Page 10 - November 2020 Life in Naples Magazine
P. 10
M Lif
M Lif
Throug Beadin
Throug Beadin
by Tina Osceola
have met very few people who could walk past a candy store a store down at Shark Valley or
I I would sell them in our booth
without being drawn in by the rainbows of color that usually
drape the walls and stocked shelves with bins of beautifully
on the weekends. By the third
This is one of the necklaces I made
decorated gumdrops, jelly beans and foil wrapped chocolates. grade, I had learned to make
during the pandemic. Vintage silver
e burst of colors is hard to ignore. I am the same way with spiderweb collar necklaces,
mercury dimes, sterling silver
beads! A bead store provokes the same sensory reaction as similar to those worn by the findings and red coral.
Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory! It is safe to say that I am as Notorious RBG (Ruth Bader
addicted to beads as I am to sugar. Ginsburg). It was by this
is addiction started when I was a very young girl. My rst age that I had a rm grasp on entrepreneurship. I made enough
memory of beading was when I was about 4 or 5 years old. My prot to buy supplies and chip in to pay my own tuition at St. Ann
parents handed me a spool of leather and a bowl of plastic pony Catholic School.
beads and told me to start stringing bracelets and necklaces. At As I grew older, my taste for beads matured into a love
rst they would make the knots in the leather so that the beads for Czech glass, handmade lampwork, Swarovski crystal and
wouldn’t fall o, but eventually I did that myself. We would travel gemstones. As a teen, my grandmother taught me to string
throughout the country necklaces using vintage silver coins. We would wear these coin
attending Pow-Wows and necklaces when we dressed up for our annual ceremonies and
arts and crafts festivals, where special occasions. She would warn me to be careful not to string
I would sell beaded jewelry them too tight because the holes in the coins would cut my thread.
alongside my family’s crafts. My grandmother was a source of inspiration and an enabler when
I will never forget the rst it came to my bead addiction.
time I bought my own beads. She would bring me bags
We were at a Pow-Wow in of beads to string for her to
Ft. Pierce, Florida and my wear and big, huge chunks of
grandma, Juanita Osceola, beeswax to use on the string.
gave me $4.00 from her Every time she would hand me
change box and told me that a bag of beads, I would get that
I could go buy myself a snack. same rush of excitement that I
I never made it because the felt when I spent my rst $4.00.
vendor who sold beads and My grandmother passed
other supplies was set up away during my sophomore
between our booth and the year of college in 1987. I still
Pepsi wagon. I picked out have some of the beads she gave
some beautiful blue beads me as well as one small little
with ¨owers painted on the piece of beeswax. Beading isn’t
glass and my own needles and a hobby for me. Beading is a
thread. e vendor put my way of life and an intimate part
A photo of my grandmother, Juanita treasures in a little brown bag of where I come from. I am This photo was taken in St Augustine
Osceola and I, demonstrating and the exchange of money condent that is in my DNA. in 1975. I was standing in front of
Seminole arts and crafts at the for the beads was the best I have passed this love and way our family’s arts and crafts booth,
Florida Folk Festival in White selling my beadwork... trying to. In
Springs, FL. This was taken in 1977, feeling EVER! I was 5 years of life down to my daughter, the background from L-R are my
I was 9 years old. old. Dakota, who is also teaching mom (Joanne Osceola), my dad ( O.B.
It seemed like, from that my granddaughter, Mia, how to Osceola, Sr), my Aunt Mary Moore and
her husband Frank Moore.
point forward, every quarter that came into my possession was string small plastic beads onto
spent on beading supplies. My Aunt Marie taught me how to stretchy nylon string. We are
make rings out of wire and seed beads. I would make a hundred or tying her knots like my grandmother and parents did for me.
more at a time and carefully wrap them on pipe cleaners in groups So if you see me in my favorite local bead store, the Bead
of 10. I would then “wholesale” them to my Uncle Pete, who had Boutique of Naples, and I seem hypnotized, don’t worry about me,
I am in my happy place.
10 Life in Naples | November 2020
