Idea's needed

Every day I walk the dogs on our local beach, during the week this consists of two walks a day as I have to take monster number one on his own as he is such a handful.

This is the monster dog, he is a very nervous rescue dog - if people when seeing me with him and his THREE leads on would just lead up their dog and keep out of my way all would be well, but sadly this is not an ideal world and many other dog owners have very little consideration towards others, so most days its a difficult walk.  Anyway, I digress.... back to the shells above.
On this beach is little but sand, mud and an abundance of these razor shells, for weeks I have looked at them daily and wondered if I could make some use of them in my art work?
I am still not really sure how, I have had a couple of ideas.  So, I collected them up in a little bag - washed them in my little bowl..

carefully laid them all out to dry.

Then, added a coat of varnish to give them some extra strength.  But what on earth to do with them next, anyone got any idea's?  If all else fails I might just crush them up to use as texture on a background.  Seems such a shame that I have regular access to something so pretty that I simply cannot think of a use for.

Influenced by another artist on Art 101 (Lucy) I have purchased some smaller canvas, I think they are 8" x 8" in size. She does wonderful collage work on them, so I thought I would have a try at working on a smaller scale too.  Look!  I have made a start with layer number one.

I am going to take a bit longer with this one, and dry each layer through before starting another, so may well be some time yet...
Weather is much cooler today so got more done - fingers crossed it stays like this for a while at least, still have all the doors open but due to having a slight breeze it is making a difference for once and not as nasty, hot and stuffy.