The Lava Tube Hale #8

“I have to fly home by myself?!?!”
“Yup. You’re gonna have to find your big boy panties.”
“They’re all dirty.”

Dear Verna,

“Tell it to Jesus!” is the new phrase around the Lava Tube Hale at the moment. It’s our invented way of dealing with each other’s complaining and I can’t help but giggle every time we use it. Lover was saying something one day, some complaint that had no solution in the end, so I told him, “Good luck getting anyone to listen to that! Talk to the big guy upstairs.” He said, “I think he delegates those kinds of things to his son, right?” So now it’s “Tell it to Jesus!” for any random, senseless complaining we have to each other. I still find it funny every time, imagining God wiping his brow and saying ‘whew! Glad I have a department for that!’

Other than that, I’m back to the land of the living. I had to disappear myself for a good two weeks to get ready for the Kuauli Festival Fashion Show. Fittings, sewing, and the organizing of the multiple and overlapping lists I had posted everywhere. The show hosted 8 designers, each with 15 models, and it was a REAL DEAL fashion show in the ballroom of King Kamehameha hotel! There was also a simultaneous craft fair set up in the Herb Kane hallway with Loretta and Mary Alice running our booth thank God. It was so much going on at once. It was the 2^nd year of this annual festival and it was in celebration of all things Polynesian. Everything reminded me of you. It included lei workshops, food booths, kapa making, a craft fair, weaving, a keiki hula competition, and our fashion show!!! Aunty Nita w/ Wahine Toa was the host and organizer of the show and is who invited me to be a part of it. She had heard about the 2018 KK Collection show we did on the seawall and that earned me an invitation to this one.

The seawall show is what I want to do again for my 2019 collection since it really gets the coconut wireless chatter going :D. A seawall runway… how could I ever top that!!??

I just have the MOST amazing models. I mean, check out Lisa above. Organizing a bunch of people to do anything is never easy, unless it’s this group. Most of them have been in other shows with me so they’re all old hats at this already! Total pro. Even the organizers were making a point to say how easy it was to work with our troop.

This event was such good timing too. I’ve been so focused on the lava tube hale and now I’ve got some renewed energy for the 2019 KK show. After events like this, the models and I are all walking on air. Just high high high. Being in front of a crowd that clapped for each model as they walked was elating! Our music is also so ‘chicken skin’ with drums and chanting so it’s quite a powerful experience.

Later, after everything was over, I loaded up Kashmir because I needing some major trunk space for all my containers and little electric Chanel was a bit too small. I was outside on the curb stuffing everything in the trunk and this local guy walks by and said, ‘Whoa! Crazy car! Wait, aren’t you one of the designers?!’ Lover currently has the chef and writer, MFK Fisher’s stencil all over the hood, the passenger side spray painted crazy, and Andy Warhol’s wild haircut stencil on the trunk. Meanwhile I’m wearing a Hawaiian top, maile leis, and I have a feather lei on my head. I can see how that scene was confusing. ;D

But Kashmir is used to it. She’s become quite the catering mobile.

Oh and speaking of Kashmir, Hamilton has been so concerned about these new self-driving cars. Have you heard about this? He’s afraid they might actually go the speed limit and not have an ‘override’ feature, making our commute extra long. Hahaha!!!

“Self driving cars are right around the corner. Tried to teach Kashmir how to drive. Almost killed myself.”

So with the big show over, we bounced over to Molokai. Cousin Noelani had a work trip, and it was memorial day weekend so we were guardians of the Godsons.

The boys are 8 and 5 now.

What amazes me the most is that even with ipads, mindcraft, and their knowledge of youtube, they still play all the same games we did in small-kid time. Well, as soon as ‘Godma’ puts a ban on the technology ;D. Chase master must always be played with your slippers on your hands in order to run away faster from the one who is ‘it;’ any type of small seed, bean, or shell will eventually become currency; when cleaning fish, the scales stick to your arms and shine like rainbows so we add more and more transforming into part fish; secret languages will inevitably develop along with passwords, codes, and general elite-isms to include and exclude each other at will.

We got there Wed and Lover had to leave on Friday to get back for work on the weekend while I stayed till Monday. I had a beautiful visit with the boys’ Grandma, Nannette, one afternoon and she suggested my posts have more pics. So… there you have it. I’m adding many more this time! 😀 It was a full and wild weekend for all of us, complete with lots of harvesting our own food. We cooked and ate pipinela from the side of the road, turned wild kalo into poi, put wild raspberries on our breakfast waffles, and O.D.’d on fish. Kauluawai is a great fisherman and caught our dinner 3 days in a row with his throw net.

If I don’t have to clean or scale fish for a while, I’m SOOOO good with that. And poor thing… I started a ‘it must be this big to come home or throw it back’ rule after I tried to clean and gut his fish that at the end were reduced to a microscopic filet.

One night, Lover crushed spicy Cheetoes to bread and fry the itty bitty filets. The boys were BLOWN away. When asked how dinner was, Kauluwai said, “Uncle Hammy gets a solid 10.” He’s getting into cooking and couldn’t have a better mentor. It’s such a truth of life that you will always adore anyone that has cooked for you. Lover’s hands always smell like garlic. Not a typical thing to like, but on him, it smells like feeding those you love. It smells like nourishing conversations in the kitchen. It smells like laughter, and passing the wine around the table. It smells like olive oil covered lips, and eye contact that caresses. It smells like family, and everything that word ‘love’ stands for. I just had a funny image of myself running down the road barefoot, hair gone wild, yelling, ‘love smells like garlic!!!’ and getting a ‘eeeew, you’re insane’ response from someone. But then there’s an Italian guy that says, ‘but of course! You only figure this out now???!!!’ And maybe there is another someone, a French someone, also in agreement. 😀

Coming back to Big Island felt like climbing back onto Grama’s lap.

The red dirt stains of Molokai slowly fading from my feet and I was once again transfixed with our rugged terrain and my love for lava. However, I must confess that I DID fall in love with the stones of Molokai. They’re so round, smooth, and dense. All their porous exteriors have eroded away and what’s left are perfect shapes with not one edge. None. All our stones here are ONLY edges! Finding a round stone here is symbolic of a river, or remnants of an old trail. A true FIND! My next rock wall we build at the hale, I will be craving the old, smooth stones of Molokai.

Something else I came home to was the addition of TWO to our family. Yup. Got home and our children had doubled.

They are named Easel and Theo. Two boys, don’t worry. Lover’s egg supplier at the Butcher Shoppe has been raising these dwarf Hot Tots in Puna which are known for loving people, being very social, and NOT for eating. Would be another ‘tiny filet’ hahaa!!!!! So this pic that Lover sent me while I was in Molokai is the whole family (sans Vincent) at work at the Butcher Shoppe.

I think it could win some sort of culinary photo contest being that they are in a stew pot. ;D

Alright, gotta head out. Oh! And here’s the pics with your birthday rocks. Just LOVE your smiles!!!

Lots and lots of love!

…and garlic.

KK