Pathway to Two Trees

Yesterday a group of artists from PAAR were treated to a paint out and potluck at Elin Pendleton's home in Riverside, Ca. Elin lives in "Box Springs Park" Two Tree's Trail, so there is literally nothing but beautiful landscapes on three sides and a expansive views across the valley that goes on forever. Everyone should be able to live like this, it just doesn't seem fair. We arrived around 2 p.m. as I was waiting for an ebay auction to go off. I wanted to bid on a pochade easel box that I had found, and luckily I won. One can never have two many easels as an artist. Elin gave me a tour of her home and I took a tour of the grounds trying to figure which view I wanted to paint. It was not easy as there are so many great views. She has all kinds of critters that would have been fun to paint, but I chose the view in the canyon. I can just imagine the beautiful walks on these pathways and I hear they are quite rugged in some spots. Elin had been bragging about the magic light and that we would want to be ready for it starting around 3:30 p.m. I set up my gear and started to work on my design. I got enough down on the canvas before the potluck as I wanted to capture the beautiful light after 3:30. We had a great potluck with Louise's barbecue beef sandwiches, Durre's Indian veggies, Elin's salad with all the fixings from her garden and much more that other artists had brought to share. Then for dessert we had a wonderful banana pudding with hot fudge topping made by Louise. I started noticing the beautiful light going on outside and decided I needed to get on my painting if I wanted to capture the light on the mountains and the trees in the canyon and finish before dark. The light started changing from pink to orange to red, it was wonderful. The contrast on the mountains was so beautiful. We packed it up around 5:30 and headed home. Later we found out that one of Elin's beautiful cats had escaped during the day. She was so worried and all of us were checking our cars as he likes to get in cars when they are open. Then she remembered that she had been showing me around in her studio and checked the doors. Yep, there he was. Bats was safe and sound and really hungry after a day in the closet. Elin was relieved as were all of us. The end to another great day in Nature. Enjoy the art, Terry