Everything in creation has its appointed painter or poet and remains in bondage like the princess in the fairy tale 'til its appropriate liberator comes to set it free. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson
(Credit: www.manmadediy.com) My great-aunt Annabelle was a shell artist. Her big apartment was right on the harbor overlooking Clearwater Beach back in the 1960's. Whenever my mom would take us with her to visit Aunt Annabelle I knew I would have to be a very good little girl because her little-old-lady dwelling was crammed full of antiques that were breakable & tables full of shells in the process of being colored with dye & glued into flowers, critters, & other shell works of art. As we climbed the front steps to Aunt Ann's house your nose was always greeted by the distinctive whiff of glue fumes. Back in the day the only glue available for shell craft was the kind that would give off a vapor that would make you a little woozy & it took a quite a while to dry. My mother carried on the shell crafting tradition. She had her little plate with a puddle of glue. She would dip her toothpick in and dab a littl...