I bet you didn’t see this post coming!  I have loved beach combing since I was a child but now I’m getting more into researching what I find, especially unique pieces.  While my focus has primarily been on shell hunting, I have also gained an interest in finding fossils and other oddities even if I’m not sure what they are. I’ve learned from years of shopping for antiques that I have a good instinct when it comes to finding interesting things.  That same skill seems to apply to beach combing as well.  Some of the odd things I collected ended up being ancient fossils and some excellent specimens of bryozoan-encrusted shells.  It started with one find that I assumed was a fossilized shell, but the more I studied it, the more baffling it became. I’m not quite sure why I picked up what looked like an odd rock, but there

My mom and I started talking about the IOP shell collection contest of 2022 before we even found our first shell this year.  Once the competition was mentioned, though, my mom became unreasonably competitive.  “I found the first olive shell!!  I think that should earn me bonus points!  I found the first lady’s ear so I get another bonus point!” “Mom, people vote on their favorite shell collection.  Bonus points are worthless.” She has made it clear that she doesn’t need bonus points anyway because she’s going to wipe the floor with me.  While she’s being a little intense about the contest, she did earn bragging rights by beating me with over 85% of the votes.  She’s been insufferable ever since, so thanks for that. The 2022 shell collection contest was spur of the moment, but this year the contest was going to be a bit more organized.  We collected

We’ve been spending Spring Break at Isle of Palms, a beach in South Carolina we’ve visited with extended family a few times over the past four years.  The thing my mom and I most love about this beach is the shelling.  We can find wonderful shells and it’s my favorite activity to go out once or twice a day to comb the beach.  One of the best parts about shelling with my mom is that we look for different things.  It’s sort of like when we go to antique stores together.  I know I’m never going to have to wrestle her over a piece of ironstone or a writing slope.  At the beach, I am mostly drawn to the shells with character – shells that “speak to me” in a way that others might not get.  When you see my collection of shells set out together, you can see the