Exciting News: I Have Joined the Hoyt Arboretum Staff Community as a Watercolor Workshop Instructor.
Last December, my son and I stayed at an AirBnb in Portland, Oregon for our annual Christmas celebration. Neither of us had ever been to Portland before. I was planning a move out of Alaska and closer to Northern California where my son resides. Portland seemed not too close and not too far away. It's about a nine hour drive between the two.
While we were visiting, we went to Hoyt Arboretum for a short hike. I remember so clearly stopping at the gift store and hearing people happily chatting behind slightly ajar doors. I asked if there was a workshop going on as I also noted one of the participants, who dashed out for a snack, carrying a paintbrush in one hand. The volunteer cashier replied, "Yes, it's a watercolor workshop. It's sold out but we have one a couple times a year." I had this flash idea that perhaps one day I would lead such a workshop.
The idea of teaching a watercolor workshop at the Hoyt stayed with me when I visited Portland a second time a few months later. This time it was a solo visit as my son wisely suggested I return to the city on my own to see if I still favored the idea of living there without him being present.
One of the first places I returned to was Hoyt Arboretum. I bought a year membership and a sweatshirt. I had found a place that truly resonated with me, a sanctuary tucked within a city. I walked through a forest of redwoods at Hoyt, saw a distant flash of pink and instantly recalled the pink-shell azaleas I had seen at Arnold Arboretum. I used to walk through the Arnold weekly when I lived in West Roxbury, Massachusetts as it was a short bike ride away.
Nature draws so many reflective emotions from each of us. For me it is this feeling of serenity and a greater awareness of all that is around me; the colors, and the diversity of leaves and flowers. Too, the four and two legged creatures (and those who wiggle under the dirt) that find their homes and nesting areas in piles of un-raked leaves, non-mowed grass, or high above in the limbs of towering trees. The poet Gary Snyder wrote, "Nature is not just a place to visit. It is home."
Botany has been a long-standing study of mine. Before I first moved to Alaska from Boston in 2011, I had a sizable collection of books about Victorian women botanists. It included books about women who went to sea with their captain husbands and their preserved collections of seaweed. Also, about those women, like Marianne North (1830-1890), who traveled the world collecting and preserving diverse species. Another fascinating Victorian botanist is Sara Plummer Lemmon. A book about her is pictured below:
I spend hours a week walking miles throughout my neighborhood and those nearby. Sometimes neighbors come out and ask, "What do you see?" or "Are those edible?" They so want to join my outings yet they also want to stay on their porches and simply know what it is I am picking up here and there and adding to my tote bags. They are so wonderfully curious that I often show them.
Mostly I gather seedpods or cones. I recently spied a Deodar cedar (Cedrus deodara) cone on the curb of a heavily trafficked street. I nabbed it before tires crushed it and carried it home in my coat pocket. I am in awe of its golden colors and that it is a full seed cone (remember that pinecones are that, they are the cones of pine trees. Non-pine trees have seed cones). It's a treasure that I now keep up high on my bookcase of botanical art books.
I also found a four-winged Maple samaras a week earlier. See photo below:
I have become a quiet botanist. I walk quietly and slowly through local neighborhoods gathering small finds that I later itemize and jar.
(Matches are from the Quiet Botanist)
After I had a significant collection of diverse seed pods and more, I emailed the Head of Education at the Hoyt Arboretum inquiring about teaching watercolor workshops. Actually, I did two things before that.
First, I signed up and attended two workshops at the arboretum, one on basketry and one that was an engagement event with sound via singing bowls. Besides enjoying each, I gained insight on how workshops were run. Too, I met members of the Arboretum staff, including the Head of Education.
Secondly, I painted various works of Maple samaras that I brought with me, as well as several of my jars of seedpods, to the interview I was granted following my sent email.
It was such a lovely conversation, my interview to teach watercolor workshops at the Hoyt. The Head of Education so favored opening each of my lidded jars to see the botanical finds within. Too, she was very complimentary of my watercolor paintings. Another significant element to the interview was my 28 years of teaching art to both children and adults in and out of the classroom combined with my Masters in the Art of Teaching.
Before long we were talking calendar and dates for workshops. I was so happy that I think my face was as red as a tomato! She and I even hugged after we agreed my first workshop will be in late January or early February, 2026: “Seedpods and Watercolors.” There are also workshops for the Spring and Fall of 2026 in the planning stage.
After our meeting I took a short hike through the arboretum. I remember stopping below one low hanging Maple branch with a dozen or more samaras dancing in a summer breeze. I let out this loud and joyful, “Yahoo!!” I am still so wonderfully happy reflecting back on the moment she said, “Welcome to the Hoyt Arboretum community, Susan.” She then added that workshop instructors are with them for years.
I just ordered this cloth-quilted artwork from an artist who I have other works from. It says it all:
https://www.latesummerflowers.com
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