I am so excited to share with you all the newest additions to the My Sweet Hawai’i Collection! This collection consists of designs/products that not just remind me of home, but also helps to keep my memories alive. Memories that may have been buried deep in my mind or memories that I just want to hold on to a little longer - every element is special to me in some way, shape, or form. This release includes 3 new travel jewelry case designs and a new product - passport covers! All items are available now on both my website and Etsy shop.
Pikake Lei Travel Jewelry Case
One of the strangest things that I enjoyed doing when I was younger was watching my aunties and uncles wedding videos. If you’re wondering, yes, they were on VHS. I don’t know why I loved to watch them, but the vain side of me knows it was because I wanted to see myself in these videos. A tradition that was common back then, not sure how common it is now, would be a video played during the reception about the couple. Typically, it’d start off with them as babies and show them growing up, then it would show them hanging out with their closest friends, and then it would be all the pictures they took together as a couple. This was always my favorite part about weddings.
There is one song in particular that I felt was used in a lot of these slideshows and it’s Love and Honesty by Hawaiian Style Band. It was sometime last year, when I was listening to a Keali’i Reichel playlist on Spotify, that I heard this song again. It had been decades since I had last heard it and once it started playing, I was instantly brought back to those weekend afternoons where I would be in my grandparents living room trying to find one of the wedding videos to watch.
The funniest part to me is that there is just one line in the song that I always catch myself singing, “a fresh pikake lei.” Literally, that’s it and it’s that line of the song that brings back so many memories.
However, that song isn’t the only reason why I decided to add this design to the shop, but it’s also because my parents, grandma, and I are obsessed with trying to find a pikake scent that we can have around the house! There really is nothing like a fresh pikake lei and if you haven’t smelled one, I encourage you to do it, but it’s just so hard to find a fragrance that isn’t too powdery. I feel like every time my auntie comes up, the number one thing we ask her to try find is a pikake scent. I’m sure it feels like mission impossible for her.
Crown Flower Lei Travel Jewelry Case
If there is one flower that can bring back so many memories, it’s the crown flower. This flower’s beautiful purple color instantly brings me back to my elementary school days. You want to know how safe it was back then? Because I didn’t like attending A+, an after school program, my mom let me hang out at what we called the pavilion, which was a recreational building right by the school, until she was done with work. I’d get out of school around 2:30PM and she finished work around 5:00PM, so I’d spend the afternoons hanging out with my friends.
On some of those days, my friends and I would hang out near these transformer boxes that were near the bathrooms, but around that area was a crown flower bush. My friends and I had this bright idea that we wanted to bring home some of these caterpillars so we could release butterflies - let’s just say that didn’t go too well and a lot of brave caterpillars were lost to the endeavor.
Needless to say, any time I see crown flowers, I remember those days. I remember how patient my mom was with me when I would sneak home caterpillars, cockroaches, beatle bugs, etc to be my own “pets” since we couldn’t have any.
Opihi Shells Travel Jewelry Case
Words can’t describe how excited I’ve been having opihi designs popularized! I always thought that their shells were the coolest looking shells, especially the inside. So naturally, I needed to add this design to the shop.
When I would visit my grandparents on the Big Island, one of the dishes I always remember having is opihi with tomatoes and onions. It’s simple and delicious, but it brings back memories of nights just sitting in my grandparents kitchen, thigh sticking to their chair cushions, plate of steamed rice, opihi, and whatever the main entree is, and a cold apple iced tea from Aloha Maid. It’s even more special now because of how expensive it is and the fact I don’t get to enjoy it as often as before.
There’s also a song by Ka’au Crater Boys called Opihi Man that I used to hear all the time when I was younger that brings me back to days of Summer Fun, specifically when we’d do our Finale performances. Usually there was always a theme and I felt like my group always had a fun song. However, I remember that one of the groups with the younger kids performed to this song and I distinctly remember the choreography to the chorus, “Opihi man in the sun, opihi man grab your bang and run!” Talk about good times.
I was enrolled in Summer Fun throughout elementary school and although there were days where I hated it, I thoroughly enjoyed going. I’m not really sure what age the leaders were, but I always thought they were the coolest people because most of them could drive. I also thought it was so cool to be able to hangout with them - it really didn’t take much to impress me when I was younger! Not only that, I remember sitting in our lines waiting to get our lunchbox handed to us, and most days I would hope that my mom would pack me either a Lunchables or spam musubi. However, it never really mattered because I just remember having fun with my friends as we talked and laughed. Then we’d clean up, but our lunchboxes back on the rolling rack, sit in line again and wait till we did the next activity. Most of the time, to calm us down, the leaders would do the boom-chicka-boom thing, you know, “I said a boom-chicka-boom” and we’d respond saying the same thing back while copying their motions. I remember I couldn’t wait to be a leader so I could be that cool and do my own version of it.
I never had the chance to be a leader there. In fact, I hadn’t thought about those days until I started working on this new release. This was probably one of the more impactful moments for me growing up because I didn’t attend the same elementary school as most of the kids that were a part of this program. However, I ended up having to change elementary schools when I was going into the fourth grade. I remember feeling so nervous and scared because I wasn’t great at making friends, I’m still not great at it, but I was worried that I would be made fun of for not being like the other kids. On that first day, I remember my mom walking me to the door and I was begging her not to leave me and to bring me home. I remember begging her to homeschool me instead, but then I remember seeing some of the friends that I made during Summer Fun and they remembered me! I was so relieved to feel like I had friends, even though they weren’t in my class, I remember them telling me that we’d play together at recess. I guess you can say the rest is history, but those days at Summer Fun were more fun than I’d like to admit.
All of these products are available in the shop and my Etsy store and if you’re reading this before July 4th, 2026, then lucky you! There’s a sale currently going on. I hope you all enjoyed this Behind the Design post! Like I mentioned, the My Sweet Hawai’i Collection is special to me because it’s my way of being able to preserve some of these memories and to honor the different moments that have shaped me into who I am today.