Workshops

Morning Yoga with Kara Douglas – Welcome each new day with an hour of fresh sea air and movement to awaken your senses. Early morning classes will be designed with postural modifications to suit the experience of practitioners present and will include guided breathing and meditation to inspire connection, creativity and a balancing of the interactive and introspective. For those who wish to explore yoga philosophy, meditation, nuanced postural alignments and breathing techniques.

Yoga & Meditation with Kara Douglas – The longer afternoon workshops will offer different approaches to yoga practice (including Yin Yoga, Yoga Nidra, Restorative Yoga) and how to deepen work within active postures. Meditation practices will include Metta, Tonglen and Adara Points (body scan).

Kara Douglas lives in Harpswell, Maine with her husband and daughters where she runs Fishmoon Yoga, a studio they built in the former hayloft of their 1860’s barn. She has been practicing yoga since 1998 and teaching since 2001. As a writer and naturalist, Kara steeps her teaching in a love of nature.

Tarot for the Soul with Hanne Winarsky – The little deck of cards referred to as “tarot” means many different things to many people, across many cultures. But at heart, one of the common threads is the practice of using this series of numbered pictures and symbols as a way of “focusing the attention of the soul.” This workshop in two parts will 1) give an overview to tarot’s major themes and concepts, and some of the common interpretations of major arcana, as a tool for self reflection; and 2) learn through doing—get comfortable with a few simple readings, spreads, and interpretations.

Hanne Winarsky has studied tarot at Scarlet & Sage (San Francisco) and completed a mentorship with artist, clairvoyant, and tarot reader Mary Grisey (Los Angeles). After Hanne began reading tarot, she learned it had history in her family from generations before.

Botanical Printmaking with Leslie Beattie – In this workshop, we’ll collect wild plants from the island and capture their “sun print” on a piece of fabric. After our prints are washed and dried, embellishments can be added using simple embroidery stitches. You will leave the island, but you will come back to your artful treasure again and again.

Leslie Beattie has been crafting and making things most of her life. She enjoys many different media…and can be found painting with acrylics one day and sashiko mending a pair of jeans on another. 
She lives in Topsham, Maine with her husband, Donny, 3 children, 4 cats and a dog named Dylan. 

Create & Cultivate with Rob (and Bill) Gimpel – Create and cultivate a bit of Star Island to take home with you.

Roses: Join Rob and his dad, Bill as they propagate Star Island’s ubiquitous rose, Rosa rugosa. Learn a little about the growth cycle and habit of this beautiful shrub, and then you’ll be guided through choosing cuttings, how to pot them up, and how to care for them off island.

Troughs: Rob will guide you through several methods of selecting, creating or repurposing containers to create miniature landscapes. You will use foraged materials from the island  to create your own planter, or embellish something you have brought with you.  

Planting: Have you wanted a miniature Star Island to take home with you?   We will create tiny landscapes for our planters using natural materials from the island, and plant them with succulents from the island and around the world.  

Rob Gimpel is a professional gardener and amateur stonemason, naturalist and Greenman.  He has been playing with rocks and plants for most of his life.  He built his first rock garden more than 30 years ago.

Bill Gimpel is an entomologist retired from the Maryland Department of Agriculture.  He has been breeding roses in his spare time for many decades.  Along the way, he imbued Rob with a love of gardening. 

Music and Stories with Kemp Harris – in addition to leading the Morning Meet Up each day, Kemp is offering these workshops.

The Union Gospel Choir: Come and be part! Learn “Star, I feel like Coming Home” – to be performed at a special gathering on Wednesday evening. Here’s a link to the original song, “Feel Like Going Home” by Charlie Rich. (Kemp is rewriting the lyrics, but it would be great to give it a listen to get familiar.) All singers welcome. https://youtu.be/dduFhdgsM6Q

Songs in the Round – Remember how much fun it was to sing songs in the round? Let’s get together in the chapel and share songs we know in this tradition.

The Moth on Star – Tell us a story, tell us your story. In the spirit of the Moth Radio Hour, there will be a theme (TBA) and folks can tell a 7-9 minute, true story that reflects our theme for the day. We’re all storytellers at heart.

Kemp Harris been coming to Star Island for almost 40 summers and has been involved with Star Union from the start. He brings his background as an educator, a storyteller and a musician/composer to help foster what is sure to be a good time. http://www.kempharris.band

Foraging & Arranging with Margaret Blodgett – Join Margaret and Rob Gimpel to roam the island and forage wild and cultivated greens and blooms to arrange for our conference and our rooms.  Day 1 will be a romp around Star with buckets, shears, and gardening gloves.  Rob will cover botanical names and Margaret will talk about texture, variety, and compostion of bouquets.  That afternoon we will cover the basics of flower prep and arrange large containers for our conference meeting spaces and social hour tables.  In the following days Margaret will lead lessons in twisting tiny bouquets, wearable floral art such as floral crowns and boutonnieres, and miniature arrangements (think jam jars) that can be placed in your Star accommodations and brought home to dry and treasure when you leave the island.

Margaret is a florist in San Francisco, where she lives with her husband Matt, son Julius, and dog Daisy, along with an ever-changing menagerie of lizards, spiders, and other animals caught and released on a regular rotation from the wild.  A former teacher in the Newton public schools, she is an avid forager, hiker, and plant mom.