A need for beads

Local author and her sisters release book on Web sites for fast-growing hobby

Debbie Altman and her three sisters had no idea that a Christmas 2006 family gathering would yield such fruitful results. After staying up until 3 a.m. talking and indulging in their mutual love of beading, the four sisters hatched a plan to develop a Web site that would serve the growing beading community.

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A need for beads

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"It was like, 'We should have a Web site,'" Altman, the Lady's Island resident, recalled. "'Okay, let's have a Web site.' 'Who can do the Web site?' 'Well, Debbie can do the Web site.' It was just like that."

The Web site, capebede.com, was launched in March 2007. The site's name is derived from the first letters of the four sisters: Debbie Altman, Carolyn Burger, Peggy Whisenhunt and Betsy McGrath. Not satisfied with only a Web site, the sisters decided to publish a book, and "Websites for Beaders: The Bead-a-Holics Guide for Beads and Findings on the Web" was released by Outskirts Press this past January.

"Each one of us had a stack of places where we could get this or that, and we thought, 'Well let's just put it all together,'" said Altman. "It's like visiting a new bead store. The variety is as different as everybody who works with beads. We all collected from our favorite magazines and Web sites, and then we started separating them into states. We contacted everyone in the book. We doubled our hits in the last two months, and our sales have tripled since January, so I think word's getting out."

The book is available at capebede.com as well as on the retail Web sites for Amazon, Borders and Barnes & Noble for a suggested retail price of $16.95.

"Debbie, our baby sister, comes up with some wild ideas," said Burger, 73, of Fort Worth, Texas. "She was really gung ho about putting a book together."

Altman described beading as the "fastest growing hobby in the United States," with bead shops popping up everywhere, and said that the feedback to the book has been phenomenal.

"It just sort of boomeranged," said Burger. "I got started for fun, and it's developed to a lot more."

The sisters already are planning a second edition of the book and have been receiving requests from beaders who want to be featured. Altman said they'd like to have the second edition out around January.

"You hear about if you do something you love, that it just kind of happens, and it really does," said Altman, sporting a necklace and earrings made of honey jade and sea beads, created by McGrath. "I'm amazed. There was even a blog up called the bead blog, and a lady from India had our book."

The four sisters have always been into jewelry, and McGrath, 56, of Irving, Texas, has operated her own jewelry company, Valet Executive Plata de Texas, for the past 13 years. Although all four sisters were born in Texas, McGrath attended Beaufort High School for two years, and Altman attended Beaufort Junior High School.

Their late father, William Altman, was an aircraft representative for Vought Aeronautics, and even though he wasn't in the military, the family moved with the military about every two years. According to Altman, the four got their love for jewelry making from their mother, who is now 92 and lives in Beaufort with a caregiver.

"My mom instilled a love of everything sparkly, shiny and beautiful," said Altman, who holds a doctorate in natureopathy. "We're all artistic. We've all done crafts, especially Betsy and I moving all the time. We'd move in the summer, we didn't know anybody, so we'd be at the house, and my mom always had needlepoint for us or embroidery or painting, things to keep us busy."

Altman returned to Beaufort after accompanying McGrath to Beaufort High's reunion about three years ago. Altman had been living in Fort Worth and worked in human resources at Chevron for almost 17 years but said she got sick of metro Dallas/Fort Worth traffic.

"I always loved this place," she said. "I always wanted to come back here. It's just an easier lifestyle."

Altman said visiting Beaufort with her sister for Beaufort High School's reunion made her realize she was homesick for the beaches and trees that typify the area's beauty, so she decided to return permanently. She works at the Secession Golf Club, where she handles new membership.

"We really loved living there," said McGrath, who makes a point to return at least once a year. "We were really upset when we had to leave Beaufort. We were so upset."

In addition to operating her own jewelry company, McGrath has been studying at the Gemological Institute of America and is taking her final class before graduation.

Although Burger has never lived in Beaufort, she described it as a "lovely place." She's been involved in beading since 1950, and she even ran two jewelry businesses in Niagara Falls, N.Y., in the 1990s. Berger said she moved there from Biloxi, Miss., because she got tired of dealing with the many hurricanes that strike the Gulf Coast.

"When people are beading, and they are looking for different beads, sometimes you just get stale," said Burger. "You need something different to perk up your imagination, and you need some different places to look. The beading book gives you different Web sites to look and see what people are making, what people have to offer, and it gives you a different outlook on what you can use in your own jewelry. This should stimulate the beading public into where they can go to have an easier time of finding what they need."

Altman and her sisters regularly attend bead shows, and she mentioned Bead Dreamer Studio in Savannah and Black Market Minerals on Hilton Head Island as some of her favorite local bead shops. She also said that Carolina Stamper in downtown Beaufort has very good beading supplies, but she wasn't able to feature them in her book because the store does not have a Web site. Altman said she would love to open up a bead shop with her sisters one day.

"(Betsy) jokes about listening to our inner jeweler," said Altman. "If you're older, it doesn't mean you can't keep pursuing your hobbies and doing things you enjoy. If you have an idea, just go for it. A lot of people say, 'Somebody should do this,' and they never get around to it, and we just jumped on it and did it, and we're happy that we did, because it's so well received, and we're having fun doing it."