After the excitement of Friday’s Studio Sessions, Orca sighting, and Open Studio, everyone greeted Saturday morning’s hot breakfast with gusto.
Seaside Sessions Saturdays are usually quite relaxed, with ample time for our Creative Explorers to complete their projects, take walks on the beach, soak up some sun, and participate in the Saturday Salon. This year’s Salon topics centered on how to create a website and how to enter art festivals to sell work. We were able to answer questions, give resources and feedback, and generally cheer everyone on about reaching the goal of getting their work “out there”. Resources we explored included: Squarespace for websites, Square Up (similar name, different company) for online selling portal, CAFE (Call For Entry), and Zapplication for directories of art shows and festivals. All are free to explore, with Squarespace offering a free 14-day trial before requiring payment of a yearly fee for your website.

The afternoon was spent working on finishing touches of our canvases, the claiming of sticks for hanging (see Jill T. proudly declaring ownership of hers at right), deliberating and sometimes collaborating on final details, and excited exclamations of “I’m done!” were frequent occurrences. All of this was prepared our Creative Explorers for a somewhat mysterious final evening event.
And what an event it was! Our first ever Gallery Hangout was held in the game room on the lower level, where each completed Canvas of Curiosities was hung along the walls. We enjoyed dessert and a tasty Prosecco, toasting each other; the magical, artful experience we’d shared; friendships made; and to the wonders of the beauty surrounding us.
Below are some images of the finished pieces and the artists who created them.

With sadness, we realized that this was our final night together, but we looked forward to the possibilities of next year’s event: Seaside Sessions 2026! Each Creative Explorer enthusiastically agreed that she was interested in returning to our idyllic art haven by the sea, and we were ecstatic that everyone had so enjoyed our time together.

Our final wrap up post will be tomorrow, with some tantalizing hints of what may be in the works for next year, so stay tuned!

Welcome to Seaside Sessions 2025! Each day this week, we will look back at the magic that was our latest offering of Seaside Sessions. While technically our 5th ‘anniversary’ we lost a couple of years to COVID but we’re not letting that slow us down one little bit!

It’s hard to believe that it was 2 weeks ago that we said “Good-bye” to the class of 2025. We packed a ton of fun into our annual gathering by the sea. Thanks for joining us for our traditional re-cap!

…after some rocky weather to start the week, we were gifted clear skies and moderate temperatures once our Creative Explorers arrived (and an AMAZING surprise visitor during our stay).

We welcomed our latest crew on a sunny Wednesday afternoon. Guests drifted in during our standard Check-In time (3-5) and enjoyed some time to get settled, take to the beach, and/or enjoy some fizzy water on the deck overlooking the ocean.

After a brief Orientation and quick Meet & Greet, we shared an overview and explanation of this years theme: The Canvas of Curiosities. We illuminated many of the different techniques we would be sharing over the course of our time together and showed them in use by way of the sample projects that we had on display. Following our Welcome and introductions, we enjoyed a Bohemian Feast (a bountiful buffet of nibbly bits) and officially commenced the creative component of Seaside Sessions.

As in each year since our very first retreat, every one of our guests opted to participate in our Creative Exchange. It is a lovely addition to our event, and this year was no exception. As in years past, we drew numbers to determine the days of participation for everyone. This year we had a request by one of our Creative Explorers to go first. It was quickly agreed that Seaside Sessions uber alum, Jill T., could lead the festivities this year. It is nice to note that Jill has attended EVERY Seaside Sessions retreat since our very 1st in 2020. Everyone was thrilled to receive her Artists’ HANDbooks – customized covers for their SS25 notebooks. *My apologies, in advance, for the lack of photos to accompany each of the subsequent Creative Exchange gifts that were shared. We will show them all in all of their glory at the end of our look back.*

We then spent the remainder of the evening exploring the creative rabbit hole that is the making of Mandalas. My offering in the Creative Exchange was a set of micron pens in five different line widths. We put those to use over the next few hours as we learned ways to make the form our own.

Before turning in to rest up for our 1st full day on Thursday, we agreed to undertake a collaborative art work of a Seaside Sessions 2025 Group Mandala. Everyone would complete one circle and the finished piece would be displayed on our final night….

That is yet another facet of this gem that will be revealed in time! Join us again tomorrow (Tuesday, April 8th) when Michelle will take the helm and share all of the fun that was had in her Studio Session on Thursday.

You don’t want to miss it!