Happenings in the house of Hoke

Sunday, June 24, 2012

Back to our Belizean home!!

The kids and I just arrived back to our beautiful condo in San Pedro, Belize yesterday after a long and exhausting trip. I plan to blog almost every day during our 2 weeks here so watch for updates!

We were up at 3 am Friday morning (I stared at the ceiling from about 2 am onwards...) and headed to Detroit for our 6 am flight. I had planned to stay at the DTW Westin which we always do but Murphy (our Corgi) was limping badly and we ended up on a 2 hour tour to the vets so decided to stay home, relax and just get up early and drive in. Poor Tommy always has to get up at 4 am for work and I robbed him of a sleep in day. Oh well...

Flights were easy and uneventful although - note to self - NEVER declare alcohol that you bring into the country!! I stupidly decided to admit to bringing some wine in and was charged $32 for the privilege of bringing my own wine into their country!! I only paid $21 for it to begin with!! I was SO FURIOUS at the obvious ripping off of tourists just because they can. Really sucked the joy out of the beginning of our vacation. Took me an hour to shake it off. Poo.

my spoiled kids...Jen is groovin on her own personal cubicle chair at the Delta Worldclub!

then even more spoiled... a bump to first class. Wine for Mom!! :-)

A happy form to fill out

onto the Tropic Air flight

and headed to Ambergris Caye

my favorite little town where golf carts are the preferred mode of transportation!

this is our sweet Mango puppy that we brought back from Belize 2 years ago... miss her terribly

and look who showed up at the condo! I swear it's a close relation to her!

could be her brother, father... who knows

so when we travel to the island we pack things like peanut butter, coffee, wine etc. This jar of Jiffy in the grocery store was...guess how much...

$20 US!!!

SAGA Humane society tent at lobsterfest

Jen can't wait to get there to volunteer. She volunteered at the shelter almost every day last trip (which is how we ended up bringing home our sweet Mango...) We packed a HUGE bag full of dog toys, cat toys, and other things that Saga needs to donate. Customs lady when going through the bag of stuff said "do you have a dog there?" and I quickly said YES! Can't imagine how much they would have taxed me for our donation!!

Full out steel band and reggae music was a blast!

the streets were jammin

and only in San Pedro do you find someone in full-out pimp daddy attire riding a motorcycle. He had a floppy pimp hat, shiny leather jacket, the pants speak for themselves and black and white cowhide boots with SPURS!! Hahahaha! I swear this will be Tommy's new look when we retire here!!

That's it for day one...until tomorrow!

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Extending our "Zen" time from spring to fall

Well it's finally here!! The centerpiece of our outdoor living room in our Zen garden, The anxiously awaited granite fire pit table! We have waited almost 7 weeks for this thing to arrive but let me tell you it was WELL worth the wait!

After sitting outdoors this past April with the sun shining and a beautiful but rather cold evening, we finally succumbed to the Michigan spring and headed indoors. Even after bundling up in sweatshirts, jeans and the like. I was really bummed out because I wanted to have some outdoor wine time with my friends but it was just too cold. I lamented to Tommy that it would really be great if we could extend our spring/summer/fall out back a month or two longer. Especially in the fall after coming home from Spartan football games there would be nothing better than sitting out back with some cocktails watching other college games. (hence the aforementioned TV that went up!)

So I had the brainstorm of the fire pit table! Let me tell you we researched the internet for quite some time and I think we looked at nearly every possible fire pit table out there. We finally headed out to our local upscale patio furniture store to see what they had to offer and found the perfect thing. Only caveat was we had to special order the one we wanted because each one is custom ordered for size, shape, color, etc.

But, after a nearly 7 week wait it is HERE! Just in time for 90 degrees on Sunday! Haha!

the delivery guys are assembling it in the front to make sure everything is there then taking it piece by piece out back

Here's the "before" pic with the glass and wicker coffee table

Holy cow! It's like it was made for this space!!

fits beautifully plus there is room to set drinks etc on the table

copper and bronze reflective glass sits in the center on top of the metal pan that conducts the propane gas

and Voila! Instant fire! This baby puts out 54,000 btu's and definitely keeps the area toasty warm

Mango was a bit freaked out!

sitting on the couch looking out at the pond and waterfall the reflection off the black granite is just beautiful!

Here's to a longer season in the Zen Garden and warm, toasty evenings of wine, warmth and football!

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

The landscaping and outdoor projects never cease!

Well spring is nearly in the books and summer is almost upon us! June 20 is the official first day of summer but it may as well be here now. The Zen is up and running and my hubby has been busily doing landscaping duties that I keep finding for him. Yesterday's tasks were running cable from the basement outdoors, under the deck and up the bamboo post of our Japanese roof for our outdoor living room. This is now attached to the small TV that we have mounted outside so as to extend our outdoor time even more. Yes, not very "Zen like" I know, we have already been criticized for that. But when you live in Michigan and have so few summer months outside to enjoy AND your husband works in college football coaching, we wanted to maximize every minute we could outdoors! Our plans are to enjoy watching other football games outdoors after we get home from our games this fall. NOT to sit outdoors and watch reality TV! Haha!

It's really barely noticable and will be off more than on. Tommy found a great bracket that he can pop out and in easily so it's not out there all the time

see... you can barely see it!

Tommy's old college job as a landscaper is put to good use at the Hoke household! He has done a beautiful job with the bushes, etc and transplanted the giant one in the far back left of the photo from the front of our house yesterday along with a funky pine tree that got too large

Out came three giant shrubs. one that we couldn't identify but looked awful and two that he transplanted out back. We replaced them with these double knock out rose bushes that should get really large. Looks so much nicer! Next task, paint the ugly red door a different color. We are open to suggestions!

He also pulled out a large hydrangea that we had on the side of the house here (we had two and one died) and I was able to put in a mini vegetable garden. We'll see how it does. We have very little sunny space for a garden but we love summer veggies!

Last big addition this summer is the arrival of the granite firepit table for the outdoor living room! It's supposed to be here Thursday...pics to follow.

Another load of mulch coming this week and hopefully that puts us at the end of all of the spring yard and pond overhaul maintenance and we can enjoy the fruits of our labors!

Fun vacation to our condo in Belize coming up in T minus 18 days and counting!

Monday, June 4, 2012

Hoke Hiddenite family fun!

Every year we load up the Land Rover with 2 kids, 3 dogs and the Thule stuffed full on top and make the trek to Hiddenite, NC for Memorial Day weekend and the big Hoke clan family gathering! Tommy's 86 year old Mom Alva and 81 yr old Aunt Rita live on 75+ acres of beauty in the foothills of NC. Along that property is a spring that feeds into a giant pool that Tommy's Grand Dad built years ago. We gather together early in May to patch the cement and paint the pool then after the paint cures and dries, Alva opens up the spring and fills the pool. It's just about the best pool I've ever been in. The water is so cold and refreshing on a hot summer day!