I am truly blessed by the colorful people with wide smiles and generous spirit. The colossal, emerald green craggy peaks shrouded in misty clouds and graced with double rainbows, briny turquoise waters lined with over fifty miles of pristine white sand beaches, trade winds playing with Coconut Palms, lush gardens and the ever present sunshine.
These are my words that will appear in the travel blog I now write for. I really can’t believe how fortunate we are and how things continue to line up effortlessly. I don’t mean to say we aren’t working hard, I mean we aren’t looking hard for work. The time flies as Dan and I are doing work that is fun for us. Free to be and express ourselves mostly on our time. I can see that soon we will be struggling to find a balance between work and enjoying this beautiful and charming isle. I’ll deal with that when the time comes but I fully realize that you can’t start over and not work hard, at least we can’t.
I’ve been leading with my heart and occasionally tripping myself up with fear, forgetting to live in the present, forgetting what I do have. Forgetting that I am supported by my husband, god, my spirit, my ancestor's spirits and the energy of this island. We are staying true to why we came here, to start over and follow our passion. Dan is still at Papaya's and happily giving computer classes and designing websites. He is in the process of redesigning mine as well as creating two others with the possibility of three more.
I just got another job. While maintaing my job at the farm, I will be creating flyers, catering, working the farmers market and being a bakers apprentice! I get to learn how to cook and bake on a professional level, for free! I am so excited I can barley contain myself, you’ll see why after you look at the pictures. The hours are flexible and the job varies which is excellent for me. Island SOL Bakery is owned by Shelsea who has been baking “for a very long time”. She had a bakery in Honolulu with 50 employees and one here for 12 years, leaving Kauai for 18 years when hurricane Iniki took it out. She is back and seriously rockin it. Her company is only 6 weeks old and she is creating mini muffins to go into every Westin hotel room along with a card I will design. She got into the Hanalei farmers market which is notoriously hard to get into because it’s extremely profitable. Her delicious and sometimes gluten-free baked goods are in local stores from Piopu to Princeville. She is serious, this is her retirement plan. She hopes to generate a large enough bakery to sell in 5 years and then kick it full time on the beach. And...she’s really into yoga. She alluded to a trip to Joshua Tree, California for a yoga festival and changed the subject when tears of joy spilled down my cheeks. SOL (which is sun in Spanish but stands for Seasonal, Organic, Local) will be providing baked goods for this major yoga retreat and it looks like she may take me to work it!
Our big dreams are coming true in ways I could never imagine! Doing what we love and creating financial success on this remote island with time to play in it’s abundant beauty! I feel like we’ll be getting a two bedroom in a month or two! The private home will have a second bedroom for a guest room, office and yoga studio. Of course it will have a well made wrap around lanai with a stunning view where I can do yoga and entertain friends. It will also have a beautiful kitchen with a bay window overlooking a small kitchen garden, a gas stove and full size oven and refrigerator, plenty of counter space and ample storage space via crafted cabinets. Tile will be throughout the clean, well maintained home which is open and airy. There is a roomy bathroom (attached to the bedroom but separate from the guest bathroom) and an outside shower to wash the dogs. We’ll get really lucky and have neighbors that are almost as great as Phil and Simone. This will be a place where the dogs are welcome and have space to explore, near the beach and hiking trails, and we will be able to easily afford a king size bed to put in our beautiful bedroom, with a view of course. It’s comin, I can feel it!
I met Shelsea for the first time today at the Kauai Community College Farmers Market. Simone emailed me a job posting on craigslist and Shelsea and I had been emailing and conversing on the phone sporadically over the past 3 weeks.
This time I wasn't after veggies.
It was Shelsea's stand I was looking for.
She is very generous with her samples!
Chocolate volcano and blueberry scones
Cinnamon and macadamia nut rolls
enticing selection of savories
basil, macadamia nut pesto roll and Greek rolls with spinach, feta and tomatoes.
Turkey sausage and mango rolls
Chicken sausage, apple and smoked gouda rolls
Smoked salmon, goat cheese, tomato and caper roll.
She had the most people at her stand
trying to decide what to pick!
