For where your treasure is there is your heart...

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Thanks to Shelley Stejer for sharing her 'heart rock' story with us on the Heart Rock Collective.




Found all these in about an hour without even looking, and about 8 more later. Every time I looked down, there were more. I keep wondering what this means. I found them the day we purchased and took ownership of a small piece of land on a lake. They were all found right at the entrance to the land in front of the gate :)


Shelly Stejer

Collective Garden of Serenity

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What am I going to do with all these rocks?
If you're a voracious rock collector, like myself, you've probably pondered this question many times.

The idea of a desk 'rock garden' emerged one day at work with my desire to create a welcoming and peaceful atmosphere for our clients and colleagues upon first entering our office suite.  Someplace to relax...a place of refuge from the demands of the work day. 


It started with a few simple rocks...you know how that goes. The 'rock' garden continued to grow as colleagues and friends dropped by the office with gifts of rocks and shells from their vacation and travels. When someone asked about where I found all these rocks, I'd smile and then begin to share the stories behind each rock. 

My former colleague, Barbara, told me that as she trekked through the deserts of Arizona, she remembered my love of rocks. She slipped a few precious finds in her backpack to bring back for my collection.

Strangers would pass by my office window; stop to admire the garden and a few would venture into the office to share their passion for rocks.

One colleague joked that soon my desk will be covered in rocks and there would be no desktop to work (yes! that is my plan ;)
How do you share your 'heart' rocks? We'd love to see/hear how you spread the love with your collections...please send your stories to heartrockcollective@gmail.com.

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Home is Where the Heart Is...1 year later

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Don't you just love happy endings -- the kind that moves your spirit, makes you swallow hard and catch your breath as a burst of joy washes through you?  
Some of you may remember last December's posting,  Home is Where the Heart Is from Greg Sarles. He shared the poignant story of the tragic loss of his parent's cabin,  "a home away from home."  One of things that made this place special was the heart rock embedded in the hearth.  Greg reached out to the Heart Rock Collective to share his story and ask where he might find a replacement heart rock. One of our HRC readers reached out to him and offered him the gift of some of her heart rocks. Open Hearts...giving and receiving.

A few months ago, I received another email from Greg. Reading this one left me with a warm feeling and a permanent smile etched in my heart. Here's the rest of the story as Greg tells it:

Kimberly:

One of your reader's  (I believe that her name was Jenna) sent a gift of two-heart
rocks and a "Heart-Rocks" book to me this past December after you had posted
the story of my parents cabin fire.  I in-turn presented Jenna's gifts to my parents at
Christmas.  My usually reserved parents both reacted with sincere joy and hope in
receiving such a thoughtful gift.  I just want to express my thanks to you and Jenna
for sharing your heart and hearts!

I have included a couple of photos of the hearts solid in their new hearth.

Sincerely,
Greg Sarles

PS...Hear is the original story...
 

In 1990 my parents built the cabin of their dreams on Ten-Mile Lake in Northern Minnesota. The most amazing feature of the cabin was the field-stone fireplace rising from the floor to the ceiling 25 feet overhead. We spent hours looking for faces, animals, and hidden objects within the rocks of this majestic fireplace. In the middle of the fireplace was a beautiful heart-shaped stone that my mother had insisted that the builders center in the rock formation.
This past weekend, the cabin burned to the ground. Only the fireplace stands intact. But the intense heat caused a majority of the rocks to explode, shatter, or crack. Although all of the personal belongings and family heirlooms in the house were lost, we feel extremely blessed that no one was home at the time of the fire, especially considering that the entire family was planning on spending the holidays together at the cabin this coming weekend.

The cabin was insured and a new structure will soon replace the former, but the "broken-heart" pictured is very symbolic of the loss. I would love to surprise my mom with another heart-shaped stone which she could use to anchor the new cabin. Please contact me if you know of where I could purchase such a heart!

Heart shaped rocks are better than rock shaped hearts

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Thanks to Toni Hemminger for sharing her story of seeing hearts in Nature...

"Wow... where to start, I have been collecting heart rocks for many, many years and my family and friends are now adding to my collection. Actually my sister in Magnolia Texas started her own collection recently. I not only collect heart rocks, I take photos of hearts in nature. I have included a photo of a heart on the side of the Brazos mountain in New Mexico.


Also an oil stain on my driveway.

They are everywhere!! My nephew Ethan (6) and; niece Grace (5) are the expert heart finders in my family. My daughter found the most perfect heart rock for me on a camp trip that she was able to bring back with her its about the size of a dime.
The second to last photo above was a heart she found on a backpacking trip that she was not able to bring back, but she got the photo!!

J's Heart

The most memorable story I have is from July of 2010. My daughter transferred from UNM in Albuquerque, NM to Humboldt University in Arcata, California. She is my only child and 1356 miles was a very long way away for her to be away from me as I have a medical condition and cannot fly. So I drove out, following her and her boyfriend to make sure she would be ok there. We had an awesome time on the trip but when we got there we found out the house they were supposed to be renting had been let out to someone else the day before so my daughter was basically homeless. I about lost it, they needed to find a place to live and I was on my own for 3 days. So I headed to the beach. It was socked in with fog the entire time I was there but I didn't mind it was only my second trip to the ocean so I was mesmerized and low and behold as soon as I hit the beach the first thing I saw was a heart rock in the sand. I spent hours beachcombing finding bits of shells, drift wood and I found over 50 heart rocks in my time there.
A man and his wife were sitting in the parking area eating lunch and the man walked out on the beach to ask me what in the world I was finding and I had just found the best heart rock ever (the last picture attached) so I just held out my hand and put it in his palm, he just stared at it then looked at me and said WOW its a heart! I said yeah isn't it amazing? You will need to come find your own :O) My daughter called me that afternoon and said are you meeting us for dinner? I had been on the beach for 6 hours totally missing lunch. It was very hard leaving her there without a home but they were camping on the beach and in a KOA for about 2 weeks before they found a place. I think that God kept me busy on the beach and gave me hearts so that I would know that she would be safe there.
I see hearts everywhere in the clouds, wood, pavement & I know I will continue to see them. The world is still full of love

Parking Lot Heart

Emma's Heart

Tawnya's Heart

The world is still full of love. I saw this quote somewhere... Heart shaped rocks are better than rock shaped hearts.... So true!!