Tag Archives: hipehabitat
The Butterfly House – A One Bedroom Casita on a Budget
We became friends with Marilyn when she came down for a Surf with Amigas retreat a couple years ago and Kim agreed to design and build a small simple 1 bedroom casita on Marilyn’s sea view lot at Seascape Terrace. … Continue reading
Our House Is Finished
This post is a long time coming, but in case you wondering, yes we did finally finish our house. It was mostly complete in time for Luna to be born back in September of 2014. Since then it’s been a … Continue reading
Posted in Brisas
Tagged brisas nicaragua, construction management, hacienda boom, hipehabitat, holly beck, house design, kim obermeyer
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Day In The Life – Living in Nicaragua With a 5 Month Old Baby Girl
Posted in living in nicaragua
Tagged baby, beach house, day in the life, estuary, girl, hipehabitat, holly beck obermeyer, lifestyle, luna suli, nicaragua, surfing
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Jacek and Ivona’s House by Hipehabitat
After the seeing the successful outcome and great feel of our L-shaped hacienda home Kim has agreed to build a slightly customized version for a Canadian couple planning to retire in Nicaragua in the next few years. Here, Holly and … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged building in nicaragua, construction management, hipehabitat, kim obermeyer, nicaragua, northern
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Settling Into the New House
It’s been about 3 months and we’re loving our new home at Brisas Del Alma. We’re still very busy settling in, putting finishing touches on the house (building shelves to store all our stuff mostly), and embracing our new lifestyle. It … Continue reading
Posted in living in nicaragua
Tagged brisas del alma, hipehabitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, living, new house, nicaragua
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The New Dipping Pool
The house is now mostly finished, and we have an 11 week old baby girl named Luna. Little Luna has occupied most of our time lately, so I’m way behind on blog posts. Eventually I’ll get a chance to take … Continue reading
House in Progress Tour
In Part 2 of our Nesting in Nicaragua series, Holly is one week shy of being six months pregnant and the house has been under construction for five months. The roof is mostly on and you can start to get … Continue reading
Cool Roof Design by Kim Obermeyer
Kim Obermeyer of hipEhabitat.com talks about his design for a cool roof – a double layer roof that will prevent heat from the sun from radiating into the living space. The roofing system features pre-painted structural zinc roof panels with … Continue reading
Posted in Building in Nicaragua, Green Building and Bamboo
Tagged cool roof, design, hipehabitat, kim obermeyer, nicaragua, structural zinc, tropics, white roof, zinc
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Breaking in the Beach House
It was a long time coming (8 months to be exact), but the beach house is finally finished! Ok, so it’s not totally finished. There are still plenty of details to be addressed. We’ve got trim to put up, painting … Continue reading
Posted in Nicaragua
Tagged beach house, hipehabitat, holly beck obermeyer, kim obermeyer, nicaragua
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Beach House Progress – Plycem Walls and Bamboo Siding
We started building the beach house way back in March – or was it February 2013? The point is, it’s been so long that it’s hard to remember. The main delay has been caused by an irresponsible carpenter with a … Continue reading
Our Caretaker’s House at Brisas Del Alma
Ok, I know you can barely see the house in this picture, but it’s just such a classic shot of me telling the dogs that they cannot eat our caretaker’s pet squirrel “Simon” (named for one of the chipmunks). You … Continue reading
Beach House Progress – Slow and Steady
The whole process has been really slow, but at least it’s been steady. We bought a beachfront concession lot back in April of 2012. It wasn’t easy and you can read the full story here. Since then we’ve been working … Continue reading
Drilling a Deep Well in Nicaragua
We’re in the process of installing infrastructure for a small 16 lot housing development in northern nicaragua called Tierra Del Sueno. In order to provide water for the development we decided to drill a community well at the top of … Continue reading
Belgian IPA homebrew “Belguraguan”
OK, here’s the brew I’ve been waiting for, wanting to try for months, yearning for – a home-brewed Belgian IPA made right here in Nicaragua. I’m thinking of throwing a packet of dried Belgian yeast into our palm-thatch roof so … Continue reading
Posted in Eat drink and be merry
Tagged belgian IPA, belgian yeast, hipehabitat, homebrewing, kim obermeyer, nicaragua
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Teak Post and Concrete Block Bodega
We have begun building up on the ridge! First project – a place to store our tools, saddles, surfboards, wheelbarrow, and the building supplies that we’ll need to collect when we’re ready to start building the actual house. The name … Continue reading
The New Living Fence on our Lot in Tierra Del Sueno
We bought an awesome lot in the new eco-friendly community in Northern Nicaragua called Tierra Del Sueno and are starting to make some improvements. The first step was installing a fence around the perimeter so we can more clearly see … Continue reading
Posted in Nicaragua, Tierra Del Sueno
Tagged hipehabitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, living fence, lot clearing, lot for sale, nicaragua, northern nica, tierra del sueno
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Phase 1 Roads at Tierra Del Sueno
It’s been a year or more in the planning stages but we have finally broken ground on the new roads that will service lots in Tierra Del Sueno. We had been waiting to finalize the lot lines before figuring out … Continue reading
How to Make a Stubborn Passionfruit Vine Flower – Nicaraguan Folk Wisdom
We love passion fruit! Called calala or maracuya in Nicaragua, delicious passion fruit is awesome mixed with plain yogurt, granola, and a drizzle of honey. We buy them a dozen at a time and have been eagerly awaiting for the … Continue reading
Green Papaya Thai Salad Recipe
Kim spent 8 years living in Thailand and learned some great recipes for delicious and healthy Thai food. One of my favorites is the Green Papaya salad. It’s super easy to make, fresh and healthy, looks awesome with all the … Continue reading
Posted in Eat drink and be merry
Tagged green papaya thai salad, hipehabitat, kim obermeyer, recipe, thai cooking
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“Volcan” Cacao-Cafe homebrew Stout
The third, and possibly the best batch, in tropical home brewing adventures, almost met its end in the moldy rainy season condition of June. The rainy season brings clouds of mold that drift invisibly through the air landing on … Continue reading
Posted in drink it, Eat drink and be merry, Make your own
Tagged beer, cacao, coffee, DIY, hipehabitat, holly beck, homebrew, homebrewing, kim obermeyer, mold, nicaragua, stout
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Make Your Own Cottonwood Balm For Muscle Pain and Wound Healing
Kim was in Oregon for an early spring trip and on a hike along the Columbia River found a grove of young cottonwood trees in full bud. Cottonwood is in the same family as willow, the tree from which aspirin … Continue reading
Posted in Make your own
Tagged bees wax, candle, cottonwood, Cottonwood balm, DIY, hipehabitat, make your own, muscle ache, muscle rub, patchouli
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Our garden grows
We started planting the garden in late October, 2011- lots of chillies (habanero, jalapeno, arbol, New Mex, serrano and others), various greens, tomatoes, Thai basil, lemongrass, dill, tea tree, sunflowers and a bunch of randoms like purslane and indigo. Some … Continue reading
Posted in Eat drink and be merry, Make your own, Nicaragua, Uncategorized
Tagged chillies, garden, gardening, hipehabitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, nicaragua, organic agrden
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Extreme Driving to Extreme Luxury in Southern Nicaragua
We were headed down to Southern Nicaragua to check out Rancho Santana and talk about possibly using it as a location for an upcoming women’s surf and yoga retreat. The drive usually takes about 6 hours but we wanted to … Continue reading
Posted in Nicaragua, Surfing and Surfboards, Videos
Tagged hipehabitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, luxury condos, rancho santana, southern nicaragua
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Hippy Hop Attack IPA
I’ll admit that I was a doubter. After participating in numerous homebrewing efforts over the years I learned that it isn’t easy, there’s a lot that can go wrong, and especially considering our lack of refined equipment I thought our … Continue reading
Posted in Eat drink and be merry
Tagged hipehabitat, hippy hop attack, holly beck, homebrewing, hops, IPA, kim obermeyer, nicaragua, wort
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Coconut-Rolled Cashew Honey Cacao Balls
We are all about the homemade – home-brewed IPAs, home-fermented honey wine, and now hand-rolled cacao balls!
DIY Guanacaste Stairs
We moved into our new cabana about a month prior and had yet to take full advantage of the loft because we didn’t have any stairs. We had considered several funky stair designs with notched logs and spiral things, but … Continue reading
Posted in Make your own
Tagged asseria, cabana, DIY, guanacaste, hipehabitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, loft, make your own, nicaragua, stairs, wood
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Eco-Friendly Bee Hive Removal
While trying to install our signal booster antennae on our new house, we heard a buzzing and came across a buzzing mess lurking under the palm fronds. Kim grabbed a plastic bag and I got in place with the camera. … Continue reading
Posted in Nicaragua, Videos
Tagged bee hive, bee removal, eco friendly, hipehabitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, nicaragua
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Building a Cabana in Nicaragua – Walls up and Siding on
The walls are up, the siding is on, and our cute little 18’sq cabana is nearly finished! We had to leave Nicaragua at this point and are very excited to get back down there and put in the details like … Continue reading
Geodesic Dome with solar, wind, geothermal power
A friend of a friend’s place in NY, also has old tire terraced gardens, crushed rubber paths and an awesome 40’+ foot inside climbing rope!! Click the link to watch the video: http://www.sciencefriday.com/embed/video/10407.swf
Framing the Octagon Window
Designing the window placement was a fun experience that involved measuring, re-measuring, and measuring again, then erasing, measuring, and changing the dimensions multiple times. Our friendly red-headed framer was smilingly patient as we changed our minds back and forth. Right … Continue reading
Posted in Green Building and Bamboo, Nicaragua
Tagged building a cabana, framing, hipehabitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, nicaragua, northern nicaragua, octagon window, pine
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Building in Nicaragua – Concrete Floor, Tile, and Wood Dilemmas
Building in Nicaragua is both much easier and much more difficult than it would be in the States. This project in particular is easier than most since we’re building on Coco Loco property with full access to power (except when … Continue reading
Building in Nicaragua – Palm Fronds for the Thatch Roof
Accessing the palm fronds for the thatch roof turned out to be one of the easiest things we’ve had to do so far. There’s a property nearby owned by a friend full of the right kinds of palms, so we … Continue reading
Building in Nicaragua – Is Cutting Mangroves ever Sustainable?
Mangle, mangle, mangle! We were told we needed to get some varilla to support the palma (palm thatch leaves used for our roof). So we said “OK, where do we get that”? We could either buy it from a local … Continue reading
Building in Nicaragua – Eucalyptus Plantation and Roof Assembly Video
The video footage of the Eucalyptus plantation experience and the start of the roof assembly.
Building in Nicaragua – Eucalyptus Plantation Politics
The house progresses rapidly. It’s amazing how quickly the eucalyptus posts can be assembled into home shape. Our nine supporting pillars were bought, cut, delivered, and cemented into place within four days. For the rest of the roof structure we … Continue reading
Building in Nicaragua – Shopping for Eucalyptus Video
A video summary of shopping for the eucalyptus posts that will become the pillars for our cabana in Nicaragua.
Building a Cabana in Nicaragua – Eucalyptus posts
Lately our home base has been a thatched roof cabana at El Coco Loco, the Eco-hotel where we run our women’s surf and yoga retreats. Since the guys at Coco Loco have been letting us crash there in between retreats, … Continue reading
Building with Bamboo – Making Esterilla
Esterilla is essentially flattened bamboo and can be used as flooring, wall paneling, and anything else where you need a strong flat material. In Ecuador we saw it used as walls in many local homes. We happened to come across … Continue reading
Bamboo: Hip-E habitat?
The search for a sustainably built home has led us all over the place in the past months. We’ve been learning a lot about various green building methods and materials, from hay bales, to clay, earth ships and bamboo. … Continue reading
The Best Beer in Ecuador
Hiking through permaculture farms and admiring bamboo structures makes one quite thirsty. Usually, quality hoppy libations are inaccessible in Latin America, which is why we were so ecstatic to happen upon Cafe Flor and Roche’s Brewery in Canoa, Ecuador. We’d … Continue reading
Posted in Eat drink and be merry, Ecuador, Videos
Tagged beer, brandon roche, cafe flor, canoa, ecuador, good, growler fill, hefeweizen, hipehabitat, hippie habitat, holly beck, kim obermeyer, roche's brewery
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hip-E habitat 