After a week of warm weather in southern Maine, Saturday started off cool at Portland’s Deering Oaks Park, where dozens of local vendors set up camp at the Portland Farmers’ Market. 

Hundreds of shoppers strolled the market throughout the morning, purchasing vegetables and fruit from local vendors, picking up handmade jewelry and buying fresh baked bread. 

Maddie Weston, 22, of Orono, showed off her newly purchased blueberry earrings. Weston, who visited the market with friends on Saturday, said farmers markets are a “great culmination” of what a community can be.

“I think it’s really fantastic to see so many people with individualized passions and their creative spin on things,” Weston said. 

Community was an important theme at Saturday’s market. 

Sam Appelbaum, 25, who lives in Portland, said the farmers market is the closest to her community that she feels. 

She picked up mushrooms and bok choy at the market, and planned to make “some sort of fun stir fry” with her produce.

“It’s nice to eat good food, but it’s also nice to eat food that’s local,” Appelbaum said. 

On the way out of the market, Megan Tumavicus, 51, of Portland, carried a “huge” tray of flowers to her car, already planning her garden in her head. 

She’s been going to the Portland Farmers’ Market for years. 

“I love buying local flowers and produce, probably like everyone else,” Tumavicus said. “You always run into someone you know.” 

Farmers markets across southern Maine are now open on Saturdays, including markets in Bath, Cumberland, Saco, York and Kennebunk. 

At the Kennebunk Farmers Market, which runs every Saturday from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in the Garden Street Bowl parking lot, shoppers can find not only locally grown produce, but also meat, flowers and seafood. 

Piscatrix Seafood, located just up the road at 10 Storer St., will be at almost every Kennebunk Farmers Market date this summer, selling seafood such as oysters, mussels, fish, lobster meat and scallop ceviche. 

For owner Tricia Reslewic, joining the Kennebunk Farmers Market has been “a lot of fun.” 

“I get a lot more foot traffic,” Reslewic said. “It’s fun to be able to talk about the business and bring seafood to the community in this way.”

Like much of the community, Reslewic has also enjoyed trying products from other vendors. 

Ira and Kathleen Cohen, both 76, of Wells, love The Mushroom Hut at the Kennebunk Farmers Market. They’ve been visiting the stand, which they lovingly call “the mushroom man,” for years, and they enjoy using their finds to make mushroom pizzas, often also topped with onions and sweet peas.

“The market is relaxing, and there’s a good variety,” Ira Cohen said. “The people are so nice. We love the fresh vegetables and fruits.”

Other local markets include the Saco Farmers Market on Saturdays, the Cumberland Farmers Market on Saturdays, the Biddeford Farmers and Makers Market on Sundays, the South Portland Farmers Market on Sundays and many more.