It's the 50th Post! Holy Cow!

Being that this is the 50th post, we'll just share some randomness of the past few weeks and other miscellaneous stuff.

Missing Maya, we have adapted to our Gecko's as our housemates; I mean, they eat bugs, so it's a good deal for all of us

Happy September!

School has begun again. On Monday the 1st, primary schools opened for the 2008-2009 academic year and we got right to work! It's fun to be back with the teachers and pikni. On the first day we were greeted with lots of hugs and excitement from the kids we hadn't seen in two months. It's fun to see them in their new classrooms, too.

Mailing Address Update

Since we're back in school, if you would like to send us mail, please use the school address again. It's the one listed to the right under the mailing information section.


Belize is ready to party!

A dancer at this year's Carnival showing Belizean Pride

We can't believe we are in our second September Celebration time. This is the busiest month in Belize, full of all sorts of parades, holidays, expos, and of course Ginnie's birthday! It's pretty fun to share my birthday month with Belize - Independence Day is on the 21st. This weekend (the 6th) we will enjoy Carnival, in which paraders come out and dance in elaborate costumes and beads and sweets are tossed to the crowd.

Paraders march the streets for St. George's Caye Day, September 10th

I heart my Crockpot

Chili with cornbread topping

The inventive home cooking is in full swing with all sorts of new things. Ginnie discovered a new love for our crock pot, which we'd picked up to cook beans but now is being used for all sorts of delicious meals and desserts. Who knew you could make a cake in the crock pot? And, it makes the moistest cakes, it's incredible! We've had eggplant parmigiana, lasagna, chili with cornbread topping, lava cake, "baked" pasta with mozzarella, and curries all from the crockpot. Too bad when we received two for the wedding we returned one, we could have one making dinner and one making dessert at the same time :) I don't remember the kind we have at home but I think it has a timer which will be even better since I know we'll be away from the house for longer than the time needed for some items. The good thing here is coming home for lunch and being able to just get dinner started then... oh so nice. Plus, not having to use the gas stove in this heat is pretty awesome.



Eggplant Parmigiana over homemade wheat rotini

Falafel from the crockpot! So delicious and topped with a homemade yogurt sauce (not homemade yogurt, though)


Recently-made spinach lasagna with homemade wheat noodles


Lava cake - it's crazy that flour, cocoa powder, a few other things and water comes out cakey and with this gooey chocolate-ness among it all (we actually didn't really like this that much, surprising since one of us is a chocoholic and it is not Ginnie)


"Gourmet" Time

Eggplant steaks topped with a spinach & tomato mixture

We're taking our favorite dishes to new levels and trying out some fancier versions of pizza and veggie burgers. Taking inspiration from food network and favorite flavors from home, we have been testing out new pizza and burger flavors; so far we have had a delicious Thai-style pizza with homemade peanut sauce, a barbequed tofu sandwich on homemade wheat rolls, curry soybean burgers, Anthony's own southwestern veggie burgers with a homemade vegetable bread. We've tested some barbeque pizza too, it's all been good. We also tried grilled eggplant steaks as seen on Rachael Ray and they came out so delicious - funny thing is we don't have a grill, so we made one out of rolled up tin foil placed on the comal and it worked! Just imagine what more we could do if we only had ground turkey...

Thai-style pizza

Barbeque tofu burgers with creamy spinach mashed potatoes

Anthony's Southwestern Veggie Burger on his vegetable bread (made with zucchini, tomatoes, and onions - reminds us of the pizza jamba bread from Jamba Juice)



Grilling up the eggplant steaks on our homemade grill - you have to be pretty creative sometimes


It's hot, hot, hot, hot, hot....


Weh di go ahn wit dis heat, man? It is so much hotter now than last year at the same time, even than last summer which I recall being pretty hot. Everyone is saying it's unusual (though, that's pretty much what you always here in this time of climate change nowadays) to be this hot. We're reaching the 90's on a daily basis and it is not getting much cooler at night - well, outside is cooler, but not enough to cool off the house whose concrete traps the heat of the day. Even the water is coming out warm because it is in the hot, hot sun all day. We miss the cold showers!

Iguanas hangin' out on the street near our neighborhood trying to stay cool

As you can see, year two is really moving, we wonder what other adventures are in store in the next 11 months, but we'll be sure to keep you posted :)