Good morning my lovely ssg friends and I apologise I did not post yesterday, it was however, a day well spent, as it was friday most of it was spent homeschooling, and those times that weren't were spent literally reading, watching, researching, til my poor eyes could no longer stay open. My status as stackling improved yesterday, I learned a lot about fake coins and testing etc, and I know that all of you my lovely friends already know your background to these subjects but I am very new to this and I was quite blown away, not in a good way, although I certainly appreciate learning the lesson.
So now I see how difficult it is to tell whether any precious metal bought is in fact real, and that I have no way of testing it :( I learned the magnet tests are unreliable, and I cannot go getting that chemical because I have a slight challenge where my bones are concerned, certain bones complain at me more than others , one of the complainers is my left arm, consequently the holding of dangerous chemicals that really ought not to be spilled?...... not a thing :)
I was left quite dismayed, worried I had bought fake coins, luckily as you know I had only bought a couple, but all the same I decided I wasn't going to buy any more vintage coins from ebay, I also decided that in fact I would only buy hallmarked silver miniatures from ebay and all other silver or gold buying I would only do from trusted sites. Luckily all my maple leaves and monkey were bought from trusted site and came with invoices.
Many of you have helped me learn and some have been absolutely brilliant recommending sites etc for me to look at, particular thanks go to 
In the course of my many hours research I also covered the concept of deciding what I get most from collecting now, I have definitely changed how I collect, I have also changed what I want to collect, I now take into account a number of factors before buying, I now decide if I am adding to the weight of my stack or whether I am after a particular coin for the design, I no longer collect vintage coins, and in the main I will be concentrating on designs that have personal appeal rather than rarity etc and weight.
This means I have now cut down my wishlist by half :) and it now takes me much longer to actually commit to buying something :) To me the weight comes first, so I am now concentrating on making sure I buy more weight than design, and the design now has to satisfy a very basic but important rule before I buy it , and that rule is called the 'hell yeah' rule :)
the hell yeah rule
For those who don't know I spent many years as a feng shui practitioner. It was good I enjoyed it, it was a lot of bloody hard work, and contrary to popular belief there is no money in it, at least I never made any money, but then I am that soft lass who whenever someone says 'oh but we are friends so you won't charge me', goes ahead and does it for free, so gave up fang shui. Following that though, after a while, I discovered Abraham Hicks, and have followed everything she says with much enthusiasm. I had many issues that Abraham solved, I was left with one last big, big, big, problem, and it was personal :) No way, I thought, no way she would have an answer........... she did. Abraham said to me 'only do it if it feels like a hell yeah moment if it makes you feel like saying hell yeah then you got it' and in that one sentence she solved my last issue and I was free. I have used it many times since, so now I shall use it for guidance in my treasure buying :) if I see a coin or bar that makes me say 'hell yeah' I will buy it other than that I will add for weight................................. only thing is; now I have to stop saying 'hell yeah' to every pretty coin I see :)
lets go find treasure!
thank you for reading
Velveteen 2018