Aloha friends!

That baby pineapple I showed you awhile back is all grown up! Here’s what it looked like just before I picked it....

It was turning yellow and had a lovely pineapple scent. That’s how you know it’s ready to harvest. Behind it you can see my neighbor’s mango tree...another yummy tropical fruit.

What it lacked in size was made up with delicious flavor! It was sweet and juicy.
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When I cut the pineapple, I saved the top. I removed the flesh and planted it in a pot. I have a few pineapples started. I just need to decide where to plant them in the yard. For now they’re all just hanging out together on our lanai, enjoying the sunshine.

Next time you buy a pineapple from the store, save the top and plant your own little pineapple. They’re fun and easy to grow. You can even keep them as houseplants, if you place them near a sunny window they’ll be happy.
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Thanks for reading my diary!
Wishing you aloha!

Aloha Friends!

Wishing you a fun filled July 4th! We’re having a good day here on Kauai. Barbecue is on, fireworks have been bought and we got smores ready for dessert!

Thanks for reading my diary!
Aloha!

May 1st is Lei Day here on Kauai. Local school children celebrate the holiday with colorful leis, homemade ti leaf “grass” skirts, and hula. Aloha and happy May day!

Aloha friends!

Take a look at this...my pineapple has a little baby growing! I’m pretty excited! To understand my excitement, I should tell you where this pineapple got it’s start. It was part of a fruit basket from a good friend. She gave it to us as a housewarming gift when we first moved to Kauai. After we enjoyed the fruit, we planted the top. It lived on our lanai at the condo for 6 months until we bought our home. Shortly there after my husband planted in in our backyard. It’s been happily growing in our yard now for a year. I was delighted to walk out one morning to see it blooming!

Once a pineapple blooms, I was told it takes 5 to 6 months to mature into a full size fruit. So, between July and August we should have our own pineapple. I’ll keep you posted to it’s progress.

Aloha!

Aloha Friends,

Humans are not the only ones who like to visit Hawaii in the winter. Every year thousands of whales come down from Alaska to Hawaii in December. They give birth and hang out in the warm tropical water for a few months. Then they all head back in March.

Having a clear sunny day, we thought it would be a time to go looking for whales. It’s nice to pack a lunch, grab a couple beers and head out for a day at the beach. We barely got our beach chairs onto the sand before we saw the first one. There’s no mistaking a whale when you see one, they’re big! They like to play and breach, making huge whale belly flops! They’re very silly and a lot of fun to watch. Quite entertaining!

My husband and I ended up seeing quite a few whales sitting on this little beach. It’s just north of Kapaa Beach Park and is nearly always deserted even though it’s in town. I think it’s because you can’t see the beach from the road, people don’t realize it’s there. Be sure to check it out if you’re on Kauai, especially if the whales are here. It’s a perfect place to watch them from.

Thanks for reading my diary! Aloha!

PS The beach is close to the Tamba surf shop if you’d like to pick up a cap like the one I’m wearing.

Aloha friends,

​We have had a bumper crop of tomatoes! I know that sounds strange for January. What’s stranger is that we have just two tomato plants and both sprouted out of our compost pile...I kid you not. Once we realized what they were we carefully transplanted the seedlings into a large container. This was at the end of September....

Here are the same two tomato plants one month later...

They grew like crazy! The container is called an EarthBox, it’s self watering and has a reservoir that holds about 4 gallons of water. It takes a medium bag of soil and I added some granular fertilizer to it. Tomatoes seem to really like it. That and the warm Kauai sunshine.

As the tomatoes grew and produced fruit, I could tell one was a Roma (I’d been buying them at Walmart in the plastic clam shell) and the other looked like a tomato I had grown last spring that was a burgundy color only this new one was red.

Pretty soon we had tons of tomatoes! I had already given some to our neighbors and we still had more than we could eat. So, I made fermented salsa. It’s delicious, super easy and good for your belly. Here’s the recipe...

4 Cups Chopped Ripe Juicy Tomatoes
2 Tablespoons Chopped Sweet Maui Onion
2 Tablespoons Chopped Bellpepper
1 Tablespoon Chopped Cilantro
1 Tablespoon Finely Chopped Jalapeño Pepper
1 teaspoon Salt

Mix and taste it. It should taste salty but, not too salty. Put the salsa into glass jars. Press it down a bit so that the tomatoey juices cover the salsa. Cover loosely and put in a dark corner of your kitchen. Check the salsa a couple times daily just to make sure the salsa remains covered with the juices. Taste it after 24 hours to see if you like the flavor. If you like it, go ahead and cap your jars and place your salsa in the fridge. If you want it more tangy, leave it to ferment longer. I fermented my salsa about 36 hours. You can ferment it up to 5 days. The salsa will keep in your fridge up to 6 months. I made ours 3 weeks ago and it’s nearly gone. It would never last 6 months in my fridge!

Here we are now the end of January and my tomato plants are still going strong. They produced more than 120 tomatoes, I stopped counting. It’s been fun and we’ve really enjoyed the flavor of these tomatoes. I saved some seeds and already have two plants started to replace these guys once they die off. No surprise they sprouted easily.

Thanks so so much for reading my diary!

Aloha Friends,

We had a fun New Years but, we seemed to have greatly underestimated Kauai’s enthusiasm for fireworks and love for all things noisy. Lol! It was crazy here! And obnoxiously loud! Made July 4th weak in comparison. The fireworks we bought to celebrate New Years...haha...

What everybody else bought...

Everybody had fireworks. One of our neighbors was telling us about about a homemade noisemaker that the locals like to put together. Made from simple stuff you’d have around the house. A bamboo pole, a lighter and gasoline!!! Makes a loud BOOM!
Happy 2019! May your new year be blessed.

Aloha!

It was a warm, still day on Kauai. Pretty muggy actually. We beat the heat by spending the afternoon at Kalapaki bay. For those who are curious the Christmas sand sculpture still stands. Here’s a photo I took just before we packed up and headed home. Can you see the humidity?

Hey friends!

Wanted to wish you and yours a very merry Christmas! We went down to Kalapaki bay this afternoon to see the sand sculpture...it made front page news in our paper yesterday! The sculpture held up well despite the 2” of rain we had last night. Here’s hoping that you all held up just as well through the Christmas craziness! Mele Kalikimaka friends!

Aloha friends,

Every year Kauai celebrates the holidays with the Lights on Rice Parade. I’ve always wanted to go as I’ve heard it’s quite spectacular. This year we finally got to attend. There were 61 beautifully decorated floats and about 13,000 happy spectators! It was so much fun!

This was my favorite float. It had a gingerbread theme with a flurry of snow falling. The snow was actually bubbles...the kids loved it!

Lots of folks made an evening of it and packed picnic style dinners, I think we may do that next year. If you’re on island during the light parade I highly recommend you check it out. We had a great time.

​Thanks for reading my diary!