal at the end, clean and simple. For others a wand will have many embellishments that take a bit more time. No matter what kind of wand you have chosen to make, the first task is to make sure that the stick or tube is reasonably close in diameter to the crystal you have chosen. If you have chosen a crystal that is quite a bit larger than what it is attached to you can have something so top-heavy that it will fall off. I do know a local channeler who found a way around this when building a staff (giant wand as tall as a person). He used automobile bondo to build a descending base on the back end of a pool cue in order to have a very large crystal attach to something smaller in diameter. Then the entire thing was wrapped in leather to hide the bondo. Unless you are willing to take extra time finding a medium to build with in such a way, you may desire to stick with crystals and wood or tubing that are closer in diameter. Also, if you are using a tube and desire to fill it with stones, herbs or a vial of sacred water, etc., you will want to be sure that the tubing is large enough in diameter to hold such items.

The second challenge in building a wand is to get the crystal to attach to the end of the stick or tubing. One of the best ways I have found to do this is to make sure that the crystal is fairly flat on the bottom and put a blob of E6000 or Household Goop on the end of the stick/tube and on the bottom of the crystal, wait a moment, and then put the two together. Sometimes this is a bit difficult, so you can use clear packing tape or regular transparent tape to help hold the two together while the glue cures. Often the results are best when you remove excess glue with a toothpick or paper towel before wrapping the tape around. Then you will want to find a way to keep the shaft of the wand upright while the curing process takes place. After a couple of hours the tape can come off and you can use a knife-edge to clear any excess glue off of the crystal.

Once your crystal and shaft are cured you can remove the tape and choose what you will use to cover the juncture of the crystal and the stick or tubing. Strips of soft scrap leather are often flexible enough and thick enough to cover and mold around this area. You can apply a small dab of adhesive glue to the underside of the leather before wrapping it around the crystal and shaft. Scraping the end of the tube across the backside of the leather strip while barely squeezing is often enough to put a very thin layer on the leather. If you get too much it will bleed out from the edges and you will be busy trying to pull off bits of adhesive with a toothpick or paper towel. A very little will work quite nicely on leather. If you are using fabric you will want to be even more careful with glue application because the glue can bleed through the weave of the fabric. If you are unsure how your fabric will react, use a tiny scrap and glue the fabric to a bit of cardboard first to find out how the glue and the fabric work together.

If you are planning on having crystals on both ends of your wand you will simply repeat this process with the other end of the stick or tubing. If you are using tubing you will want to insert any special items into the tube before adding the second crystal. Also, if you don’t want things you have put inside your wand to clack and rattle, you may desire to pack cotton, or herbs such as sage, into the tube along with a small vial or stones to cushion them and keep them from moving around in the tube. People place all kinds of things inside wands, herbs, crystals, sacred waters, hair, etc. I used to put small tumbled stones that were balanced to the chakras inside wands made of tubing. I have also been known to place capacitors and wiring inside as well. Your intuition will tell you if you should place something inside a wand and what that something should be, though you will want to avoid using anything potentially explosive.

Once you have your basic wand complete then it is up to you what other bits and pieces you attach to it. If you are gluing stones onto the shaft you will want ones that are a bit flat in one area so they will stay put once glued. You may also use leather, leather lacing, beads and linen sinew, wire and other items to accessorize your new crystal wand. You may also desire to use fabric or leather to fashion a bag for your new tool that will protect it from exposure and cushion it against unexpected blows. Always transport wands with care. A long wooden box or hard case, or cardboard tube filled with packing materials such as foam, bubble wrap or crumpled tissue paper is recommended if you are traveling with a wand and desire to protect it from breakage. Make sure you can easily get to the wand if you are traveling by air, as security may desire to see what "that thing" is. Use judgment in having such an item in carry-on luggage, as some airport security employees will view something long and pointy as a weapon, no matter what it is made of. It could also be quite distressing to see security officers taking your wand apart to be sure that a concealed vial does not contain drugs or explosives.

Pendulums

Pendulums are one of the simplest tools to make. Just about anything you can hang on a chain or cord can be a pendulum. In fact, when people come to the store and ask if there is something special a pendulum should be made of or if one type works better than another, my husband, Chris, pulls out his drill chuck and says, "Watch this." Then he proceeds to show them that even a drill chuck on a cord can make a great pendulum if that is your intent. The only things I have seen that didn’t make good pendulums have been objects that were particularly lopsided in their weight distribution, with all the weight on one side.

The tricky part of pendulums comes when you have something you desire to make a pendulum out of that doesn’t already have a loop on top or a hole through it. Usually you can deal with this problem with a bit of chain or cord, adhesive glue, some wire and some leather or fabric. If you are going to make a wire loop for the top, bend the wire to the desired shape and then curl the edges of the wire so they will hold glue better. Fit the wire edges to the upper sides of the object you are using and use household cement to secure them (the tape method we used with the wands works well here). If you are using chain be sure to put the end through the wire before curling and gluing it. Once the wire is secured to the sides and the glue is dry, you can use leather or fabric to cover the wire curls and the glue. If you are using cord or leather lace instead of wire for the top attachment, you would do the same with the cord or leather that you would with the bent wire, except that you would knot the ends of the cord that are being glued to the object. Usually leather lace will glue flat and stay put quite nicely.

Once you have completed the process with the pendulum itself, you get to decide how long the chain or cord should be and whether or not to put something at the other end. Most pendulums have a cord or chain that is between 7 and 12 inches in length. Top ends could be made out of stone donuts, favorite charms, beads, etc. If you are using cord, be sure to leave extra length for knotting. Now that you have your pendulum completed you may desire to read about ways you can utilize your pendulum to receive information clearly through The Art of Dowsing.

Medicine Bags

When making a medicine bag you will desire to draw the shape of bag you plan to make on a piece of paper before you start cutting out leather or fabric. If it is for a special piece it will be important to place the piece on the paper and be sure to leave plenty of room around, it as you draw, for seams that you will be making when you sew or lace. Once you have your pattern you can draw it off on leather, or pin it on fabric and cut it out. If you are using fabric, turn the nice outside edges of the fabric together facing each other and hand or machine-sew around the sides (pinning will really help keep fabric from sliding). Then turn the top edge back and stitch a tube for the laces to go in, and then turn the whole thing right side out. With fabric bags this is where the tapestry needle comes in handy. You can thread the cord and go through the fabric at the seam. You can do this with one cord to make a bag that hangs around the neck or two cords to make one that can be drawn shut with both hands.

If you are making a leather bag you may choose to use a leather punch to make holes for lacing or linen sinew to go through. This speeds up the process and the work can be done wrong side out to hide the seams, or the seams can be sewn on the outside and become part of the decorative qualities of the bag. Often, the drawstrings work better threaded through holes made by a leather punch. Many leathers are too thick to fold over and then gather. If you are using leather that is ultra thin and ultra soft, you may be able to work with it as you would fabric. It can be a lot of fun to add beads, fringe or other artistic qualities to you special bag. Some fringes and beadwork may be easier to do before assembling your medicine bag while some can easily be left for after. You will want to keep this in mind so that you don’t end up trying to sew on something you can barely fit your fingers into.

Dedicating Your Tool

Whether or not you have created a wand, pendulum, medicine bag or other tool it is important to treat all of the components you are using with an attitude of sacredness and high respect. Valuing them highly during the building process generates energy that adds to their power. Once you have completed your project take the time to clear, charge and program the tool for your use. Remember as you are doing this to thank all the elements that you used as components for adding their energy to the purpose of your new crystal tool.

Personal crystal tools can add significantly to the energy of your manifestations and energy healing facilitation. They can be a positive way of focusing your own energy to enhance whatever energy work you are involved in.

Do you like to pour out your M&M’s and make patterns with them before you eat them up? Making patterns with objects is a form of creating grids, and grids can be very useful and powerful crystal tools. Next month we will investigate the use of grids for meditation, manifesting and healing.

© Joysprite, The Crystal Lady, 2002

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Joysprite - otherwise known as The Crystal Lady - is a Reiki Master, Crystal Healing Facilitator, NLP Practitioner and Mom of three beautiful children. Her own personal crystal path began in West Texas and is continuing in Ocean Beach, California, where she is the owner of Wisdom Crystals.