How to Preserve Sand Dollars

Did I ever tell you that I wanted to be a marine biologist for most of my childhood, adolescence and even early college years until I realized that calculus and organic chemistry would be the death of me? True story.

I love the ocean, and I try to incorporate that love into my decorating (without using ship shower curtains or porcelain seagulls). I also love to beachcomb when I'm lucky enough to be at the ocean, so over the years I've gathered a nice collection of shells, rocks, driftwood and agates to display.

When we were in California this past summer visiting family, my brother-in-law was lucky enough to stumble onto a group of intact sand dollars on the beach and we each took a few home. It was such a treat because if you're a beachcomber then you know that finding intact sand dollars is like stumbling onto a treasure chest.

A quick warning though, if in your beachcombing you happen to find a sand dollar that looks like this...

(follybeach.com)

...leave it alone, because the fuzzy purpleness factor of it means that it's still alive.

However, if you find one that's already dead, you should take a few simple steps to preserve it so that it lasts, and also so it doesn't smell and attract your family dog. Not that I know anything about dogs eating things like starfish or sand dollars off of carefully created bedside table vignettes. My dog is perfectly behaved and never chews up anything. Not.

Anyway. The first thing you'll want to do is place the sand dollars in a container or bucket of fresh water. The water will cloud up, turn murky, and probably start to smell. I figured we didn't need photos of that, right? Keep changing the water until it stays clear and the sand dollar is cleaned out.

Next, soak the sand dollar in a solution of bleach and water. I've heard people use 3 parts water to 1 part bleach for 10-15 minutes, but I was lazy and I used closer to 10 parts water to 1 part bleach and left it overnight because we went out of town. My sand dollar didn't start to crumble or anything, so it  must have been okay. After you soak it in the bleach solution, make sure to rinse it really well.

Here are my sand dollars going into the bleach-water solution:

And here they are the next day:

Finally, let your sand dollars dry really well. Then you have the option of brushing on something like mod podge or a glue-water mix to help harden and protect the sand dollar if you would like. Otherwise, you're good to go.

Now go on and decorate with those bad boys and cross your fingers that your dumb dog doesn't find them.

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