Shan-Marie Stockman knows beads. Pink beads. Purple beads. Green beads. Pearl beads. And glittery beads.

“I’ve got them all,” said Stockman. “And I use them all.”

Stockman is the creative power behind Beads for Sophia, a jewelry-making business she operates from her home in Silverdale. Her sole reason for the business is its namesake, her daughter Sophia.

Sophia is 10 years old and is a special needs child. Two days after her first birthday, she was hospitalized for a high fever and through a medical mistake suffered severe brain damage. She needs assistance in eating, dressing, and cannot sit or walk by herself. She attends school and has a caregiver, but much of Sophia’s world is her parents, Shan-Marie and Greg. Her father works full time for the Department of Defense as a computer programmer at Keyport and Shan-Marie is a full-time mother.

“It’s not exactly as I planned it,” she said.

It was in 2005, when she found herself at home with Sophia and she knew she needed to have something to keep her spirits going. Her mother suggested making rosary bracelets for the women at her church.

“That’s really how I got started beading,” Stockman said. “I made rosary bracelets for my mother’s friends and it has just progressed to this craziness.”

The rosary bracelets had a series of 10 beads and a cross. Sometimes they were worn and other times people just held them in their hands while they prayed the rosary.

As a youngster growing up in California, Stockman rode horses and was much more of an outdoor person. Back then, she made a few wreaths but wasn’t really crafty. “But now I am,” she said. “I do scrapbooking, painting, sewing, and I make fairy gardens (with miniatures) for people. But my bead work is special because it is for Sophia.”

Although her daughter’s communication skills are limited, she knows “bling.” Sophia wears special glittered hair ties her mother has made for her.

Stockman’s beaded jewelry is shown on Facebook and at a local spa, Elizabeth’s House of Wax in Old Town Silverdale. She makes earrings, necklaces, bracelets, and decorative chains to hold eye glasses.

She also makes earring holders from old picture frames that she fills with chicken wire. It’s something she saw somewhere and decided to try.

“I get a lot of my ideas for projects from magazines and from what I see when I’m out and about,” she said. “If it strikes me, I give it a try.”

She buys supplies locally and online. And she takes special orders.

“People will call and tell me their wedding colors and tell me what they like and I put the wedding jewelry together for them,” she said. “Sometimes they’ll bring me old jewelry that’s been in the family, and I’ll make something new from it.”

She, too, has used some of her mother and grandmother’s old jewels in the pieces she makes, including antique crystals and pearls.

One of the requests she’s received recently is for Seahawks-themed items. She’s stocked up on green and blue beads for those.

Most of her customers find out about her from friends.

“It’s just word of mouth,” she said.

She does repair jewelry and is planning to host an open house similar to the one she had before Christmas.

Currently she is making jewelry on the Disney theme.

She’s been saving her “jewelry money” and she and her husband are taking Sophia to Disneyland for her 10th birthday in February.

While she said she won’t ever get rich beading, it does give her an outlet and it provides extra cash for the family.

As for her, she does wear her own work.

“I like bling,” she said. “Mostly the creations that are purple. And I like my jewelry to be on the bigger side.”

To see her work go to the “Beads For Sophia” page on Facebook.

You can contact her at 360-698-2443, or shanmarie.stockman@centurylink.net.