I Must Be in Heaven

      As many of you know I love fabrics and quilting.  I also love searching for sea shells.  Well I have hit the "jack pot" here on Sanibel Island.  There is a lovely quilt/fabric/craft shop here on the island.  I have already taken a class there and purchased some fabric.  More about that in a future post.  Let me tell you about shelling on Sanibel and show you some of the nifty "beach bling" I have found since being on the island.  

     Now you must understand, Sanibel is well known as one of the best places for finding sea shells in the USA.  So shelling here is somewhat like an olympic sport.  Both residents and visitors down here take shelling to a new level. Many have dedicated shell bags made of strong mesh in different colors for collecting sea shells  (I used an old oyster bag all summer on Ocracoke).  Many also carry a sifter on a stick.  This is a small thing that looks like a miniature spaghetti strainer attached to a stick so they can dip it into shells along the waters edge and the fine sand goes through leaving them with shells to look through and collect (I just bend over and use my hands).  

Here is a picture of one example of the many shell sifters out there.  There are many versions.

 I figured I had to get an edge somehow if I was going to compete.  So the other day I got up at 4:30AM with my flash light and makeshift shell bag and headed to the beach.  I know what you are thinking....she's nuts, certifiable, totally gone off the deep end.   Well folks, I was not the only one on the beach.  I actually did this two days in a row because there was a larger than normal low tide during the new moon. The beach was lit up like a Christmas tree with numerous people and their flash lights.  So I am not alone in my affliction.  It actually was kind of cool being out there at dark.  Many of the sea creatures along the shore were alive.  I saw starfish, live whelks, crabs, fish, and cockles.  It was pretty tough getting pictures with the flash light and my phone but here are a couple.

One of many star fish I saw early in the morning.  This is under about 6 inches of water.

 This was a live sand dollar partially buried in the sand on the surf line (it is actually in knee deep water).

Once the sun came up it was much easier.

Morning on the beach.  Ahhhh heaven.  This was one of my lightening whelk shells.

This little calico crab looked like he had not had his morning coffee yet.

This little octopus was only about the size of my hand, but he unfortunately was deceased.

I have also done some beach walks during the daylight hours as well.  I did two mega beach walks of about 5 miles each this past week.  Here are some of the treasures I found.  It has been fun finding different kinds of shells than what I normally find on Ocracoke.

I found these three banded tulip shells and an alphabet cone shell (a very cherished find) all on the same beach walk.

Here Pengi displays some of my tiny but very cute shells.  One of my favorite is the nutmegs in the lower right of the picture.  I just think they are adorable.  Hope to find more this winter.

And these are a few of the more medium sized shells I found.  There are multiple paper figs on the front left.  Also a bunch of different sized fighting conchs and several lightening whelks.  Three olives and one cockle in the back left.

Here is a little closer look at two of the paper figs.  They are very thin shells and fragile, so it was awesome to find several still whole.

The fighting conchs are a dime a dozen.  I had to stop picking them up.  But some of these have some really nice coloring.

This is a picture of a lightening whelk on the left and a pear whelk on the right.

I wanted to give everyone a sample of some of the things I am finding on the beach.  After winter storms there are supposedly tons of shells on the beach, but the weather so far has been very quiet and settled.  (The first time I've even been on a boat and was wishing for stormy weather)  It has still been a blast.  Stay tuned as in future blogs I will give you more shell information but for now enjoy these pictures.  After this winter I may need to complete the "shellaholic" 10 step program.