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We all enjoyed our annual Pastel Society of Maine Plein Air Retreat. Everyone pitched in, and contributed to a remarkably supportive environment. We rented a large house on a lake in Warren, Maine, and arrived last Wednesday evening, leaving on Sunday morning. The first day we painted at the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens, the second day we painted on the coastline, and the third day we painted at the lake. I cooked the four dinners we had for all fifteen attendees (blog post here).

In the photos below you can see me stopping in Portland on the way up for a huge hunk of wholesale halibut from Harbor Fish arranged for us by a local blog reader here from my own fish market; thank you Bob for this– it was wonderful! Also in Portland on my way up, we did a little gallery hopping, so there are a couple of those photos here too, before our retreat kicked off.

We ate one lunch a McLoons for lobster rolls which was terrific too. So were the fresh strawberries and hot cider donuts at Beth’s Farm Market.

All the paintings here were done by others. I’ll post the six I painted soon.

Thank you to all the participants for making it such a special time; I’m already looking forward to next year.

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