It's Merrie Monarch! Yesterday Cara coordinated a girls' day trip to the Craft Fair. Among the list of items, pāpale lauhala was on the shopping list.
Still smiling after the long ride to Hilo... we found a parking space relatively quickly.
Cara found her "pencil roll" and fragrant fresh lei at Ipolani Vaughn's (from Oʻahu) booth.
Tickets to the hula competition sell out immediately, so people get creative. I don't know if this person was successful in their endeavor but points for creativity!
I was enthralled with the sensory overload: the scenery, the variety of art and beautiful crafts, the sounds, the music, the fashion, and the palpable excitement.
It took a while as there were many options. Possibly too many. LOL. It made decisions difficult... but mission accomplished, pāpale were found. Laurie & Joanie are wearing pāpale by Lola Spencer of Molokaʻi and Raynette's was made by Debbie Toko of Waipiʻo.
Not only did I forget to take pictures of lunch at Cafe Pesto, of the pictures I did take of the craft fair, I forgot to ask for permission to include them in my blog. I was pleasantly surprised that there were several pāpale lauhala booths. Weavers from the other islands brought their creations. I got to talk story and visit with weaving friends in between their customers. And that was just at the Civic Center.
Then we picked up our mochi orders. IYKYK. Two Ladies Kitchen was slammed. There was long line of people waiting to order, and a shorter, but still a line, of people waiting to pick up their orders. So glad we called in orders ahead of time.
LOVE the strawberry mochi. Made sure to take a cooler bag with ice packs because they need to be kept refrigerated.
There was a cute peach shaped mochi and lilikoi square mochi that should've been in the picture above but I ate them. LOL. Turns out, EH isn't as into mochi as I am, so more for me. Yay! This morning I realized (or rationalized?) that the strawberry mochi were really just made up of rice, beans, and fresh fruit... so I enjoyed them breakfast. :-)