December has been a very wet month, with rain almost daily. So far, we’ve accumulated 13″ of rain this month alone. One night though, it rained so hard that it woke us up and lasted for a few hours. After it was finally light enough out, I could see all the water flowing through the yard. There was a river about a foot deep flowing down the driveway and in front of the casita where it was at least 20′ wide. Some of the bamboo bordering the walkway in front of the casita was washed away, along with solar lights and the doormat. The last time we had this much water run through the yard, there were some good sized fish swimming around. It’s going to take quite a while for this to dry up, since rain is predicted till the end of the year. The good thing is that Kelley followed the flow of water towards the creek and managed to find our bamboo, solar lights and door mat. After assessing everything, I checked the rain gauge and it recorded almost 5″ of rain in a very short time.
I know that most of our friends up north already have their firewood chopped and stored for the winter. We just got started the other day with some trees we cut down last year. The first year we were here, I got an ax and thought I’d chop our own wood. With most of it being hardwood, that didn’t take long for me to give up. So we bought a log splitter and now it’s fast, easy and our backs thank us.
I know some of you are thinking, they don’t have a fireplace to keep warm and they have a gas firepit on their porch, so what’s with the firewood? It’s for the pizza oven out back. This should be enough wood for all year, considering that it’s stacked two rows deep. It looks like we’ll have to start firing up that pizza oven a little more this next year.
This is what our Sunday afternoons look like lately, we sit around roasting chiles, watching football and having a few cold Belikins. So far, we’ve picked seven five-gallon buckets of green chiles and there are still more on the plants. We’ve roasted about five buckets and the rest we’re using fresh and giving some to friends. Most of the roasted peppers are being frozen with six nice big chiles per bag, which is perfect for just about anything Kelley makes.
The last batch we picked, we are letting set out and turn red. Once they are all red we’ll put them in the dehydrator and dry them out really well. They’ll work great for making enchilada sauce, birria or any other red based Mexican food. All these chiles should satisfy our chile cravings for the next year.
The other day on our way to town, two Collared Peccaries (Javelinas) ran across the road in front of us. We knew there were Javelinas in Belize, we’ve just never seen one in the wild. Back in Arizona they are quite common, and once a year I would hunt them. Besides the Collared Peccaries, Belize is also home to the White Lipped Peccaries, which are a little larger.
With Thanksgiving being so late this year and how busy we’ve been, we really didn’t have much of a chance to get in the Christmas spirit. We did manage to get a few lights up around the house and a couple small decorations, but that was about it. We didn’t even get our Christmas tree up, but we did get our small sea glass one out, and I guess that sorta counts.
The weekend before Christmas we headed down to Hopkins and Placencia to deliver some meats to our friends. It was one last chance to get in a little beach time before 2025 was gone. In between the rains in Hopkins, we did manage to get some great fried chicken from our friend Ant at his new BFC (Belly Full Chicken) chicken shack. We took the chicken and a couple of cold beers down towards our river lot and sat on the tailgate enjoying the views. After that, we headed over to Mangos to drop off more meat and to play some music bingo. It was only one night in Hopkins, but we still had a great time.
The next day we headed over to see Ron & Rhonda for a couple days in Placencia and to drop off more meat. On Saturday night Barefoot Bar was having a calendar signing with the models from the 2026 Belikin calendar. I can’t believe this was my 10th year of getting a signed Belikin calendar. Sunday, our friends Jolly & Darrel at Fin Obsession said that they recently got a few big Wahoo on some lures I gave him last year. So they gave us a big bag of Wahoo steaks to take home. We will cook some of these either blackened or with some sage brown butter and I might even throw a few in the smoker. Either way, they should be great.
Throughout the year we are still very busy making all our different sausages and other meats. Once a year, around this time, we make up our summer sausage and everyone seems to love them. Most everyone shares them with friends over the holidays, but I’m sure there are a few that save it all for themselves. In early December we started making these and got the first batch in the smoker. While they were in the smoker I posted on our Wicked Toucan site saying that they would be available. It only took about two hours before they were all spoken for. Over the next couple of weeks we ended up making around 80 summer sausages before we decided to call it quits.
It’s been a while since we made some Irish Cream. Almost every year before we moved here we would make up a big batch and give it to friends around the holidays. It goes great in a cup of our fresh roasted coffee. At least that’s my opinion, as Kelley still can’t stand the smell of coffee.
Every year around Christmas time Kelley bakes a bunch of different cookies to give to friends. This year’s assortment was orange dreamsicle cookies with white chocolate chips, red velvet cookies with a white chocolate kiss and some with cherry-filled kisses on top, pretzel bark with toffee covered in chocolate and peanut brittle.
Since we have an abundance of chocolate around here, we decided to include an assortment of different chocolates on our cookie plates. This year’s assortment included chocolates with caramel, dried pineapple, marshmallow fluff, craisins, and mini s’mores (graham cracker with marshmallow covered in chocolate). Maybe next year we’ll start selling little boxes of assorted chocolates.
Just to make everything look a little more festive, we took some Oreos and dipped them in chocolate. After that we added some pretzels for antlers, a couple of white chocolate chips for eyes and a red M&M for a nose.
We also heated up some candy canes in the oven to soften them and then pressed them together in the shape of a heart. After that we filled them with chocolate and added some shiny red candy balls to give them a more festive look.
We hope everyone had a healthy and happy year and are ready for the next chapter in life. Kelley and I had a very busy and amazing year and we can’t wait to see what next year holds for us.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays from Belize.
Miss your sweets and treats this time of year. The Snoopy apron misses you!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year dear friends.
XOXO