Hidden treasures found on Juno Beach

JUNO BEACH, FL  -- The Juno Beach Renourishment Project has shored up the oceanfront, but it's done more than added extra sand. It's also uncovered some hidden treasures.

Barb Allen has been collecting shells all her life.

"I inherit it from my mother, she has been a sheller for 80-some years," Allen said.

So when Juno Beach started sifting the new sand for unwanted rocks, something exciting turned up.

"To anybody who picks up shells, this was like a thrill. To come down here and see so many shells in one location, you'd have to hunt for them and they just dump them," Allen said. "In the evenings this past 6 weeks, we've let everybody come onto the pile once they take all the fences down. Last night we had 72 people here. It was big event, being as it was probably going to be the last night of shelling for everybody. They're hauling everything away today."

And what does Barb do with all of them?

Barb has come up with some pretty creative ways to use her new found treasure. On the outside of her house she uses them as shell mulching and on the inside, she and her mother have some craft-projects that really show off the shells.

"She's [Allen's mother] the head of the operation here and...she's 89," Allen said. "She is the original sheller in the family."

Like mother like daughter.

And when Barb comes home from the beach, her mother Thelma laughs and says "ok, how many do you have now….what do you got for me?"

Thelma has made nearly 100 different projects.

"I can put them on a lot of things you can use," Thelma Allen said.  "I usually make a box for a Kleenex holder."

Thelma enjoys making art and makes dozens of other beautiful crafts.

"I like to do something with my hands, and my mother wanted me to play piano, but I didn't like that," Thelma said. "My favorite subject, art class, I like that better than anything."

Something else has come out of the shell pile; people finding a common interest.

"It turned out to be a friendship kind of thing too," Barb said. "Meeting a lot of people down there, we're all going to get together now and everybody's going to bring all the great shells that they found and were just going to have a kind of shell party."