What is the best, most efficitent, cheapest way to drill a holes in shells. I have lots of shells that need to get small holes drilled in them, but it seems that shells are very hard and it takes an incredibly long time. I have used a hand drill with an ordinary drill bit and it worked OK but took a long time. I tried a dremel but it just stopped going if I pushed it on the shell too hard. I suppose I could try a large power drill but I am not sure if it would be easy to hold the shell and drill at the same time without something disastrous happening. Any thoghts?

The shells are hard enough to dull a regular bit very quickly. Try a masonry bit if you can find one small enough for the holes you want.

I don't know if this will help, but I saw this exact thing on a show on diy.. DIY Video Guide - Crafts : DIY Network there's actually a video for it...