BEES!! and other exciting news....

I finally got my bees on April 19. My friend Brian picked them up for me from a supplier in Laytonville. I got 3 lbs of bees and a queen of the Minnesota hygenic breed that Brian has been using and they do well here. I reread the chapter of my book on hiving the bees and made up sugar water before Brian came. I got the hive all set up. You start with only a 'brood box' and add the 'honey supers' later to collect you honey. You also put a feeder inside with sugar water and get a spray bottle full of sugar water to spray them while you hive them. You open up the box and sneak out the queen and put her in the hive. All of the bees want to be with her, but you wait to let them out. You spray them well with sugar water to make them happy and remove 4-5 frames from the brood box. Then you dump them into the hive. Lots of them stay inside and are hard to get in there, so you dump them onto a white towel which leads up to the hive and they slowly make their way up. Many of the bees sit at the entrance and fan out the smell of the hive so the bees can find them. It was cold and wet, so many of my bees didn't make it in and are still outside of the hive. I spent hours trying to move them in by hand and got most of them to the entrance. The bees in the hive will carry out and discard any that die inside. You replace the frames you took out and shut up the hive and then you have to leave it alone for a week. Next weekend I get to go back and open up the hive with my smoker and look for honeycomb, eggs, larvae etc. and overall health. I'll have to break apart any frames they melded together, but I get to keep any 'burr comb' that they make and put it in the fridge for craft projects later. They honey is cool, but I'm excited about the propolis, wax and royal jelly too. My biggest concern is the health of the queen. If the bees are unhappy with her they'll kill her and try to make another, which doesn't always go well. If she is unhappy she could leave and take them with her. Next weekend they will be protective of their hive and I'm more likely to get stung, but no stings so far. It is strange to have them crawling all over your hands and not shake them off or freak out. It's not wise to wear gloves though, because you are more likely to injure the bees and that just makes them more angry. I'll post more photos of my weekend results if I can get anyone to come around while I check on them. Loren and Nolan took these ones.

The chickens are all laying now so we generally get 4 eggs a day unless they get out and lay somewhere else or just have a lazy day. We've been able to give lots of eggs away which is nice.

Loren and I also got to go to the Death Cab for Cutie show at the Van Duzen last week. It was a really great show. I would say I'm biased because I went to school with Ben and Nick and always thought they were amazing people as well as musicians, but in this case I believe the bias is absent and they really did put on a great show. It was also free because Nick got us guest passes! I guess I went to the right college. We got to see them 4-5 years ago in Eureka at a smaller venue. Nick was kind enough to hang back and talk to us for awhile and share a bit of the experiences you get to have as a popular rock band. More exciting than bees and chickens I suppose. Anyway, it was a wonderful experience and great to see lots of friends there as well. Quite a diverse crowd. I doubt they'll make it back this way again anytime soon, but I'd definately pay to see them and we'll buy the new album when it comes out.

Fish and Ducks,

We've got a new member of our flock. Spiderwick joined us this week. He's named after the Spiderwick Chronicles. We haven't seen the movie and don't know anything about it, but Nolan heard the name and liked it. Spiderwick is an Indian Runner duck. I got him when I stopped in the feed store for straw and some dog treats. He was there with two Mallards and although I couldn't take the Mallards because we don't have a pond, I was excited to get him. I'd wanted a pair of ducks and to have my neighbor raise them while there were raising baby chicks, but the stores didn't order them this year. These ones were a special order that didn't get picked up. So Spiderwick was in the house with us for a few days. We tried to put him with some bigger chicks/chickens for company but they picked on him and didn't really let him snuggle like he wanted to. He stayed in a large tupperware container with us and got to come out for special occasions. The first couple of days he got to be in the living room, but was later restricted to tiled areas. He followed Nolan everywhere and loved to sit on his lap. He's now with our friend that picked up the earlier part of the order on Saturday at the feed store. When we get him back we might get a girl along with him and have a pair like I wanted. He's so sweet he really deserves a girlfriend.

Anyway, another exciting event was Nolan's first fishing trip with dad and our nice friend Mitch (they've got Indian runner ducks too!) Nolan got to reel in about 4 little rainbow trout. He even identified them off of a poster he saw today in the Pacific Watersheds satellite office. We're excited to have some more fun fishing days!

No photos please!

We love fish!

But not that much!

We've also been working really hard on the yard. Dad has been clearing blackberries and the secret garden area for the upcoming septic mound (whohoo!) and fence. I've been working on planting, pruning, weeding, mulching, fertiling etc. The apple trees and rhodis are blooming and the grass is getting green. I made Loren help me set up a garden bed just for the boys and we've been working on the tree house a lot. I'm also prepping for the bees I get tomorrow.

Planting seeds in the children's garden.

Nolan roasting a marshmellow.

It's not often get to take two vacatations in one month! We got to go to Spokane and Bozeman the last half of March. We got to see a few friends and some family. Look at Erika's great faux suede wall. If the nursing career doesn't pan out, interior design would be a snap for her! Couldn't get the boys to look at the camera with the TV on. At least we got them to leave the playroom. We also got to see lots of trains while we were driving around and that was a lot of fun for the boys. We stopped at the Silver Dollar Store on the drive back to Spokane and the boys got some new toys. We met up with Grammy Diane and Poppy at Savageland in Spokane.




Nolan got his own snowboard after spending a day at Bridger in Montana. The hill at Bridger was pretty easy and he did great, but the slope at Mt. Spokane was steeper and a litte more frustating. The chairlift was fun though and even Caleb got to go up in Montana and ride down with Daddy. We rented a board for Nolan the first day, when we were in Bozeman. Caleb didn't want to go and had this expression for most of the afternoon except for a few fun moments of snowman building and goggle wearing (and hot cocoa drinking-not too hot of course.)



The best part was seeing family. Grandma was 96 and looking great, must be that Mountain Dew. Lynn watched the boys so we could go out and gave them lots of tickles. The cousins were great and played with the boys and hid Easter Eggs. They spent a lot of time running around and on the swing. Cousin Tim pushed me on that same swing 25 years ago! The boys got to bowl for the first time and Nolan won on his team. We started practicing tieing our shoes. I took the boys to the Rocky Mountain Natural History Museum and we got to see the dinosaur display again as well as a great rock and mineral display. The boys got a few rocks and a book about them.

Grammy's house !!
We had a great time at Grammy's house. We got to celebrate birthdays for Elsa, Papa and me. We also got to have a party with Loren's friends and family. The boys really loved hanging out with their family. Especially Cousin Kailey. Grammy played games and cards and Papa took Nolan to see the boats again. Both of the boys got their summer shaves. Uncle Darin gave me his old longboard and though I didn't actually make it out because my arms are too out of shape,I enjoy having my own now! We bought the boys brand new bikes, but Caleb cried about his not being red enough and then road the pink one around-hmmmm.