Yesterday I woke up to pouring rain. I immediately checked the weather online and saw that a 20% chance of rain was predicted for the morning. Palletteers paint, rain or shine, so I packed my painting gear into my car and headed east, anticipating what I'd be painting. Leslie and Rick's home is charming and interesting. There was something to paint everywhere I looked. This was going to be a difficult choice: Paint the great view over the Buccaneer Hotel and outward towards Buck Island? the great architectural elements of their house? the crystal clear pool beside the charming gardens? one of the interesting flowers blooming especially for us to paint? For me, the triple Peach hibiscus called to the Georgia O'Keefe in me and, even though I usually don't paint flowers, I HAD to paint this one!
Gosh, a lot of Palletteers, old and several brand new, had shown up to paint! We were spread out all over the Rickenbach's home, outside, inside, on patios, porches, in bedrooms and driveways! We had a blast! It's always such fun to greet old friends, returning to St. Croix for their winter sojourn, but after the intitial hugs and exchanges, the quiet was palpable as each of us set up and focused on capturing our subject matter with our paints. There were some mumblings and rumblings, some chuckles, some "talking to our canvases" (you artists out there know what I mean!) but for the most part, there was a peaceful quiet. Were there really 27 women painting here?
One by one we completed our paintings and I, among the early finishers, walked around to see how everyone was doing and chat some more. Leslie was "in her element", socializing, making sure all of us were comfortable, and filling us in on some stories of their home.
"Show and Tell" time was really interesting! We spread our artwork out over 3 huge tables on the patio and "oohed" and "aahed" repeatedly as we saw the wonderful art that everyone had produced during the prior 3 hours. Thinking that our creativity might also extend to our cooking skills, Rick had an unusual announcement to make: he had a bread making machine he wanted to raffle off!!! so everyone who was interested put their name into the mix and Marilyn M. was the lucky winner! We made her promise to bring homemade bread for us to share to our next painting site! (Not really :^)
Lunch was yummy! The Palletteers are REALLY getting spoiled!
By the way, our Palletteer "weather luck" held out: the sun shone the entire time and the breezes were fabulous!
Thanks so much for a wonderful painting morning, Rick and Leslie! Lovya much!
Ginger
PS: Can I have your bread pudding recipe.. pleeese?
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