Waiau ES Native Garden

Last Friday I met Justin in the Home Depot garden section; I had gone to pick up the replacement palapalai. Justin was there with his mom & daughter, River. We got to talking about native plants and he invited me to come and see the native garden he was working on with his students at Waiau Elementary School. So I did! Justin had students Sophie & Brooklyn give me a tour of the garden & school grounds, explaining what they were doing; they did a fantastic job! I will be keeping in touch with Justin and hope to help out on projects & field trips.

The students are treating the plants on the right with a manuka solution; the left is the control group.

There are some non-native plants like this loofah growing around the native plant garden.

The students help raise native plants for landscaping around the school.

I was given 4 native plants and some seeds to take home.

This is maʻo hau hele (Hibiscus brackenridgei), the state flower.

My native plants, L to R: ʻālula, ʻiliahi, maʻo hau hele, and ʻala ʻala wai nui wahine & nanea in the same pot.

While Sophie & Brooklyn were giving me the tour I got a text from Lori inviting me to go out to dinner with them; I thought she meant near their house so I said yes. Waiau is about 10 minutes away from them. It turns out dinner was actually in Waikīkī at the Kobe Japanese Steak House; they are closing at the end of the month and Jenny had $500 worth of gift cards that she needed to use! A lot of other people had the same thing in mind; it was a very full house. Since the cook puts on a show at the table it was also slower than usual so we weren't seated for our 6 pm reservation until about 6:30 and the actual food prep did not start until about 7:15; we finished about 8 pm which is why I got home late on Tuesday night and this post is showing up on Wednesday morning.

There were more mushrooms in the Shabu Shabu Soup but I was so hungry I forgot to take a photo before I ate them!

Getting ready for the onion volcano!

Voila!

The vegetables & shrimp are served!

The chicken, fish, & scallops on the grill with bean sprouts.

Mmmm, scallops!

Getting ready to add the 2nd egg to the garlic fried rice.

I got my steak first since I prefer mine rare.

The clean-up guy doing his thing.

The grill is ready for the next seating!

We only used up 30% of the gift cards that Jenny has.

It was dry at the house on Tuesday morning when I left, but on the way up it started to drizzle. Fortunately it only drizzled briefly as I was driving up. During my sunrise walk I saw Suzanne & Joanne with Cody & Rollie in the distance on their way down Lurline. I later saw Lynette & June on their way up Sierra. Loy was at the bus stop! I had not seen him for a while & was concerned that he was in the hospital again; but it turned out to be a better reason. He has gotten stronger so he has lengthened his walk by going down hill first, then coming back up & doing the section that I would usually see him at.

Twenty-five minutes before sunrise on Waiʻalae.

Twelve minutes before sunrise on Maunalani.

Six minutes after sunrise on Sierra.

On my way up Lurline I saw Tina with Massimo, Chloe Bacon, & Ink on their way down. She wanted to know if Maunalani had a mahjong group she could help with; she also said she could volunteer and do cooking demos.

During my cool down stretches I saw Wolf pass by. As I was finishing up my cool down stretches Curtis texted. He had a low tire pressure warning come on and was concerned that he had run over something on his drive to drop his father-in-law off at the adult day care center. He cancelled breakfast so he could go and get it checked.

Because I don't bring my backpack when I am meeting Curtis for breakfast, I had to go all the way back home to get it and my change of clothes. I looked at the time and realized that by the time I changed my clothes, packed up & drove back up it would be time for me to start changing for my mid-morning walk! They were repaving the lower section of Sierra Drive so I had to take the detour on Koko Head; while I was stuck in line I saw the other Crosstrek hybrid like mine! It was the one I test drove back in December; unfortunately I was unable to get a photo of it. The detour made my arrival time even closer to my usual walking time.

Center Road was also closed.

All the cars on the right are on their way up the hill. The other Crosstrek was in a garage around the curve.

Since Dad would have already finished breakfast and would be napping, I decided to start my mid-morning walk at whatever time I arrived, which turned out to be just a little bit earlier than usual. I saw Miss Paula just returning from an errand as I was on my way up Lurline. And I found a flattened brown anole that was apparently in the middle of a threat display when it was flattened; you can see that its red neck pouch was open.

Flattened male brown anole.

As I was getting ready to go in, I ran in to Czarina, the activities director. I told her about Tina & asked if they had a mahjong club; she said they used to but the residents that played passed away. I gave Czar Tina's contact info and texted Tina Czar's info! I hope they can work something out. Czar also told me about their plans to have the wing Dad is on become a veterans wing; as the non-veteran  residents currently in the wing pass away or move they will move veterans to Dad's wing. Based on feedback they got at the last veterans club meeting they are also planning on changing the colors of the walls, privacy curtains, and window curtains.

When I went to sign in I saw that Marissa had put part of the greeting to visitors in ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi! She & Kiʻini have decided to add a few Hawaiian words to the signs that are frequently changed.


Lunch was Sweet sour pork (15g),  Steamed rice, Garden salad (3g), Brown sugar coffeecake, and Egg drop soup (1g); I skipped lunch today since the main dish had so many carbs. I had a couple of meat sticks for a total of 5g carbs. Dad ate all his 1/2 peanut butter & banana sandwich, a piece of coffeecake, & a madeleine. He drank 240 ml cranberry juice but no water. As the lunch service was wrapping up, CNA Jade came in very apologetic with a tray for me; she thought they forgot to give it to me. I told her I had not ordered one because the sweet sour sauce on the main dish had too many carbs for me. She then proceeded to see if I wanted to at least eat the salad and egg drop soup; since they had sent it down, that's what I ended up doing!



The roofing project has reached a new phase; they are now taking off the old roof. A sign in the elevator indicated which parts they are starting on. During my mid-morning walk I got a better reference photo; I should be able to see the Phase 1 work that they are now doing.

The wing on the right is where they are working on now.

Traffic getting back home from the school was pretty light ... for the first half. Around the Middle Street merge it slowed down to a crawl, as usual for that time of day. It took me about 45 minutes to get home. In the middle of it Curtis texted to say he would pick me up in about 30 minutes; with the traffic it took me another 15 minutes to get home. But it also took him 45 minutes instead of 30!

Before the Middle Street merge.

After the Middle Street merge.

A Belated Hauʻoli lā Hānau to Paul, Greg, & cousin Justine! The 25th was also the 4th anniversary of this blog!