A Day in the Life of Smoochy

Miscarriage

2012-01-25T10:52:00.000-06:00

Ugh. I've been dreading coming here because I knew that was the word I had to write. "Miscarriage." What a horrible thing to have to tell the Internet. I lost the pregnancy. It seems the baby stopped developing before it could even be technically be called a fetus. Everything passed fairly easily and peacefully here at home Monday night. Of course, I'm sad. Of course, I am disappointed. But, I am OK too. It helps me to know that my body did just what it was supposed to do under such circumstances (as my brilliant and sensitive cousin pointed out). It helps me to know that the cells just didn't divide like they were supposed to; I understand that it is no one's fault. And most of all it helps to snuggle the three beautiful babies I have successfully carried and birthed, one of which still nurses and sleeps at night with her fat little hands cradling my face. When Smoochy and I are ready again, I know there is a fourth baby floating around the cosmos waiting for its time. A time I am fairly sure will come. So, until then I've learned a great deal, not least of which is to only post about a pregnancy on social media after the first trimester is passed. I don't ever want to title a post like this again. Thank you so much for all your love, prayers, and concerns. It means so much to both Jacob and I.

8 Weeks

2012-01-13T17:04:00.000-06:00

I know it is far too early to be making an announcement like this but I am terrible at keeping secrets. Plus, at a scant 8 weeks pregnant my little tummy seems to be betraying me. I supposed that's to be expected for a fourth pregnancy. That little bump just pops right out! I did read on some highly reliable site like Baby Center or the like that the uterus doubles in size by the seventh week, so I guess that accounts for it. We hadn't planned on telling the kids, but my preceptive little Georgia notice my belly and said, "It looks like there is a baby in there... (puts her head on my tummy and listens) Wait! There are TWO GIRL BABIES in there!!!" Can you imagine? Smoochy would have a coronary. Anyway, as far as I know it is not twins. One baby is exciting enough. We are thrilled to be expecting our new little Smoochy baby in mid-August. It feels like an eternity from now... plenty of time to get organized, right? Whatever, four kids, I've got this!

Climate Change

2012-01-12T08:57:00.000-06:00

What is going on with this weather? These pictures were all taken January 5th, and though we have all truly enjoyed each and every moment spent outside this "winter" I can't help but pine for snow. This fall I devised a plan to stay outside with the kids as much as possible through the winter. I stocked up on boots, snowsuits, and gloves for all the kids figuring that we would just bundle and go. Freezing temps be damned, we would play outside! Well, Lola's boots are caked with mud, the snow suits hang in a closet unused, and I can't so much as keep a sweater on Georgia.

As an unfortunate consequence of all this "good weather", I am suffering from premature spring fever. Instead if sitting on my couch knitting and drinking tea, I am pacing our yard frantically scheming about where to put hugelkultur beds and a chicken coop. Perhaps if the world was covered in a blanket of snow I could forget all the piles of wood to be dealt with and the garden beds to be created in the new patches of sunlight created by Smoochy's clear-cutting.. Instead, I look out and I want to start digging in the dirt NOW. I have started a little bit. But, I feel thwarted by my inability to wield the massive muscle power of a man. Plus, my dear sweet sweet hubby has to spend his time elsewhere... like at his pesky JOB. What I really want is a man-slave to put to work building fence, lugging wood, digging out garden beds, building wood sheds, putting on our missing balcony, mulching tree debris, and whatever else I deem to be of importance. I might need to slow my roll before I drive myself (and Smoochy) absolutely crazy. Oops, too late.

Yesterday we had a wee bit of snow. It was so soothing. But, it wasn't enough to blanket anything and will be melted in a few days. So, we're still caught in this strange purgatory between fall and winter that feels like it will never end. I have become so dependent on the cycle of seasons in the few short years I have enjoyed them. It's funny, in spring, when the world looks all brown and muddy like it does now, I think it looks fresh and full of possibility. Now, I look out and think how the landscape looks worn out and exhausted. The earth looks tired... like it just wants to be put to bed already. Two years ago it dumped so much snow we were all praying for it to end, now i'm praying winter would hurry up and come already. I suppose it goes to show the grass is always greener. At least he kids are loving it!

We're going on a bear hunt...

2011-12-30T13:03:00.000-06:00

We went out for a walk, as I was shutting the door and exiting the garage I was just in time to see Normy CLIMB UP THIS WALL.

Love Georgia's hands on her hips as she's surveying the situation.

"There, there. OK, little one. Don't cry."

"Mama! Look! Creatures!"

"Hmm... I wonder how much longer they'll keep me out here? I want lunch."

For some reason Lola decided to simply give up and lay-down.

On your mark!

Get set!

GO!!!

Wait! Come Back!

Goldilocks and the Three Bears

2011-12-30T11:00:00.001-06:00

Over breakfast I told the story of Goldilocks and the Thee Bears.

(This is Georgia's current favorite.)

Next, we did a directed drawing of a bear face followed by a retelling of the story while I drew the center picture.

Finally, Georgia set up her doll house and AWAY she went...

I was very impressed by her version of the story!

Full discloser: I totally staged this shot, which was met by many giggles from the kiddos.
"Run Goldy!!!"

Recently Outside: Photo Dump

2011-12-30T10:47:00.002-06:00

We all played all day.

2011-12-30T10:13:00.002-06:00

Obligatory child containment at the top of the stairs.

Table Presents: My mother's strings always looked much neater... ;-)

Welcome to Oceana

2011-12-23T07:43:00.001-06:00

Keep your eyes peeled for mermaids.

If you can't win the argument about Barbie, change the conversation!

The Perfect Kindergarden Christmas Craft

2011-12-16T13:56:00.000-06:00

We made cinnamon applesauce ornaments today. It was surprisingly simple and enjoyable. Perhaps because I was prepared (everything out and organized before beginning) and perhaps because there was so much the kids could actually participate in, there was relatively little frustration for both the kids and myself. I will absolutely admit to being the mom who looses her temper mid-craft when kids start dumping, grabbing, poking holes, and basically not doing what I want them to do. Lame, I know. these types of projects are supposed to be fun, right? Well this one was. We all took turns measuring, mixing, kneading, rolling, cutting, and painting. It was a lovely festive holiday morning. With the added bonus of a house that smells ridiculously wonderful as a result.

Here's what we did:

We mixed the following ingredients:

2 cups cinnamon

1 1/2 cup applesauce

1 tablespoon school glue

1 teaspoon nutmeg

3/4 teaspoon ground clove

Then we rolled it out to about a quarter inch thickness.

Cut out our shapes and placed them on greased cookie sheets. Then we poked holes for the hooks using toothpicks. We made out holes pretty big so we can use ribbon through them.

Then we baked the ornaments for an hour at 200 degrees on the cookie sheet and then another half hour just on the racks. They all came out perfectly dry.

We passed the time waiting for the ornaments to cool completely while listening to the Christmas book Grandma recorded for us.

Then we painted our ornaments!!!

I wish this is how it was at my house every day. I've got to get more organized...

No!

2011-12-15T12:15:00.000-06:00

The other night Lola was sitting at the dinning room table flinging crayons in to space. One after another they shot from her tiny fist and landed on the floor. Her father, a bit sternly, told her to get down and pick them up. A look of sassy determination crossed her face; her boo-boo lip protruded; the gears turned; and she mustered up all of her force to issue forth her first resounding, "NO!" Toddlerhood had officially begun.

They want to nap together...

2011-12-14T14:21:00.000-06:00

Hmm... do you think there will be any sleeping?

I hear giggles wafting through the house.

2011-12-13T08:04:00.002-06:00

It took him all of ten seconds to line these up in numerical order when asked to do so.

Then, it took him the rest of the afternoon to string them.

When he was done, he wanted to try his hand at photography. I took a deep breath, put the strap around his neck, and SMILED!

Sledding and Hot Cocoa... Weekend Staples

2011-12-12T08:20:00.000-06:00

Desperate for a turn.

Chinese Child Trap

2011-12-09T06:03:00.001-06:00

I resurrected this tube from the basement just in time to stave off the mid-morning crazies. It took far more supervision than I had intended to regulate turn taking and minimize extreme rough-housing... but man was the delight palpable in the air!

How dull life would be for Normy if there were no string in the world.

2011-12-07T17:01:00.001-06:00

She Scribbles!

2011-12-06T20:52:00.001-06:00

Dear Marker Company,

Thank you for providing me with a product that delights and entertains my toddler for minutes in a row. She has as much fun replacing the caps as she dose slathering her paper with somewhat washable ink. I'd like to think your markers are indeed non-toxic as she is prone to chewing on all the marker tips if left to her own devices. (Just tell me it's so!) All and all, I am thrilled that she has finally entered this stage so I can prep dinner in relative peace... though marker usage makes it tough to pretend she is still a baby.

Thanks, Ms. Smoochy

The Out Takes

2011-12-05T10:21:00.001-06:00

6 candy canes and a half hour later, this is pretty much all that I got:

Sunday

2011-12-05T10:04:00.001-06:00

Yesterday we trekked through a snow covered field of trees and chose a special* one. We sledded down hills, drank hot coco, took out the Christmas decorations, drank eggnog, untangled the lights, ate candy canes, blasted Andy Williams... and marveled at the fact that it's Christmas time again so soon.

* Special because the "back" 35% of the tree is dead, another 35% is browning and we still thought it was the best of the bunch and worth $40. Bahumbug.

Today

2011-12-03T20:57:00.000-06:00

Today she got these on all by herself, and reminded me that there is no greater feeling of accomplishment than self-reliance.

Today they wanted to watch a movie. I stalled, and said they could after they picked up the playroom. They marched right down there... and forgot all about the movie. For a while anyway.

Today we decided even if eating it takes five years off our life, white rice is just THAT much tastier than brown: It'd be worth it.

Dogged Determination

2011-09-15T08:34:00.000-05:00

As I stood at the kitchen sink plucking a thousand hitchhikers off Lola’s jacket I started reflecting on how far she’s come recently. It all started last week when we returned home from some adventure out on the town and I had the usual pounds of gear to lug back into the house. Rather than make two trips (one for the diaper bag, empty water canteens, and discarded shoes and socks and another trip for Lola) I simply plucked her from her car seat and set her on her sturdy little legs. As though it was the norm, she toddled on after the big kids right into the house. A new era has begun.

It wasn’t until Georgia was born that I started allowing/encouraging/expecting Normy to navigate his own course in and out of the car or up and down stairs. He was my baby, and even though he was a tank and even though I was hugely pregnant I carried him everywhere. He is a complacent type B little guy, and was perfectly content with his life as a sack of potatoes.

Lola is a different little bird. Whips-smart and feisty, snuggly and smiley she certainly exhibits all the duality stereotypical her Gemini status. She’s a climber. I am constantly extracting her from the dining room table, the end tables, and worst of all: the counters. She is fearless at the playground, tackling even the highest of slides and climbing on anything else she can manage. Last Friday, I saved her from certain-disaster. She fell off the suspension bridge. She slipped under the rail backwards after jumping a bit too vigorously. I saw her fall out of the corner of my eye and twisted around to catch her inches from the ground. I was standing right there, Allah be praised.

Yesterday, Lola enjoyed another chance to test her growing independence. She was able to WALK with us for the first time on a little stroll through what we call The Back 10 (ten acres of uninhabited/undeveloped land behind our house owned by another family.) She was doggedly determined to go the whole way on her own two feet. And even though the weeds came up past her head, even though she stumbled every other step, even though the big kids often left her in the dust to toil along with just her mother for company she would not give it up. If I picked her up she would protest with the most violent kicking and whining. Put me down! I’ll do it myself, Mama!

By the time we made it back to the house her hands and knees were muddy, her jacket hidden by a layer of hitchhikers, and she was completely out of breath. But, she was victorious. A pint sized hero of the trail. Go Lola go! Those determined little legs will take you over many mountains in your life if you remain as persistent as you are now.

Drying Out

2011-08-24T16:27:00.001-05:00

Thank you all for your concern over my poor nearly-drowned bees. However, it looks like everything is fine down at the hive. A couple of hot sunny days and the water is back down. It was a close call, and a lesson about our water table learned, but I certainly still have bees in the box!

I was checking on them this afternoon and saw a lot of activity down there. Probably more bees than I have ever seen outside at once. I'm not sure what they were up to. Some of the behavior I saw was a bit strange. There were at least six bees at the entrance fanning out pheromones. I'd never seen that before. Who were they trying to attract in? I didn't see any fighting at the gate, so I don't think they are being robbed. Well, I didn't see any chick-on-chick fighting any way. I did see one drone get beat out of the hive. He had a couple of workers on him kicking his but. But then the weirdest thing, they stopped and just left him alone on the door step. After that he walked in and out a couple of times like no big deal and eventually when in for good. I thought that was a bit strange. There he is on the door step. He's the fat guy with eyes that take up his whole head.

I did see many bees coming in with pollen. That is a very encouraging sign because they bring the pollen in to make bee bread with to feed the larva. Larva means there are new bees on the way, and I think this hive is pretty small and could use the extra work force. That's why I closed the entrance down as small as I could. It gives them a smaller space and I know there are wax moths and small hive beetles about, so I need to give the girls an advantage against those pests. In fact, when I cleaned out the swarm's dead hive, I threw all of their mold comb into my trash. The next time I opened the lid a dozen or so wax moths flew out at my face. Ugh!

Can you spot the bee with full pollen baskets?

Wax moths aren't the only pest that wants in to the hive. It looks like a raccoon or something tried to topple the boxes to get at the sweet stuff inside. Check out the paw prints on the side of the hive. I hope this would-be burglar got driven off with a bunch of stings to the kisser. And stay out!

The exciting news is that tomorrow I will know what's going on inside of the hive as well as the outside. I know I've had this thing here over a week, and still haven't opened it up except to take the cover off and add a super! I won't lie I'm a little nervous too. Not really about the bees, but because I've never manipulated this type of hive before I'm scared to go in there and crush a bunch of bees. The last thing I need is ANOTHER dead queues. But, my mentor is coming by to go in there with me, help with the heavy lifting, and offer guidance. I am SO excited. As are the bees. Can't you tell by the look on their cute little faces?

Just so I'll remember

2011-08-23T21:17:00.000-05:00

The kids were supposed to be asleep. Smoochy and I were camped out on the playroom couch enjoying a night-time bowl of chocolate chip cookie dough. Suddenly I see a little movement out of the corner of my eye.

"Georgia..."

She steps out of the shadows with an impish little smile on the face.

"Hey, wha-wha-wha-wha-what are you guys having? Is that ice cream?"

"Yes Georgia, it is. You are supposed to be in bed."

"He-he-he-hey. Wheeeeeen I get a little taller (raises her hand up towards her head making the yea-high motion) I can sit on the couch and eat ice cream with you guys!"

I can help but smile. I want to laugh. I want to plunk her down on the couch and give her a HUGE bowl with sprinkles on top and sit and chat with her about whatever she wants to babble about. I can tell that Smoochy does too. But, it's after nine and he wisely, gently, and firmly sends her back to bed with promises of ice cream tomorrow. After another hug and kiss of course.

The gods of beekeeping are conspiring against me and Mother Nature is laughing.

2011-08-22T08:12:00.002-05:00

Last night when the house was being rocked by the strength of the second mighty midwestern thunderstorm of the week I was not thinking about my bees. I was thinking about my babies and how long it would take for Smoochy and I to scoop them from our bed and dash down to the basement if the sirens started. And though I dreamed vividly about seeing tornadoes swirl out our windows we all stayed safe in bed until morning. Well, if you consider 4:30 the morning rather than the night.

I didn't give the storm much more though until the sun started coming up. I looked out my window and my heart. stopped. beating.

This picture really fails to capture the essence of just how much water is out there. It is staggering. From my vantage point in the living room I thought the front entrance could be standing in water. So the kids and I threw on boots, I strapped Lola to my back and we ran out side to survey the damage.

Um... I think the bees might be OK. I did see one or two fling around. I'm just lucky the platform didn't slide all the way off the cinderblocks. But it may still be slipping.... This sucks.

Pancakes

2011-08-19T10:53:00.002-05:00

When I was a child there was no food on Earth I loved more than pancakes. Hot stacks of syrup-covered heavenly pancakes! I requested them every year for my birthday dinner until I hit puberty. In fact, there are two things I remember about my fourth birthday: Being so excited I threw up, and that the menu that night featured pancakes. Oh wait... I also vaguely remember the pink lace-ruffled dress I'm pretty sure was my favorite gift just after Strawberry Shortcake.

Anyway, I still have quite the fondness for pancakes. Imagine my good fortune that I have married a man who's specialty (after all things BBQed or smoked) is pancakes. For years he's been making me weekend pancake breakfasts. It all started back when I was pregnant with Normy, and therefor not too hung-over to enjoy weekend breakfast. I'll always remember feeling something like a big pregnant princess sitting down to a pile of his light fluffy pancakes.

Banana Princess Preggo Pancake circa 2006

Now that we have a whole mess of kids the weekend pancake breakfast is becoming quite the tradition. It is the signal that this is a day Dad doesn't have to go to work and that fun can be expected. Well, fun or yard work. We had been having our pancakes on Saturday, but these days he's working Sunday through Thursaday, so now Friday is our pancake day. And let me tell you, they are delicious. He started out with a Bisquick recipe but has adapted a new one based on the fact that we no longer buy Bisquick or even white flour. Instead we grind our own grain. In fact here's his recipe:

1 1/2 cup Buttermilk
1 egg
3 tablespoons melted butter
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
3 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Smoochy mixes all the dry ingredients together then whisks in the buttermilk followed by the melted butter, and the eggs last. He heats butter in his skillet before scooping in the mix. When the pancake is cooked on one side it is flipped to the opposite side. The pancakes come out thin and light with a little crispy edge. When they're done he flips them on to the kids' plates.

The flip is optional, but highly suggested.

I think it's cute that even though his recipe has changed not much else has. Like he is still resistant to being photographed in the kitchen.

Stank-Eye 2006

Stank-Eye 2011

The other constant is how much love I taste in these pancakes.

Keep 'em coming, Smoochy.

outside

2011-08-16T12:54:00.000-05:00

The first hint of Fall is in the air. The wind has picked up a bit, the days seem a bit shorted, and there is an army of yellow school busses back on the streets. I love the fall, and I'm ready. We haven't had our A/C on in over a week. The kids and I have been outside as often as we can... the result is nothing short of miraculous. I don't think I ever feel as present with them as when we are outside mucking around. The rest of the time the to-do lists and schedules seem to get in my way. But out in our backwoods, it all seems to drop away leaving me to focus on the kids, not on what I have to cook for dinner, or what calls I need to return, or doctor's appointments to schedule, or dust bunnies that need to be attacked next, or, or , or...

4th Time's the Charm!

2011-08-15T10:07:00.000-05:00

Good morning! It's a bee-uti-ful day over here at my apiary! Yes folks, I am back in business! I didn't write about it because it just made me too sad to think much about, but my third colony of the season died while I was in NY visiting my Grandma. I knew they were queenless when I left, it's no surprise that the scorching July heat finished the remaining bees off. When I returned home the hive was empty except for moldy comb and at least one small hive beetle larva. Yuck.

However, the universe provides, and this weekend I learned that there was a local 2nd-year beekeeper selling her bees and equipment on the cheap. After a succession of stings she was having stronger and stronger reactions, and thought it was best to quit while she was ahead and before anaphylactic shock... Her bummer is my good fortune, as I now have a fully established colony buzzing away in my back yard. Well, I hope they are buzzing.

The new hive! The queen has been christened Deborah, which as it turns out means honeybee in Hebrew.

Admittedly, the former owner didn't pay a ton of attention to these bees this year. They swarmed in June, she hasn't inspected them in over a month, and she never got around to adding the super (extra honey storage) that they probably needed at least two weeks ago. Whatever, the price was right and it is a new lease on life for my beekeeping adventure. Truth is I didn't do my do-diligence either. I didn't inspect the hive before making the purchase. Does buying used beekeeping equipment fly in the face of prudent beekeeping practices. Um, yea. However, I figured a few things:

Firstly, it was a good deal for all the equipment even without the bees.

Assuming that the hive has a laying queen, I would have bought them regardless of 90% of the possible problems the hive might have. (The only deal breaker would have been AFB- a rare & nasty disease that necessitates burning all the equipment infected.) Anything else I would have taken on and tried to remedy.

And lastly, inspecting stresses the hive, and I rationalized that moving them would be stressful enough. Throw in the fact that to go inspect the hive someone would have watched the kids and Smoochy and I had a busy weekend, and it just wasn't going to happen. Oh well.

Part of me is pretty nervous to manipulate a Langstroth hive. (Which is what this new one is.) I've never even seen it done in person. My only experience is with top bar hives. But, I suppose if I just go slow and steady it will all be fine. What's the worst thing that could happen? Oh yea. I could drop and dump and entire box of bees, brood, and honey. And let me tell you, those boxes are HEAVY!

Let me also tell you that my hubby is awesome beyond description. Not only is he strong enough to move said bees, but he is brave enough to do it in the dark. To relocate bees you wait until sunset when all the foragers are home from a hard day's work. Then you plug up the

entrance, strap the boxes together, and away you go. We made it home long enough after sunset that there was no light left to aid Smoochy in the hive set-up. After getting the kids settled we walked the bees down to their new home with only a flashlight and steady stream of curse words to see the bees on the final leg of their journey. Smoochy held the boxes, I held the flashlight. There was an unspoken understanding that if he slipped and fell, it was every man for himself.

Imagine stepping down this path caring 100+ pounds of bees in the dark!

These bees have a different location on our property than their predecessors. For a variety of reasons, we choose a more open area by the pond. The benefits are obvious: More sunlight (hopefully), easier access, and visibility from the house (which is purely a factor in satisfaction). I can't keep my eyes off the hive this morning. I've set up camp by the living room window to watch the girls leave for work for the day. I hope they don't get lost in their new neighborhood. I've already been down there to check on them twice. At 7:00 a.m. there wasn't much going on. The sleepy-heads were still in bed, except for a few early risers getting their bearings. I expect I'll be popping down there often today just to watch them come and go. Perhaps I'll post picture updates as they settle in and go about their business. I bet you are as excited as I am faithful readers!!!

7 a.m.

8 a.m.

Unexpected Peace

2011-08-12T11:17:00.002-05:00

Usually, preparing the children lunch is one of my more stressful activities. Everyone's blood sugar is low, tempers are high, and patience is thin. I struggle to keep the peace all the while slicing fruit, cutting bread, and pouring the milk. Lola is usually strapped into her chair whaling for food or attention, while the big kids open cabinet doors, peer in the fridge, and whine for some poor food choice that would never be an option. "No, we don't have any popsicles and if we did they would not be for lunch." It is usually worse when we get home from a morning outing. We are tired, hungry, and cranky. It's times like that when I know I won't even be able too get them to wash their hands without threats that McDonald's really doesn't sound that bad... I could just drive through... (Of course I never do.)

Anyway, I was expecting the worst when we got home from a long Wednesday morning. In quick succession we had been to the speech therapist, a craft store, and then the library for story time. The only time we'd slowed down throughout the whole race was to change one very offensive diaper. When we arrived back home I expected a meltdown. What I got instead was nothing short of magic. Lola, was asleep and transferred peacefully to her bed, while the children poured over their library books. Wow. I was able to fix our food in such easy peace. Three cheers for unexpected moments of serenity.

Tuesday Morning Bliss (unscheduled)

2011-08-10T21:09:00.003-05:00

Here it is after a long Wednesday and I am reflecting on the what's building harmonies and what's going against the flow of our weekly rhythm. I've hit the same sticking point this week as I did last: There aren't enough hours in a day for it all! Inevitably, I skip the daily house-hold chore. So, this is the second week in a row the upstairs hasn't been vacuumed... but I guess in the grand scheme of things that's small potatoes compared what we have spent our time doing instead. Yesterday (Tuesday) is our day to play with friends, and since they were coming our house I had planned on doing the vacuuming before their arrival and before Lola went down for her morning nap. I had the Dyson out and ready to rock. But, first we had to walk down to our mail box with a letter before our early-morning postman made his rounds. We walked outside (Normy still in his PJs)...

Lola's first skinned knee

And never made it back to the house! What a beautiful cool morning! Before I knew it I had gone to grab waters (and another cup of coffee), to turn up the radio so we could hear it outside, and to find appropriate footwear for everyone. What an amazing morning!

The thing is, having already established a pretty solid routine when we deviate from the norm it is truly a treat... and doesn't rock the whole boat.

For example, all of our days have a very predictable flow. We have activities in the morning followed by lunch. After lunch we pick up toys, visit the potty and read books. Each child then takes a nap or at least a little rest. While the kids sleep I clean the kitchen from breakfast and lunch and prep dinner as much as I can. Once everybody is awake again we have snack followed by play time, house cleaning, and maybe some coloring or a book on tape. When Daddy comes home we all come together to share some iced tea (no kidding it's iced tea these days) and more play-time and chatting (often while I fold clothes). We are working to add some dinner routines by having the kids help with the set-up and clearing of the table. After supper we segue pretty quickly into baths followed by books and then all three of them have lights out. Every day. Everyday for at least two years this is what we do. It is incredibly comforting in it's regularity.

If only I could just find a way to squeeze in a little more cleaning, gardening, yoga, phone calls with great friends, community service, sewing, running, blogging, knitting, girl's nights out, emailing, doll-making, and reading my life would be perfect! (I know: I'll have plenty of time for all those things later... Enjoying the babes while they're small is where it's at. It's cool. No worries, I'm content. I swear!)

The New Daily

2011-08-09T10:22:00.010-05:00

I want to cultivate a sense of rhythm in our family. I have been reading about the concept in this book, this book and this book. I have been seeing how powerful a force for good it can be on this blog, this blog, and this blog (among countless others.) The basic premise is that by simplifying and streamlining life you create predictable patterns that children (and adults) can anchor themselves to. This provide some grounding and foundation for a joyful creative life to spring from. In practice it's simple. On Mondays we bake our bread, on Tuesday we visit friends, on Wednesday we see the speech therapist, and on Saturday Daddy makes pancakes! It also aligns the chores I do and the meals I serve each day. Mondays are "New Menu Monday", followed by "Taco Tuesdays", and "What's-On-Hand Pasta Wednesdays".

I am really looking forward to a predictably clean and organized life. Monday the kids and I strip the beds and wash our lines. On Tuesdays I vacuum. On Wednesday I'll clean the bathrooms. It'll be a great system if I can stick with it because it takes a lot of the stress and guess work out of the week, while still giving us room to be flexible and infuse our days with variety. If I only have one big cleaning task a day, I can do it in the morning or afternoon depending on what other things crop up. It also guarantees my house will always maintain a base standard of cleanliness. Without this consistency everything tends to be a jumbled mess, and a mad-dash from one place to the next. Having an idea about what we will do, where we will go, and what we will eat helps us relax about the particulars live more in the moment.

I had tried a variation of this back when Georgia was a baby. I put a grease board in my kitchen with all my weekly tasks listed with their corresponding day. A month into the routine, it was ingrained in my brain and the grease board became a place to run a grocery list and weekly menu. Somehow, though I fell out of the practice and it feels like I'v been living in a cyclone ever since. It's time to take back our rhythmic life. Smoochy has been urging me to get organized for years. I finally mapped it all out two weekends ago on a long car drive and have been trying to implement ever since. Last week I allowed myself to get frantic when I got off schedule. Then I decided that defeated the whole purpose of trying to find calm and balance. So, I've been more forgiving of myself and remembered that it's a process, and will take some time to work the bugs out.

Yesterday was Monday... which I have booked as a serious work day around the house. Between doing all the baking for the week (bread and granola) and washing and replacing all the bed linens I was busy. Let's just say my dogs were barking by the end of it all. But, getting all that accomplished felt pretty good and has enabled me to relax and enjoy today... our play-date day. Plus, the kids were amazingly involved with all the cooking and linen laundering. I tried not to dictate their participation, so they came and went as their interest waxed and wained. However, more often than not they enjoyed the chance to work along with me. The rest of the time Normy and Georgia played like maniacs, largely leaving me free to do what I needed to do. Hello, unstructured creative play! 5 and 3 are awesome ages!

"New Menu" Monday featured a delicious chilled carrot ginger soup with garlic and lime. Well, I liked it. No one else did. However, since I I had a hunch it wouldn't go over well I made desert... which I NEVER do. We had a gingerbread cake topped with fresh strawberries. They forgave me for the soup and didn't even realize that desert was 100% whole wheat and had very little sugar in it. He he he he!

Well, Lola liked her dinner anyway.

Liked it a lot!

Normy preferred cake

So did Georgia, but who can blame them?

I feel like we're off and running with something great. I'm going to try to spend the week blogging about the development of our little rhythms and routines. Mostly as a way for me to have a reference to see what worked and what didn't. I'm excited.

Just Another Saturday

2011-08-06T17:47:00.000-05:00

I tell you what, a Nebraska Summer is a fabulously beautiful season filled with spectacular moments spent outside. Except in July. July is just too freaking hot. During June we only turned on the AC during the day (if at all), and opened the house up at night to enjoy the lovely 60 degree temps. But, July was a whole different story. We hardly ever went outside in July. Even the dark didn't offer a reprieve from the oppressive muggy heat. In my garden, what remained uneaten by the deer was scorched by the sun. A massive jungle of weeds grew up around our house. Nothing in the world could have enticed me outside to beat them back.

However, we suddenly find ourselves in August, and though it is still full-on summer, somehow there has been a slight, barely-preseptible shift in both attitudes and temperatures. We slept with the windows open last night listening to the racket of a millions bugs and frogs. Today Smoochy and I started fighting back against the over-growth to reclaim out property. He spent most of the afternoon with the weed-wacker. Meanwhile, I did some hand-pulling on the patio where a small forest had grown up in the cracks of the slate.

The results of our efforts allowed up to take advantage of the pleasantly hot late-afternoon with a family dip in the kiddy pool. The kids splashed and sprayed, while we sipped iced tea and some fancy "mocktail" I found the recipe for in a magazine. I was pretty excited about it, as it combined pureed watermelon, papaya, jalapeño, and lime juice. It was spicy-hot and delicious in my estimation. But, when Smoochy took his first slug of it he spit it back into the glass with shock (and distaste) despite my warning that it had bite. Not his thing. :-) Oh well.

Now we all find ourselves inside, dry, and a little tuckered out. Lola is taking 5:30 PM nap, which will surely come back to haunt me at 8:00 when I am wishing she'd go to bed. But, the ability to type with two hands is just so rare and enjoyable. Smoochy is surfing the web and the big kids are watching their Saturday allotment of television. Their pick: He-Man of course. ;-) Life is good. Now to go cook dinner. Any suggestions of light summer fare? At the rate I'm going it will probably be spicy watermelon/papaya juice and scrambled eggs. I'm loving this lazy summer's-here-to-stay night.

Totally worth the whole load of wet towels and bathing suits.

Remembering they all go through it.

2011-08-05T11:02:00.000-05:00

Have a great weekend!

Daily Messes

2011-08-04T13:59:00.000-05:00

Theoretically speaking, I understand that if they are ever to learn how to feed themselves they have to be turned loose with a bowl of food and a spoon.

I also understand that if you allow children to entertain themselves buy making a mess while you clean some other mess you are walking across the street to get your ass kicked.

I get it.

Sweet Pickles

2011-07-25T14:23:00.001-05:00

Every time I can something... Ahem... Both times I've canned something I've felt like the first woman ever to try to manage the whole hot water bath thing (and all that entails) all the while keeping the children out of the kitchen and entertained. I love the whole process: the cooking, jar washing, filling, measuring, submerging... followed by the satisfying POP of a sealed jar. That's all awesome. But when babies start crying, toddlers whining, and kindergardeners making bubbles in the bathroom sink, things can feel a bit hairy. Mama starts to sweat. (Why do these damn veggies need to be canned in JULY!?). Steam clouds my vision. And things blow up. Things like a slightly over filled jar of pickles. Things like my temper. Yikes.

Everything starts off well. Jars and lids are sanitized. The brine is made, everything is ready to go. I'm literally cool as a cucumber.

The children are all engaged and busy. I'm SURE I have time to do this before calamity strikes!

Oh crap. No Lola! Don't cry... Where is that binky???

Shoo. That was close. OK. Step one, fill the jars. Step two pour in the brine...Mmmm. This looks good. I love pickles. Hope these are good...

Wait a second... why is it so quiet? Well, at least they're playing nicely.

Ooo. I just love the smell of dill... wait a second what's that noise? Kids???

The kids are in the bathroom where they have turned the sink into a water table and are gleefully dumping cups full of bubbles all over the bathroom floor.

There may have been bubbles overflowing the sink and spilling on to the floor before I put a stop to the fun. But, Smoochy doesn't need to know that because it wouldn't be good for his stress levels.

Meanwhile, an ominus popping noise can be heard from the kitchen.

I dash upstairs.

One jar down...

But, don't the survivors look pretty?

Seriously, how did my grandmothers and their mothers, and grandmothers do this? You know those ladies spent the summer putting up massive amounts of food with like six kids hanging from their apron strings. I've seen my grandmother's cold cellar where shelves full of nearly prehistoric peaches and tomatoes floated in jars covered with dust and cobwebs like some forgotten science experiment. Those shelves were packed to bursting in their glory. And me. I get all proud and take pictures of my three jars of pickles, as though it is some culinary feat preiviously unknown to womanhood. Sheesh. My great-grandmothers are laughing at me in heaven.

Handmade Love

2011-07-23T15:46:00.001-05:00

I love presents. I know it is horribly materialistic, but I can't help myself. Really, who doesn't love presents? Perhaps it's an American thing with our focus on all-out spend-crazy Christmases and mountains of gifts for children on their birth days. Perhaps it's just bred into me as my parents certainly lavished us kids on those two events, but I really love presents.

But, it's not just presents for the sake of presents that I love now that I am an adult, but the thought behind the gift. And nothing says thought and preparation like a handmade gift. Not to be a snobbish (though of course it is), but I'd much prefer a small imperfect handmade present than something bought at the mall and made in China. I shudder a bit when I think about the trade deficit between our two great nations. And dig this: Apple products have become a major static symbol in China with the iPhone retailing there for about a quarter of the average Chinese household's annual income.... and they MAKE them there. Doesn't that just scream wrong?

Anyway. One of Georgia's favorite playmates was turning four this week (I remember when she was an itty-bitty baby...) and I really wanted to make her a set of dolls. One to represent her, and one to represent Georgia. The dolls in my imagination would have had velcro on their hands so they could really stick together! Well, life got in the way and it took WAY longer to make these dolls than I had hoped. Plus, I wanted to honor to the oath I made Smoochy of NO NEW CRAFT SUPPLIES in 2001! (Otherwise I would have bought different yarn for the blonde birthday girl.) Yikes! I found myself the night before the party with only one doll completed and no doll clothes I was feeling pretty low. All I managed to slap together to cloth my little creation looked something like a sack made out of Georgia's old favorite tee-shirts. I seriously considered not giving the doll to the little girl because the stitching was just that bad.

In the end, I gifted the one completed doll, knowing the birthday girl's mom feels similar to me about stuff. Though, more than once I considered going to Target and buying something made in China. The birthday girl seemed happy about the doll. And my friend, her mom, complimented it appreciatively as a good friend would. All and all it was just fine. I especially loved the pride with which Georgia announced, "My mom MADE this for you, [birthday girl]!" That was cool.

All was well until just after returning home from the party the door bell rang. It was the postman... delivering a box of handmade birthday gifts. One was for Normy and one for Lola who's Gemini birthdays have just passed. Suddenly my little doll felt... Well, let's just say she was blown out of the water.

Way to go Aunt Cathy. I bow before your righteous skills as a seamstress. You seriously rock.

Her Bad Day...

2011-07-21T08:05:00.000-05:00

I was upstairs when I heard the loudest thump on our window yet. Though I jumped out of my skin, I knew exactly what it was a moment later. We rushed down to check for carnage and found this very stunned, but apparently OK little gal. We have quite the fondness for cardinals over here, so we enjoyed our up-close peek at her. She on the other hand, did not look amused. Luckily for her, she was able to fly off after a short rest. Others have not been so lucky.

Note the condensation formed by her breath on the glass, poor panting thing.

I wish the deer would bonk off the windows and decide to quit this place and leave my garden in peace. Well, maybe. I might miss them if they were really gone. When they get this close it almost feels like the loss of ALL my tomato plants is a small price to pay to see such coolness.

Bees in the Flowers

2011-07-20T07:29:00.000-05:00

Since I've given up hope of having a thriving hive of my own this year (more on that later), it seems I have mentally adopted every bee I see out in the world. If I don't already have my camera in hand, I rush to find it in order to capture photographic evidence of my encounter with one of God's bees. In New York (state) I saw bees everywhere I turned, much to my delight. But none were more gratifying to see than the honey bees in my Grandma's hollyhock bush. It was from this very bush she would pick my sister, cousin, and I flowers and transform them into dolls with bell-shaped skirts before our very eyes. What a joy to see the free-bees playing and working among them.

No bee here, I just like the picture.

Lola, however was not as in to photographing bees.

Hello Blog

2011-07-19T15:34:00.000-05:00

This space has not been abandoned... It has been a transitional month filled with travel and new beginnings. I have so much to write about and so little time. Since returning home from what I've been thinking of as our "Remember where you come from, back to your roots summer tour" we have been carving out new rhythms and systems around here. Nothing like some time away from home, the grind, and even your most loved ones to get a little perspective and revamp priorities. So, I'm marinating on that. Anyway, I'll be back here soon. Hopefully this week. Till then, here is my favorite picture from my week away. My grandma's farm and garden at sunset. A cool July evening. The moment I took this picture I felt completely at peace with everything in the world... and I've been caring that feeling with me ever since. Cool, huh?

I'll write more soon, and send picture DVDs to folks soon! Promise!

We're supposed to be on the road...

2011-07-02T10:27:00.001-05:00

Today was supposed to mark the first leg of a journey that would eventually bring me to visit my Grandma. Along the way there is/was to be a stop in Kansas at my children's grandmother's house and a picnic in the prairie. But for now we are delayed. A low-grade fever has made my Georgia lethargic and sad. So we'll wait...

Sad Tidings

2011-06-29T15:06:00.002-05:00

I just made a very depressing visit to the bees. I was so happy to be headed out to see them. Three kids were napping and the weather is fine after so much rain. I had visited them a week ago and had some suspicion that the new swarm was queenless... now I am pretty much sure.

They did have pollen and nectars stores... and they had been doing a little comb building. But I didn't see any eggs, larva, or capped brood (bees about to emerge from metamorphosis). What I did see were big capped domed cells scattered all over the comb.That could mean either they have viable queens cells that could hatch a virgin queen. Or, in response to long-time queenlessness a worker or several workers have started laying. But, because workers don't have fertilized eggs all they can produce is drones. I suspect it is the later senerio, because if there had ever been a laying queen there would at least be some capped brood getting ready to join the work force. I snapped a couple of pictures in hopes of really taking a closer look back on my computer screen but I didn't get good shots through my veil. I'm feeling sad and don't want to be a Negative- Nancy, so I'm going to log off now and do the laundry. It's just such a bummer. This is my last remaining colony. I joined the other sad hive with this one last week in hopes that the infusion of comb and bees could help the swarm colony out. But, it appears not. (Hence the blue tarp behind the smoker.) Oh well. There's always next season, right?

It's hard to make out 'cause of the blur, but if you look you can see the bumps in the comb I was referring to above. drone comb or queen cell?

Just a Few Things....

2011-06-28T12:21:00.002-05:00

It's summer time and I am finding every manner of bug imaginable inside the house. Roaches, ants, flies, night crawlers (I hate them the most), millipedes, spiders, and on and on. If it creeps and crawls it's within these four walls. I am oddly sanguine about it. Surely they will all just march themselves back outside without infesting our home, right? Perhaps beekeeping has calmed my jitters when it comes to bugs.

Georgie checking out a fly in one of Normy's very cool birthday gifts.

It's summer time and my baby boy turned five. FIVE. This is astounding. He is talking more and more each day. Not just words but phrases and sentences. He grins and his face splits in half, proof that somethings will never change with each year that passes. He received birthday cards in the mail from my aunt and grandmother during his birthday week. For days on end he carried those to cards clutched to his chest dancing around the house chanting: "My birthday! My birthday!" He is sweet and stubborn. He hugs me and tells me, "Missed you, Mama" Which in Normy-speak means "I love you." He beats up his sisters in joyful play. Gleefully body-checks every child within a three-foot radius. He loves puzzles and building things. He is obsessed with marble runs and anything with wheels. And now thanks to his crazy parents, he LOVES He-Man. Sure it's a violent cartoon, but at least there is a moral at the end of each episode. ;-)

The first of many shamelessly purchased birthday cakes!
What's shown here is NOT his Official Birthday Crown but one of the dozen "party hats" made for all the kids.

It's summer time and I am once again reminded to try to Play More & Clean Less. This has been my motto for three years running. And now that Normy's preschool days are behind us, each and every day is our own to claim however we see fit. The freedom is intoxicating. We still have some semblance of rhythm most days, but between flood waters keeping Smoochy working odd hours, sunset at nine o' clock, and play-dates that extend well past "nap-time," we seem to be carving out a new rhythm. Life is good.

A new rhythm that includes plenty of time with my new camera! My hubby is terrible at scheduled gift-giving. Birthday, Valentine's, Mother's Day, anniversary, nada. But, the man ROCKS at crazy spontaneous gifts. Like, the SLR I have been coveting for YEARS that materialized in his hand Sunday afternoon. I'm so excited about it I can hardly stand myself. I had pretty much decided I was done birthing little Smoochys, but I may have to change my mind just so I can have one more newborn to photograph with this camera. I tell ya', the thing is smarter than me. It definitely takes better pictures on auto than I can by manipulating all the controls. I had spent enough time with my old camera to get the best results fully manual. I have a lot to learn with the new one and have been digesting the manual the last few days. I can't wait to really feel comfortable with it. But, in the mean time check out some of my favorite shots:

OK, this is a lame post, but today is a catch-up day around the house, and I thought I should get caught up here too. Washing, cleaning, dusting, vacuuming, cooking... Catching the f up so we can go out and play for the rest of the week! Love to all!

Many Hands Make Light Work

2011-06-19T05:38:00.000-05:00

My folks were reminded of this picture after reading yesterday's post. The moral: as kids grow-up they get over thinking it's cool to help with laundry.

Slave Labor or Little Helpers

2011-06-18T16:46:00.001-05:00

I’ve been thinking more and more how to get the kids involved with work around the house. I don’t believe there is any such thing as a free lunch and I know people have better self-esteem when they pay their own way. Little kids especially WANT to help, and I want to capitalize on that by not only showing them that they can but it feels good when they do. I want my kids to know that work isn’t something awful to be avoided at all cost but something that is fulfilling in a way that nothing else is. As Normy and Georgia are getting older I have started glimpsing their capability and readiness to handle some real and meaningful responsibility. But, how should I ease their way into the world of work?

Part of me chafes at the idea of a chore chart (which I think is the standard at this age.) Firstly, it’s just another thing for mom to organize and keep track of (and complain about!). More than that though, I think it sends kids the wrong message. Like, if you check these boxes you’ve “done your part” and nothing further is required of you. Instead I want my kids to always be on the look out for a way they can pitch-in. I think it’s too easy for them to slip into the mindset of “I don’t HAVE to help Mom sort the laundry… That’s not my job. It says so right here on the chart.” (Of course this is the hypothesis of a woman with three children none of which is capable of wiping their own ass. So, there’s that.)

But, I’m already starting to see Georgia take up that line of thinking. When we pick-up toys before naps I’ll say, “Normy, you put all the blocks back on the shelf and Georgia, you are in charge of cleaning up the (play) kitchen.” To which Georgia inevitably responds:

“That’s my part, then I’m DONE!”

Um… No.

I’m not into bribes and carrots when it comes to housework either. (In the grocery store it’s a WHOLE different story. Popsicles for compliance is a regular bargain.) I don’t think Normy should earn a quarter for setting the table or Georgia should get to watch a movie in exchange for putting away her freshly laundered PJs. WE as a family, have to work together to make the home run. True, the kids didn’t have a choice as to weather they were made part of the family so, if they want to join the circus or a traveling band of gypsies that can be arranged. But, if they do want to hang out here than we are in it together. We work as a group for our continued survival; the way Mother Nature intended the human race to thrive.

But like I mentioned earlier, I’m in the sweet spot of mother-dictated-chores. Now when I tell Normy he can put away the clean silverware and pass me the clean dishes from the dishwasher he sees it as a cool new test of his dexterity and matching ability. It’s not a task, but a game. A game he can do and Georgia can’t. A game he can do WITH MOM! I know it won’t always be this easy. But, my hope is that if I can let go of my neurosis about things being done efficiently and “correctly” maybe I can get out of the way and let them develop the confidence to know they CAN make their own bed, hang up their own clothes, and clear the table.

I’d love some feedback. How do you do “chores” in your house? (I hate that word and NEVER want to use it.) What do you wish you had done with your kids when they were small. What works?

We start 'em young around here.

My Day is Made

2011-06-17T14:49:00.001-05:00

While washing dishes I saw a bee land on some flowers right out the window. I dried my hands on my skirt and rushed out camera in hand hoping to get her picture. I did not. She flew away (probably camera shy.) But while I was out I thought I'd better check out the garden. Lots of weeds, my tomatoes and peppers are going great, and sadly one of my two remaining watermelon plants has mysteriously vanished as though it never existed. I didn't see any bees, but I did see this amazing bug in the snap peas. Who is this guy? He's beautiful. I hope he's not looking to eat my garden...

I went back to washing my dishes a little sad I hadn't seen any more bees when who should appear out my window again?

Life is sweet.

Happy Weekend!

A Bit About Growing

2011-06-14T16:05:00.001-05:00

When I step back and really look at what's grown-up all around me since the start of spring I feel a little silly getting as excited as I do to see the few plants I started finally begin to flower. Mother Nature, in all her power, has brought forth all manner of plants that have gone from seed, to shoot, to foliage, to flower, to seed, and now receded to let a whole NEW crop of different plants take their place. The purple creeping charlie flowers that used to carpet our min-forest's floor have made way for a sea of wild strawberries. The wild fringy weed with the little cluster of purple flowers have almost all wilted away. These only to be replaced by tall stalky monsters with big waxy leaves that will very soon begin sporting drooping clusters of juicy mauve berries. (I really need to learn the names of all these plants.) In contrast, all the plants I started from seed in my basement back when the earth was still bare have only begun to loose the look of a seedling. But, I am elated that they are growing none the less.

My ornamental cabbage. 2 inches tall. Started April 5th.

God's ornamental cabbage comes up past my waist and appeared out of nowhere. Very humbling.

I have always wanted to garden. When I was in middle school or high school (I can't remember which) I used to keep a little journal of different flowers with their latin names, growing conditions complete with images snipped from gardening magazines. I never actually PLANTED anything. That would have actually made sence. Instead I just daydreamed about rows of bachelor buttons (centaurea cyanus) and snapdragons (antirrhinum majus). I acquired this love of the idea of gardening from my grandparents. They had a spectacular garden. Rows of corn, lettuce, peppers, tomatoes... The veggies and the gladiolas were my grandfathers specialty. And my Grandma, my Grandma loves flowers. Some of my most treasured memories of her are the times we spent in her flower garden picking flowers and taking them back to her kitchen to make arrangements. No matter what season it is my grandma has fresh flowers in her house. I think I need to start doing that. OK, I take it back. I did plant something once. One winter when my grandparents were visiting us in Florida they bought me purple and yellow posies that we planted out front of our house. But, that's about it. There has been the odd mint plant and a couple cacti, but this is the first year I have ever planted seeds other than the beans in a dixi cup in elementary school.

I don't know why it has taken me so long to get my hands dirty in the garden. It seems like a shame actually that I've waited all this time. But, there is only looking ahead. So, I'm going to enjoy each moment I can steal to go outside drink in the sunshine, get my blood sucked by the mosquitoes, and make something grow. I have plans to expand my little terrace garden next year as well as reclaim the weedy plot of ground right out by the front of our garage and turn it into an herb garden.

Currently the only landscaping I've done here is this pot of basil. (Does that count?) Next year it will be a dreamy herb garden. I choose the adjective "dreamy" on purpose.

The kids and I made a trip to the Lauritzen Botanical Gardens this morning and I was totally inspired by the geometrical multi-colored herb designs they had going over there. Sadly our trip ended quickly as the mosquitoes there were almost as bad as in our woods. I couldn't get many good pictures of the kids as I was too busy defending myself and Lola from those blood-thirty winged beasts. (The Missouri River is flooded, there is water every where. I guess I shouldn't be surprised by the mosquitoes...)

To discorage the big kids running off without me, picking flowers, and generally being terrors I encouraged them to hold on to the ribbons.

It didn't work.

There is so much to be inspired by and so many possibilities to day dream about. For now I just have to focus on my little plot and my small successes. Like the lovely yellow flowers on my cucumber plants! It may be that it will get to hot for my snap peas and kale before I get to harvest anything. The deer may come and trample my ornamental cabbages and eat the tops off my carrots. But for right now, right this second I have a garden.

I wonder if the bees have visited here?

Hello Peas!

Bumper crop of wild strawberries this year: the birds are happy.

The Perils of Life in a Forest Paradise.

2011-06-06T15:54:00.005-05:00

I love my house. I love my life. I am lucky beyond measure, and I know it... But, there is a cost to life in paradise. I just got back from what I call a walk-about. I go out, walk around, look at what needs to be watered and weeded. Take a peek at traffic over at the hives. You know, that sort of thing. It's usually deeply soothing and satisfying. But today, I couldn't be out more that five minutes. It wasn't the heat. Though it is a blazing hot day here in Nebraska. It wasn't the poison ivy, though that little beastie of a plant is a scourge. Whenever I see a my creeping three leafed nemesis I can't help but mutter, "Ivy. You bitch."

One of these is and one of these isn't. Can you tell which plant is the poison ivy? I play this game every day.

No, what literally sent me running for shelter was the mosquitoes.

Please believe me when I tell you that for me to be driven inside by mosquitoes that means they are thick. And big. And mean. I grew up in Naples, FL where I was woken regularly as a child by the roar of low-flying mosquito-spraying planes. Smoochy and I've lived in southern Georgia with a retention pond in our back yard. I GET mosquitoes. But this is off the charts. These bastards are bigger than the baby robins we have living in our trellis.

While I was out just now, I was hoping to catch a picture of the honey bees collecting water from our pond to use to cool their hive, but instead all I saw was millions of new mosquitoes climbing from the water like a black cloud of blood-sucking evil. OK, not really but you know that's where they are coming from. And though I didn't see any honey bees I did snap these pictures of the lovely water lilies the frogs are riding around on these days.

Speaking of honey bees collecting water: Saturday I took the kids to the Arbor Day Farm for a picnic lunch and adventure. (You should visit there, it is AWESOME.) We stopped there on the way home form picking Normy up from a very special visit he made solo to spend time with his Grandma (Smoochy's Mom.) Anyway, the kids had a blast especially playing at the outdoor play area they have. The farm is also home to an observation bee hive. Plus, the surrounding area with all the orchards, supports many many colonies of honey bees. This was apparent at the faux-stream the kids were playing in. There must have been at least twenty or thirty bees collecting water there. My kids were so cool about it. After all the times they have heard, "If you leave a bee alone she'll leave you alone!" They just went about their play as though the were butterflies not honey bees dancing around them! See the bees play so nicely with my kids was one of the highlights of an all around great day.

So, back to the mosquitos. They are really ruining our plans for non-stop outside fun this summer. You know what I want to do about it? Get some ducks. I wonder how many ducks our little pond could support? I wonder if it would really help? I wonder if my parents in Florida could catch us a couple of Muskovys and ship 'em over? They live wild all over the neighborhood I grew up in. Talk about an ugly duck. But, they are renowned mosquito munchers and I read on Wikipedia just moments ago that they are nice on the dinner table. I can't really see myself over-wintering a migratory animal. That seems crewel. Much better just to eat it. Hey, come on! I know plenty of people who say they'd rather be put out of their misery than go through another winter in Nebraska!

Image shamelessly stolen from here.

I don't know. It's going to take a lot of convincing to get Smoochy on board with ducks. I think they would be an awesome addition to out fledgling homestead, but he has some doubts. Like how we would protect them from raccoons if their wings are clipped? Or how are we going to keep 'em here if we don't clip their wings? There is some research to be done for sure. But, I'm ready to try anything to get the skeeter population under control.

Like a Bat House! Did you know a single bat can eat up to 1000 skeeters in an hour! That is awesome. Where are all my bats? We had TONS of bats at our other Omaha house. I can't believe with all the other animals like deer, muskrats, birds, squirrels, and whatever else is living in our back woods that there aren't some bats out there too. What the heck? Why are there so many fricking mosquitoes out there!!!

Photo taken moments before I captured this little guy with a colander and set home free outside. The next bat we found in the house didn't do so well. Smoochy smacked him mid-flight like he was hitting a home run with a shop vac extension. Good times.

Well, that's enough rambling for now. The kids are waking up from their naps and I have to figure out how to keep them entertained INSIDE. Please excuse my typos, I don't have time to edit.

Enjoy the following pics of the kids playing at Arbor Day Farms. (For the Grandparents)

Photos taken with my phone. Pardon the quality. Though I am perfectly capable on taking three kids on an Arbor Day Adventure I am not capable of lugging my camera around at the same time. Oh well.

Napping Children + Good Weather = A Tip to Visit the Bees!

2011-05-31T15:07:00.001-05:00

I couldn't resist. After lunch all three of my babes passed out... hard. I just know these are going to be killer naps. (They are still sleeping as I type.) Everyone was up early, everyone played hard, and everyone ate good lunches. I almost succumbed to a siesta myself. But, with three dead-to-the-world sleepers and the first sunny day without 30mph gusting winds I thought I'd better take my chance and get out to see the bees.

As soon as I had made up my mind I got extremely nervous. I'm not sure what induces the thrill, but each time I know I'm going to have a bee-encounter my blood pressure picks up and I have to go to the bathroom a few times before I can get on my suit. (TMI for sure, but that's life. And I think it will be funny to remember years from now that I could check on the bees without several trips to the potty first.) Anyway, once my guts settled down I went to work lighting the smoker. As the flames began to lick around the canister, I got my gear around while going through a check list of all the things I might need and all the things I was going to look for once I got into the hives. I love the process of gearing-up to go out to see the bees. It is a process both mental and physical, and I found the whole thing soothing.

In to my basket went my camera, bee brush, hive tool, bars fitted with hair clips... check, check, check! Finally I zipped myself into the suit, puffed on the smoker a couple of times to check for cool white smoke (you don't want flames shooting out of the end to singe your bees!) and off I went down the hill to visit with my favorite six-legged honey-making amigas.

My purpose for visiting the hives was different for each colony. I wanted to check in on the old bees and see if a new queen had hatched from the queen cell they made and if I could find any evidence of her laying. According to some more experienced beekeepers on a forum I read, even if they could raise a new queen their chances of survival are grim because their numbers are so low that even if a queen started laying brood, the house bees aren't numerous enough to cover the babies and keep them at the right toasty temperature. What I need to do is combine the two colonies, but it was nice today to be able to open up that box and not be overwhelmed by the sheer volume the sound of thousands of bees hard at work. (I'm sure someday that sound will be like music to my ears, but right now it is a little intimidating, I won't lie.)

The swarm colonie however: Wow! What a sound. They are some feisty girls too! Despite a generous (but not too generous) application of smoke the roar that came out of that hive was crazy!!! I had a couple fly out of the hive and ping me in the face too. Thank you kick-ass bee suit, no stingers in my flesh today! I really didn't want to mess with these ladies. It wasn't their demeanor, but more so because I want to leave them alone to do what bees do, make honey and more bees! However, after the last cross-comb nightmare, I wanted to reassure myself that they were building in the right direction. Thank god they were. It looks like they are working to attach the comb I gave them on clips to the bar. There was a TINY little bit of new comb, and it was attached nicely to a bar. Yea! Go bees! I didn't look for the queen, or check for food stores or eggs. I'll go back in a week to check on their progress. For now I'm just content knowing that they are building in the right direction.

How did those leaves blow in there is what I want to know? The all the openings to the hive are a quarter inch or less!

It was after my visit to the swarm colony that I opened up the sad little package colony. Every time I look in there there are less and less bees. It is so sad. Today, it was clear that I won't have bees in there much longer. The only queen cell they had looked like the bottom had been chewed out of it. I would have been excited about that except their seemed to be a dead (unmoving) bee inside of it head first. I don't know much about anything, but that doesn't seem promising to me. In a week... or less if I can manage it I am going to take the comb from the sad hive and place it and any bees still on it in the other hive. (There will be a mechanism to introduce the new bees slowly, but I'm not going to get into the technical bit of that just now.) If nothing else, it will save the swarm bees a ton of work to have those combs.

All the house bees left in this hive are between these two combs. It's a sad sad sight. I also saw a bunch of drones.

So, that's it. I'm feeling pretty good about the whole thing. It was actually a small victory just getting the smoker going without assistance. Smoochy is the resident pyro, so he's fired up the smoker on all other occasions. Of course, I did manage to burn the crap out of the tip of my pinky finger while trying to pry the thing open after I was done using it today. If the smoker cools with the lid on the resin makes it stick. I was yanking and yanking on it after my trip out and the thing just didn't want to open. (Maybe because I was trying to open it from the wrong end? Duh!) Than POW! My finger slipped right between the wires of the protective cage. Ouch! I almost think I'd have preferred a bee sting. It would have been less embarrassing.

Her name was Lola...

2011-05-29T20:54:00.001-05:00

My poor sweet baby. For her first birthday she got a fever. Not sure if she's sick or teething, or just transitioning from baby to toddler, but for the last two days she has been miserable.

Regardless of her case of the icks, we plowed ahead with the cake and presents anyway. You only turn one once after all. Years from now she won't remember any of it. But, she'll have these pictures to document that we honored her on her special day.

Our family could never be complete without our L-O-L-A. She's our comedian and our favorite lip magnet. Everyone wants to be the first to tell her good morning. When the big kids come into our room in the morning the first thing they usually ask (after announcing they want "lunch") is, "Is Lola awake?"

Dearest Lolly, happy happy birthday, my little fat pancake. This year has gone by faster than I could have ever believed. You were the absolute bright spot each of the 365 days since you came into our lives. We all love you so much.

Reminder

2011-05-26T11:53:00.003-05:00

This post will hopefully serve as a reminder of two things. #1: Never go out to my bee yard without my camera. And #2: Never go out without a hat. I have long hair, and bees can get amazingly tangles in it. It would also help to remember that flipping the hair around does not free said trapped be, but merely ensnares it more. I'm lucky I didn't get a stinger to the scalp. Although, I can tell I'm getting much more comfortable with the bees because never once did the bee in my hair cause me any heightened blood pressure. I simply went about my business with it's buzzing in my ear, and eventually it figured out a means of escape, and flew off. Sweet.

So I've already been out to check on the hives twice today. The first time was just after sunrise, say 7-ish and everyone was still sleeping. Now it's 11:30 and thing are a buzzing at the entrances. Well, one entrance anyway. The new swarm is coming and going like crazy. I didn't see any pollen on their legs, but I was only out there about five minutes. (The kids were in the house reading books.) The older hive looked deserted. I go it a bad feeling in my tummy as I stood there and only saw one bee return to the hive in the same amount of time I saw about 30 bees come and go at the other. Oh crap.

Today is the first good weather day in a a few so I had planned on suiting up, lighting the smoker, and doing a thorough inspection of the older hive when I got all the kids asleep. But, Lola has been taking a killer morning nap, and I didn't think I'd get another chance to go out there. I figured I might as well just take a little peek inside and see what I could see. That's when I got the bee in the hair.

Sadly, there wasn't much to look at. Most of the comb in there that had last been filled with bees and nectar looked empty and abandoned. All the bees that were in there we between two combs guarding a queen cell. Oh frick. Regina Apis is dead. I didn't get to see if they had anything to eat or if there was any capped brood (which would indicate reinforcements will soon be born to bolster their flagging numbers.) There were not very many bees in there at all... a couple hundred at the most. I hope there is an army out foraging, because the home fires are dwindling.

As far as I can tell, I have two options at this point. Let nature run it's course and see if they can hatch a new queen. She would have to successfully take her mating flight and make it back to the hive before she could even begin to lay. If Regina Apis died on Mother's Day May 8th and they made the Queen cell on May 9th there wouldn't be a chance of new eggs till May 30th or June 1st. It takes a little more than two weeks for a virgin queen to emerge from her cell and about another week for her to take her mating flights. I'm not sure there are enough bees left to hold out that long. (I could order a new queen through the mail, but I'm ruling that out because of the tiny population of the hive.)

The only other option I see is to destroy the queen cell and combine the hives. The swarm sure could use the comb any any stores from Regina's colony. Plus, it was a small swarm to begin with, and some more bees would help them I think. Then of course, the other bees sure could use a queen. I'm just not sure how to do it. If I moves the comb and the bees on the comb to the other hive would the bees out foraging be able to find their relocated sister? I have some research to do...

Eat Your Veggies

2011-05-26T10:36:00.000-05:00

So, I don't usually buy food that comes in a box or a can. It's good on the budget and good on the waistline... but hard when you just want a quick snack. Like this morning. But, luckily Lola was napping when hunger struck, so I thought I'd get a jump start on lunch. I've been meaning to steam Lola some veggies to replace the 20 pounds of Cheerios she eats each day. (Cheerios I definitely buy in a box!) In the process I invented a dish for myself, and I liked it so much I thought I'd share.

Ingredients:

3 carrots
2 parsnips
1/2 a bag of coleslaw cabbage mix
1/2 a medium onion
3 cloves garlic minced
1/2 stick of butter
1 teaspoon of horseradish
salt and pepper to taste

I Chopped and steamed the carrots and parsnips for 5 minutes. Meanwhile, I melted the butter and sautéed the slaw, onion, and garlic. When the slaw mix was soft I added the steamed veggies and seasoned with horseradish, salt and pepper. Potatoes could have easily been used instead of parsnips

This might be my new favorite food. All it needed was some crumbled bacon on top. It was filling and savory with a touch of sweet.

Game On.

2011-05-25T12:56:00.000-05:00

For those who can visualize: Lola just walked from the train table to the couch in the play room. Life as we have known it is over.

The Queen is Dead; Long Live the Queen!

2011-05-24T14:16:00.001-05:00

Well, it's heartbreaking to have to share this with you, but, one of my hives is dead. Not just a little dead, but dead as a door-nail; dead as a zombie before resurrection; dead as Elvis without the sightings. Just dead. There are several factors that played into the demise of the bees. I think the biggest factor was the double layers of screen at the bottom of the hives that trapped countless girls right at the start severely crippling their build up. Then there was the cross comb issue. Did I write about that before? In brief, the situation was that the bees didn't seem to like the guides we built along the bars for them to follow and were building their combs perpendicular to the bars. This made it completely impossible to inspect the hive or manipulate the bars without breaking the comb from the bars. And here's were rubber meets the road: Am I beekeeper for the bees or the honey?

The solution, from the perspective of a beekeeper with hopes of someday harvesting honey or just being able to manage the hive at all, was to cut the comb out of the hive and rig it to the bars. However, my poor bees were already so depleted in numbers, and this procedure would likely result in the lives lost of both some bees and their brood. (Eggs and larva could be damaged by handling the combs or not putting them back in the right order. The bees use body heat to keep the brood at the exact right temperature and it has been an often chilly and rainy month). Part of me thought if these bees were to have a chance of survival at all it might be best just to give the hives to the universe, and give up any aspiration of managing them.

Hair clips and pipe cleaners to reattach the comb to the bars

But, the part of me who liked the idea of just walking away was the part of me who had been stung repeatedly and was chicken-shit. The bigger part of me felt that I owed it to myself to get back on the horse and go out there and deal with my hives, gosh darn it. I had invested too much time, not to mention money just to be like, "Oh well, maybe next year." So, what did I do?

I had courage delivered to me in a box:

A Badass Bee Suit. (Pictures of me geared up to follow) ;-)

After the suit arrived, the next thing I did was enlist the help of my husband. Actually, he offered. I had been tormented and obsessed with the plight of my bees for several weeks, and I think he was eager to help me move on. Beekeeping is probably the first real challenge I've undertaken since natural childbirth, and I was really struggling when things didn't simply fall in to place.

So, on Mother's Day, he dressed in a sweatshirt, kitchen gloves, and my old veil; armed himself with several different choices of knives and told me:

"I'm going out there with you. But, I am going to do this so I can't get mad at you if I get the crap stung out of me. You're going to assist." Then we capitalized on nap time and went out to the hives to tackle the cross comb. I won' lie, even with my superwamidine bee suit, I was still incredibly nervous, and relieved that I could ride shotgun on this one. Once we got out there, my fears melted away pretty quickly. I don't know if it was the smoke or what, but the bees were as gentle as kittens. It was a fairly quick operation, and though there were a few glitches we both made it back to the house without a sting. The combs were all cut and rehung, and we didn't feel like there were too many squashed bees in the process. We both walked away from my bee-yard on a high. I felt like if we could break into the hives, cut apart all their hard work, and exit the situation without making the bees irritated, than I could do ANYTHING with these hives that needed to be done. I got my confidence back, and that was the best Mother's Day present possible.

Well, we may have FELT like there weren't too many squashed bees, but there was at least one bee lost that day. Her majesty Queen Eleanor of Apiculture didn't survive the ordeal. I wen't out to the hives a little over a week later to check out the sugar syrup and made a very sad discovery... my 42 inch hive only had about twenty very sad bees in it clustered around a queen cell. This means a couple of things. First, that there HAD been a queen and that they had noticed her death very quickly. There must have been some very new eggs (three days old or less) laid in the hive when they realized they were queenless, and the bees built special queen cells for these eggs in the hopes of raising an new queen to replace the one we killed. Poor bees. Can you spot the queen cell? It's on the right with a worker on it. It kinda looks like some kind of jet puffed cereal.

It was hard to pack up that hive and know that a mere month ago they came into my care 10,000 strong and in no time at all my choices had wiped this colony out of existence. I know it sounds a little melodramatic... But Mother Nature really gave me something to think about here. And yet... Perhaps unfortunately for honey bees everywhere this experience has not derailed my ambitions as a beekeeper. In fact, I have learned so much over the course of this month that I am more fired-up than ever to figure this out an succeed at beekeeping.

Apparently the universe isn't against me continuing on as a beekeeper because I had the answer to my sad empty hive appear out of the clear blue sky, literally. This is what a fellow mom spotted at the park yesterday:

I was chilling with my babes on a blanket with a good friend (Kate, a fellow beekeeper) and her kids when my friend overheard a lady talking about a nearby bee swarm and jumped into the conversation. The woman approached and warned us that there was a swarm of bees in a nearby tree, and we might want to keep our kids away. The two of us however, were so excited that we sprang up with our gaggle of kids in-tow to get a better look.

We had been told that "The City" had been called and someone would be out to "take care" of the bees shortly. My first thought was really that I didn't want them exterminated. My second thought was that it would definitely be cool to have those bees take up residence in my empty hive. Luckily I knew just who to call. I've written about Tony before. He's pretty much my honey bee hero. I tried to play it cool waiting the the 20 or 30 minutes it took him to finish up what he was doing and head out to the park. I am so grateful to the friends I was with, because they totally watched my backward slide-climbing children while I hovered under the swarm with Lola making sure no one came to steal or kill them. I was so excited I was practically jumping out of my skin.

Tony got there in no time, and totally made swarm catching look like a day at the park. Oh wait, it WAS a day at the park. He basically used a five gallon bucket at the end of a long pole and scooped the bees out of the tree and into the bucket with one swift and forceful swoosh. When he did, more than half the swarm was successfully caught. Many filled the air, and a more stayed clustered on the branch... He assumed the queen was still in the tree by the way the bees reclustered. One of the coolest things was to see some of the bees in the bucket crawl up to the lip and start fanning their wings to send their sent out onto the wind so that the other bees could find them. After a few minutes most of the bees in the air flew back to the branch and settled down. Tony used a step ladder and a pair of borrowed snips (Kate, just happened to have her gardening tools in her van after a trip to the community garden!!!) and snipped off the branch and added the remaining bees along with the branch to the bucket- It. Was. SO. Cool.

Crappy pictures taken with my phone.

By then, my kids had been at the park WAY longer than we anticipated. All three of them had pink cheeks and were over-due for a nap. It was time to get them home. Tony stayed at the park for about for a while, giving the straggling bees time to find their sisters and make their way to the bucket. It was great though because, by the time Tony delivered the bees to my hours the kids had been fed and washed up and were on their way to naps. I could focus on the bees!

While at the park I had been excitedly trying to get a hold of my hard-working husband. I called several times and finally sent him and email that read, "CALL ME!!!!! (everyone is fine)." You see, though I had new bees, the hives hadn't yet been rehabed and I neeeeeeded him to come home and put a new bottom on my hive. You see, as soon as we had dead bees caught between the screen bottoms we ripped the outer layer of screen off. We assumed that the bead bees that were trapped between would simply fall to the bottom. But, they did not. When the outer layer of screen was removed their decaying and sticky little bodies remained trapped right where they were. I tried to poke them off with a stick from the outside with limited success, and their shear number made this impractical. So, in the end we simply ripped that screen off as well, leaving the bottom of the hives totally open. Before I could introduce my swarm to their new top bar hive, we had to get a bottom on there to keep them home!

You want to know how much my husband loves me. He came home from work. To put bottoms on both my hives. I pretty much think he is the coolest man alive. (And I'm glad he has such a flexible work schedule.) It didn't take him long to measure and cut some proper sized boards to fit the bottom of the hive, and soon he and I were ready to attach them. Obviously, it was easy to attach the board without bees in it. (Except that the board, taken from our old balcony, was warped and there were a few touch-and-go moments when we thought it wouldn't go on.) Next we had to screw on the board to the hive with the bees still in it.... It was OK.

We tried to keep as many of them in the hive as we could by closing up their entrance, but because of the way the bottom board fit with the hive body there was still a pretty big gap that the bees could come and go through, right where I was crouching. About twenty or thirty (maybe it was ten) irritated guard bees came out to see what the heck all the commotion was. I was wearing jeans and a tank top, and I felt the breeze from their wings on my neck, some landed on my shoulders, and one crawled around my hand. I. Did. Not. Move. I breathed away from them. A millennia of fending off mice, raccoons, and bears has made bees defensive upon contact with a hot steamy stream of CO2. And you know what? That old adage is true: If you leave the bees alone, they will leave you alone! Even though we were drilling into their hive... no stings! My confidence grows.

Now came the moment of truth: Getting this bucket of bees into their new home. I suited up and walked the bees out to the hive practicing diaphragmatic breathing. Over and over I mentally replayed the instructions Tony had talked me through: Bonk the bucket on the ground to knock the bees down to the bottom. Undo the bungee cord and remove screen, grab the branch and tap firmly on the side of the hive so ALL the bees fall from the branch into the hive. Then double check that the branch is bee-free (the queen was likely there). Next, dump the remaining bees from the bucket into the hive; quickly replace all bars and cover. The end. And that is exactly what I did. I took a deep breath and just did it. I knocked that bucket with such authority that all the bees fell to the bottom stunned and hardly any took to the air as I whacked the few still on the branch in to the hive. They poured out of the bucket like water and fell in a heap at the bottom of the hive staring up at me like, "WTF, man?" A couple buzzed around as I replaced the bars, but the hardest part was putting my heavy and unwieldy 48" gabled cover back on the hive! I did it and let out a whoop that they could probably hear in Kansas!

I did it! I did it! I did it!

I wanted to spend the rest of the afternoon out there sitting and watching the bees... but of course my motherly duty called me away. Today however, as soon as Lola was napping the big kids and I went out to see how everyone was settling in. Jacob stayed down by the tire swing, but my excited little Georgia wanted to visit the bees so up we went. Everything looked great!

One of the things I like about beekeeping is how it is a little bit like playing detective. You don't actually have to take the hive all apart to tell some of what's going on in there. Take for example this next picture.

What you are looking at is the entrance to the hive where the swarm is now living. (Can anyone think of a renegade queen to name the new matriarch after? Bloody Bee Mary?) Tony suggested that I wanted to close up all entrances of the hive to at least a quarter inch, so the workers could come and go but the queen had to stay home. He gave me this little bit from a queen excluder and Smoochy stapled it over their only entrance. You can see two workers coming and going. That is AWESOME because it means the queen is in there and they are getting to work. If their were no bees coming or going, it would be a pretty clear indication that I did not get the queen in the hive because the swarm would have vacated, found her and moved on. Cool, huh? This big fat guy you see hanging on the outside is an unlucky drone who wants in fro some free lunch but is too big to fit through the gate. Lucky for him, any hive will take his lazy ass in; hopefully he find his way over to Regina Apis' place before he starves.

A few other pictures to show you the bottoms we put on the hive. They make me very happy.

The swarm house

Notice the little strip tacked on to cover the gap? SOme day I'll be able to take that off and the bees can use it as an entrance. It will also allow me to easily slide in a sticky board to catch an monitor for mites! I'm so happy about it!!!

Regina Apis' House

Notice the gap? The bees love it for an entrance.

It's official: I feel like a real beekeeper.

Pity and the Natural Order of Things

2011-05-18T21:14:00.003-05:00

So, those gorgeous windows I was writing about yesterday? Well, they aren't only good for bird watching. They also happen to be great for bird killing. Sad but true, there isn't a day that goes by that we don't hear the THUMP of some innocent and unsuspecting birdy braining himself against the glass. At first it used to startle me... now I hardly notice. The collision isn't alway fatal to our feathered friends, but it often is. I'm sure the local scavengers think of the perimeter of our house as an all day dead bird-buffette. Nice huh?

Well this morning we discovered a little grey bird on it's back outside by the slider off the dining area. Another goner we all assumed, until with a great and awkward effort the poor guy kicked rolled, and flapped his way on to his stomach where he sat pathetically motionless except for the labored heave of breath. He was a sorry sight, and I didn't think he'd last the hour. And yet, two hours later he was still in the exact same spot, in the exact same position hanging on. By this time the kids had hit me with every question about birds, windows, and boo-boos you can imagine. Normy must have told me a dozen times that the bird needed a band-aid and Georgia was insistent that she, the animal rescuer, should be entrusted with the care of "the little baby bird who misses his mama."

I tried as gently as I could to let the kids know that this was a wild animal, and there really wasn't much that could be done to help it. All the while inside I thought the only help I had to offer was a swift death. Of course, I couldn't bring myself to actually do that. Instead, against all odds, I brought the poor crippled thing a pile of crumbs left over from Lola's mashed toast and a shallow dish of water. I had read some place that birds had to eat very regularly and often because of their high metabolism and I must have secretly hoped that just MAYBE...

Surly, if I had any hope for the bird it was on an unconscious level. On the way to Norm's speech therapy this morning I was contemplating how to deal with the bird's death and the questions the children would inevitably ask when we came home to find his little body toppled-over lifeless on the patio. As it was Georgia talked about him incessantly on the drive. I told him he'd likely be dead when we got home.

"Where will he go then?" she asks.

"Well, we'll dig a little hole and give him back to the Earth." I tell her.

"What about the worms?" she asks. She really loves worms.

"Well, the worms will eat the birds body and turn it back in to the soil to help plants grow." I go on.

"Why?"

"That's the circle of life..." pretty heavy stuff at eight o'clock with a three year-old.

Our day progressed, and a few hours later I found myself dashing back into the house to grab a few forgotten things while the girls chilled in the car listening to the radio. I peeked out the sliding glass door and there was the bird. Still there. Still sitting. Still laboriously breathing. "Crap." I thought. I walked back into the kitchen (my back to the bird) resolved to grab my kitchen gloves and put the poor broken thing out of it's misery then remove its remains. That way it would be believable when I told the children that the bird made a miraculous recovery and flew away. But, when I turned back around the bird was gone! I didn't see him fly off; he was just gone. It was as though he'd never been there except for the few hopeful crumbs I put out for him, the smudge he made on the sliding glass door, and a little pile of birdy poop right by his water dish. I wonder if he read my mind?

I was beyond relief. Later that day however, Georgia was disappointed. She said, "But, I was supposed to return him to the Earth!" Sorry kid, maybe next time.

Out The Window

2011-05-17T16:21:00.004-05:00

There can be no question, the thing I love most about this house is the windows. The one in the playroom is lovely, but the ones in the living room are divine. Everyone gravitates to this spot to sit and stair out. We watch for deer, mallards, cardinals, robins, black squirrels, deer, deer, and more deer. These days I stair out and look for poison ivy.... but whatever.

The other big attraction for me is the trellis and mini-patio by the front door. I spent tons of time on-line imagining living in this house and setting my chair by these planters and enjoying the smells of all the flowers I was going to plant there. Last year I was too pregnant with Lola to do anything outside so a deer friend came over with trays of impatiens and filled up the planters. This year I planted them with cosmos, nasturtiums, and calendula and it looks as though every thing is coming up. Georgia was so excited this morning to go out and see all the little seedlings that she helped me plant. Their appearance out of the dirt must seem like magic to her... is sure does to me.

Apparently, I'm not alone in thinking this is quite the peaceful and lovely little spot. We've had a mama robin make her nest in the trellises right out front. I must confess, I am a little shocked by her choice of location. You'd think a bird would want a spot a little more private than by out front door. Every time she catches me starring at her from INSIDE the house she freezes. And the thunder of racing children's feet on our hardwood floors sends her into the say. I can't help but wonder if her poor eggs will hatch. I really hope so. It would be so cool to see her babies get big. In the mean time, we'll just wait and enjoy the privilege of watching her sit. Spring is quickly becoming my favorite season.

You've got to take the good with the bad...

2011-05-10T18:09:00.000-05:00

Especially when it comes to forest gardening.

The Good:
My calendula flowers have started coming up. My starts are weathering the elements fantastically after 6 days of hardening off. (I hope to plant them Thursday...) After thinning my snap peas, they are doing great. The baby lilacs are thriving. And best of all, I have been seeing honey bees foraging all the time. Just a few minuets ago I saw one investigating my starts on the patio.

The Bad:

Today I pulled a GARBAGE BAG full of poison ivy off our property. (Wearing pants, long sleeves, two pairs of gloves, boots and goggles.) This was after ripping out tons of it on Saturday. And there is still tons more out there. Of course as a beekeeper, and a citizen of Earth standing in defiance agains Monsanto, Round-up isn't an option. Although after some research I am thinking Tamworth pigs. Pig roast anyone?

As Lola would say these days, "Uh-oh!"

Happy Friday!

2011-05-06T16:40:00.000-05:00

Our weekend is off to a good start. Hope yours is too!

She Gardens

2011-05-05T15:12:00.004-05:00

Ah ha! It is official. After years of imagining myself with a garden, I am officially off and running with a bonafide plot all of my own. Seeds went INTO the earth yesterday, people! I feel so fulfilled and happy with myself. Yesterday Lola granted me two lengthy naps (earning her the title of Best Baby EVER). The first was while Normy was at Pre-K, so Georgia and I were able to go out together and get our hands dirty. First thing first though, we had a little outside snack.

Next I drug out all of my starts from the basement and set them out for their first day of hardening off. I felt like a protective mother taking her kid to the bus stop for the first time. Was the wind too strong? Was the day too cool? How would they do in the sun? They did just fine, and after four hours found themselves back safe inside under their lights. (Today I didn't put them out , though because the wind is crazy strong.)

After that Georgia and I planted cosmos in the planters out front, calendula seeds in a pot, and a pot of rosemary. That was about the time Georgia got bored and went in to do montessori math and letter games on the Ipad.

I however, went on to plant tomatoes, peppers, carrots, parsley, kale, and spinach in with the snap peas I already have growing nicely in what will surely be a deer buffet. I don't have fence. And as of yet, have been unable to get my husband to pee around the garden's perimeter. He claims it is too far a walk from the tree by the garage, which is his spot of choice.

I have also started a little space as a bee garden. Foxglove, canterbury bells, columbine, chives, and alyssum should start popping up there over the next few weeks if the gardening gods smile on me. I'm hopping to add some sunflowers, mexican sunflowers, and butterfly weed before the week is over.

But there is NOTHING I am more excited about than the flowering cabbage I have started under my grow lights right now. I don't know what it is about these lovely plants that really make me happy, but they are the only thing I really care if makes it this year... Funny because I haven't exactly figured out where to put them. I fell in love with them during a trip to Omaha's botanical garden and can't stop thinking about them.

image shamelessly stolen from here

I had a moment of pure bliss yesterday. After watering my newly planted lilac twig (hopefully someday a bush) the sun was warm and happily shining down on me and my garden plot. I thought it might be a nice time to visit the bees. I had seen several drinking at our pond and a few more in the creeping charlie... but I wanted to see the action out at the bee boxes. They didn't disappoint. Little gals flying into the hives with heavily laden pollen legs, plenty of activity, and an overall happy hum emanated from both front entrances. Perfect.

So that's cool. As of this week I am both a new beekeeper and an new gardener. It's official because I have been stung by the bees and I am currently covered in calamine lotion to deal with a nasty run-in with poison ivy! How sweet is that?

Sweet Delays

2011-05-04T17:24:00.000-05:00

Naps were delayed today because I had to grind grain and vacuum. Neither activity is conducive to sleeping children. So, I sent my brood up-stairs to play while I finished my work. For a while all I heard was the sounds of them pummeling each other. (Over the sounds of the grinding grain and vacuum, mind you.) Then... nothing. Fearing the worst, I rushed up stairs and stumbled upon this precious scene.

Sweet babies!

We spent all weekend outside...

2011-05-02T19:55:00.000-05:00

I'd write about it, but I'm too exhausted from all the fresh air, gardening, and toddler washing. They get so dirty!!!

What are they doing out there???

2011-04-28T11:26:00.002-05:00

Well, there are certainty still bees out there despite all my unintentional attempts to sabotage their existence. These bees are truly a testament to the resilience of life. Go bees! But what on Earth are they doing out there? I didn't expect there to be quite so much activity OUTSIDE the hive. Every time I get a chance (3 napping children is no small feat) I pull on my boots and take a walk down to my apiary! Yesterday the clouds parted just long enough (literally and metaphorically) for me to visit my bees... from a distance.

As soon as I got close enough, I could hear the buzz and see the clouds of bees zooming around each hive. I hunkered down and just watched. I stayed out there as long as I dared... 15 minutes? But, as long as I watched I couldn't make out any obvious pattern. The girls didn't look to be coming or going. They were just flying around. To me, they looked without objective. Could they be queenless? I haven't been up in there business enough to figure that out yet. (Too chicken)

Could it have just been that it was the first time all day the sun was out and the wind and rain had died down so they were doing orientation flights? Getting out of the house for the first time that day? (Orientation flights are when bees fly patterns in front of the hive to learn landmarks memorize where home is.)

This hive is my 36-incher where (if she's alive) Regina Apis rules supreem. They have decided to use the entrance I intended them to use. Good girls.

The other hive has ideas of their own.

This is the bottom of my 48 inch hive where Eleanor of Apiculture was hived. These gals have decided it is far easier to fly in and out through the holes in the farmers cloth under the hive. A few days ago I had Smoochy go out an rip off the outer layer of screen so more bees wouldn't get trapped while I puzzle out a long term solution to a bottom board. I thought all the dead bees would just fall out when he took the screen off, but most of them stayed right where they were. YUCK. I have seen some alive bees fly around and land on the bottoms of their dead comrades, as though they are almost trying to pull them off the hive. I wonder if they are trying to clean up the carnage?

And what's up with the bees congregating ON the hive?

I never expected they would just hang out on the outside of the hive. These girls looked like they were feeding each other and telling secrets.

I'm utterly captivated by the mysterious life of my bees. As soon as I can muster the courage I am going to put on my big girl panties and take a look at what's going on under the hood out there. But, for now, I'm pretty happy just to watch from a few feet away.

A Spring Photo Journey

2011-04-27T21:28:00.000-05:00

Thank God for the invention of soap, without which none of this would be possible.

(Mis)Adventures in Beekeeping Part II

2011-04-26T14:59:00.005-05:00

When I was 36 hours into Normy's labor and asking to be taken to the hospital for my epidural Smoochy told me, "Just because this is harder than you think it is doesn't mean you can't do it." Those words changed my life, and have become a mantra I repeat to myself when things gets sticky. When I went on to push my son triumphantly into the world 8 hours later I knew what Smoochy had told me was true. Now I believe I can accomplish ANYTHING with enough stamina and hard work... But, I have been repeating the mantra a lot this week.

I wanted Part II of my beekeeping adventure tale to be a cheerful retelling of the day I hived the bees along with a status update of their life in the hive that featured sunshine, rainbows, and of course the promise of honey. Instead the news from Becca's Sunshine Apiary is slightly more realistic, a whole lot more humble, and a little bit grim. The girls aren't doing so well. And really, most of it is my fault.

I have to go back to the moment just before I vigorously shook my first three pounds of bees in to their new home. Well, that was what was SUPPOSED to happen anyway. The reality was more like I just shook them around in the box. When they finally got their bearings they flew out and started sticking their stingers into the jackass who had just treated them like a can of new paint in a mixing machine. Actually, I wasn't the only one. Smoochy took a hit in the dead center of the back of his neck, but he got some great pictures. I wasn't expecting to get stung. I had seen all these YouTube videos of these beekeepers with neither gloves nor veil deftly introducing bees to their hive with the calm of a Zen Master sitting on a mountain. Let's just say I had unrealistic expectations. I'm sure I let loose a high-pitched Oooooooh-Nooo! the first few stingers to pierce through my skin-tight jeans and billowy white blouse. But, I held it together and as quickly as humanly possible set up shop. I was suddenly a lot more grateful that Smoochy caught that my fly was down BEFORE I attempted to hive the girls. The trouble was there was still one more package to do.

The bees circled my head madly, and followed me over the few feet to stand in front of the second hive that still needed to be dealt with. I don't know if any of you have ever experienced having your nipples pierced, but I'm here to tell you that the second one is a lot worse than the first because you know what's coming. Plus, you also know there is no way to get out of it without looking really really silly...

Here I am getting the crap stung out of me.

So, I muddled through. I was so shaken from the first incident that I attached my queen cage horribly to the bar. This forced me to leave out the second bar that should have snuggly fit next to the one the cage was suspended from. This also left a huge gap to the outside world and the cold rainy April elements were able to blast right in on my poor bees. But, I wanted to get out of there so badly that I didn't take time to think about what I could have done to fix it. As it was, I had to walk around our property forever to finally get the angry mob of bees to quit chasing me... or die on me with their stingers ripped from their butts.

It wasn't until after I had slurped down a rum and coke and had a moment to reflect that I realized I had made another bone-head move. Instead of putting the queen in the center of the hive body with plenty of room for the bees to cluster around her cage and keep her warm, I had suspended her from the bar closest to the entrance. Frick. Not good.

This was the properly attached queen cage. The second was a little wonky! Smoochy took this shot right before I banged, shook, and dumped the first package. I remember feeling confident and exhilarated. Hope to get that feeling back soon...

Then, to add to the problem, it was cold and rainy, and cold and rainy, and cold and rainy for days on end. Not good weather for bees.

Three days later I finally went out to check on the girls and made yet another horrible discovery. The bottom of the hive was constructed with two different sheets of farmers cloth layered over each other. The inside sheet (the first we installed) had bigger holes. Turns out those holes are too big to keep out pests (like small hive beetles and wax moths). Instead of ripping that sheet off and starting again, we just layered the cloth with smaller holes over it from the bottom. I never could have imagined that the bees would try to crawl through the bigger holes in the first layer of cloth and get trapped by the second. But they did. My heart sank and my stomach hurt when I saw the layer of dead bees sandwiched between the two sheets.

I have to say, at this point I was a little shaken. I got on the phone with the main organizer and chairman of the Omaha Bee Club, bee doctor, and bee-friendly pest management guru, Tony Sandoval, AKA Big Bear. This guys rocks. I think he could sense the fear and distress in my voice when he talked with me about what I was going to need to do to start fixing the situation out at my hives. I had never even lit my smoker before, and after my fist run-in with angry bees I was a little too on the scared-shittless side to go out there and start messing around. Tony offered to come over right then and help me open things up and take a look around. My hero. He told me, "That's what the Bee Club is all about. Bee people helping bee people."

Having someone that experienced come over and walk me through opening up the hives was just what I needed. When we got out there all was not lost. There were lots of dead bees, sure. But, lots of alive ones too, all clustered together to keep warm. Tony helped me move the queen cage of the first hive over where it needed to be. On the second hive (the one with the wonkily attached cage) we discovered that the queen had been released, so we could close that one back up tighter than I had left it initially and things were good. It was a huge sigh of relief to be out there and not get stung, and to see Tony work without any protective gear at all and not get stung either. But, the best part of the experience was observing the slow, gentle, and steady way he manipulated the bars and the bees. It was masterful and I learned so much.

Since then I have been out to visit a friend's bees once and my own just last Sunday. I have a residual phobia of getting stung that I really need to work through. I'm seriously considering buying a full bee suit, because a calm confident beekeeper will always be more successful than a spastic freaked-out one. But, the adventure has begun. I'm not sure how this first chapter will end. Frankly, I don't think my hives are very healthy right now, but I'll save that story for next time. The thing is: I'm in it to win it, so to speak. I am not giving up. Even if these hives crash and burn (poor tortured bees!) I will start again and take everything I've learned from this experience and do better next time.

The good new is, there are defiantly bees in both my boxes. I was just out there watching the field bees come and go which was a promising sight. I'm not sure that they have queens, or are building comb... but they are out there and working the yard. On Easter while we were out egg hunting I saw quite a few girls I'm sure were mine. ;-) We have been seeing honey bees in the creeping charlie on our property and the last time I opened the hives up I saw bees with lovely bright yellow clumps suck to their hind legs... in their pollen baskets! Life goes on.

How I Know

2011-04-18T17:46:00.001-05:00

Every time I look out my window at the hives on the hill, I know my husband loves me.

It is a special man who works so hard to make his wife's dreams come true.

Thanks you, Smoochy for always being my partner.

Adventures in Beekeeping Part I

2011-04-17T18:54:00.002-05:00

I started writing this last night, and though I haven't completed the tale, I feel as though I should at least get started with it. So...

Well, Becca's Hard Knocks School of Beekeeping is now in session. After hours of research and reading, reams of plans, and a bit of day dreaming it has begun. I wish I could express to you just HOW MUCH of our lives the last few weeks have revolved around the arrival of the bees. My husband has taken time off from work to build hives. In fact, he's spent ALL of his free time on the project for weeks. The kids have missed him. I too have spent every second of free-time I could (or couldn't) scrounge to make this whole show go off today (Yesterday). Smoochy and I have been bouncing ideas off one another on how to make each little detail work... and there have been a surprising number of details to tweak. Hive ventilation, top bar guides, hive covers, screen bottom boards, bee feeding apparatus... It's enough to make your head swim.

Then there was the day of the bees' arrival. A grey cold day. Steady constant rain. North west winds averaging 35 miles per hour and a chilly 33 degree low... NOT the best day to introduce the girls to their new home. Here's the thing with bees. Packages of bees are typically raised in nice warm places like California or South Carolina where winter is something friends from the North mention, but really remains abstract. Once the bees are caged and trucked to their final destination they have been confined for several days...3... 4... more? And it is time to get them into their new home as quickly as possible. Every extra day they stay in their box is another day of stress and diminishing food supply. I don't know exactly how long my bees were caged up, but I know the can of sugar syrup they had to snack on was almost empty... and they were pissed off about it.

The day they lived in my basement waiting for the rain to stop was a day of anticipation and joy for me. Strike that. It was not joyful... I was totally stressed that I couldn't hive the bees immediately. I kept hoping against all hope that the clouds would magically part. Why it had never occurred to me that there could be bad weather in the beginning of April that might complicate our beekeeping plans surprises me now. Regardless, the kids and I would go down into the basement and listen to the buzz the bees made in the dark compared to the super-sonic buzz they made when we flipped on the lights. The change in tone would have shocked you. Each time we visited them (every four hours) we sprayed them down with sugar syrup to give them a little snack. There were actually a couple of bees that clung on to the OUTSIDE of the packages. These poor girls wanted so bad to be inside with their sisters and the can of sugar syrup. At least one made it to the hives with the rest but the other found the plant starts under my grow-lights and died a sad lonely death.

Anyway, the day I was actually able to hive the bees dawned grey and WINDY. I was scared those poor girls would starve to death in my basement. So, just like a woman in early labor fiddling with her bags packed for the hospital I started dinking around with my bee-gear. Oh the bee gear! There has been no shortage of things for me to over-think with this project. It might have been different if I had decided to go with a standard Langstroth hive, but I opted for top bar hives, which still leave a lot of room experiment and personalization.

I have belabored each and every point of construction, much to the chagrin of my accommodating husband who has changed mid-stream with me as I have flip-flopped with each new beekeeping source I've read.

Like top bars: Which guide to use? OK, bees will build their lovely comb without any real help from us people. But, to keep them going in nice straight lines (which makes it easier for the beekeeper to remove the comb) it helps to give them a guide to work with. I thought at first I would have Smoochy cut bars with grooves to be filled with beeswax to serve that purpose. So he did. Then we decided that it would be better if they had a wood guide to work from, so he cut those same bars again. All would have been fine except the wood piece had a groove left over form the first cutting, and I found myself obsessing over this at 6:30 this morning, and filling that groove with beeswax despite myself. This was totally at the expense of all other activities, like making breakfast of diapering the baby. Hmmm.

before

after

Then there was how to feed the bees. (When you first get them started in the hives you need to help them along to make up for the fact that there aren't enough nectar and pollen producing plants blooming just yet.) I decided on inverted mason jars placed inside the hive as feeders, which is great. But, which way to punch the holes? If I do it from outside-in the bees (supposedly) are in danger of having their proboscises (tongues) ripped off. If the holes are made form the inside-out then they have something to grip on to but their heads could get wounded on the sharp metal.... Oh my god!

In the end I made some holes going in each direction. Now I just have to count whether I see more bees with scratched heads or missing tongues.

I've heard it said, "The only right way is what works for you and your bees." Great. That's helpful. I've also heard if you ask 100 beekeepers how to do something you'll get 100 different answers.

Like which flavor of mini-marshmellow should I stop the hole in the queen cage with??? OK, I didn't really agonize over that one. Everyone knows the bees like the lemon ones best. (The queens come separately in their own cage with a little cork baring her escape. When you introduce her to the hive you replace the cork with with a mini-marshmallow to hold her in, so that by the time the bees have eaten her out they have had enough time to smell the pheromones she gives off and accept her as their rightful ruler.)

Well, as I spent the morning fiddling with molten wax and top bars, Smoochy was finishing up the hives. After spending hours building lovely gabled roofs for the hives, I decided they needed an inner cover to protect against heat seeping between the bars and up into the roof. So, at the last minute he was back out in the garage measuring, sawing, and swearing. He really does love me. Two o' clock in the afternoon rolled around, the sun was shining even if the wind was a little too breezy, and the hives still weren't 100% ready to go. My poor husband still needed to lug them over an acer away from the garage and up a 45 degree hill to their final resting place on the far side of the pond.

Yikes! Luckily fate smiled on us and we found ourselves with three sleeping children. I was able to help him lug cinderblocks, clear brush, and even chop down one last tree just for good measure. Each minute that ticked by I became more and more excited and nervous. How was the whole thing going to go? Would the wind pick-up before we could get the hives set up? Was I going to get stung? (Yes.) Was I prepared enough? (Um... No.)

Well, I hate to leave you hanging, but I'll have to get back to that later. This will have to be a two part series. I've already spent two days working on this and now it is bath time. See ya' soon!

Spring is a Wild Ride

2011-04-14T07:55:00.000-05:00

Spring is a wild ride. The thrill of feeling sun on your skin. The delight in wandering out doors without a protective bindle. I have been enthralled by watching the earth spring to life with all manner of plants. Every time I look out my window and see an army of purple flowers I’m a little sad that the bees aren’t here yet. They should be cashing in on this early bounty. Every drop of nectar and pollen they save now is bit of insurance that they will be able to make it through our next long Nebraska winter. I have no expectation of surplus honey for me this year. I am using top bar hives, which are (supposedly) better for bee health, but notably less productive in terms of honey.

Speaking of bees, I need to be outside painting my hives in anticipation of the bee’s arrival on FRIDAY! At last!!! The girls are coming. I am anxious and excited all at once. I wish I was a little more prepared, but then I think beekeeping is a little like parenting in that you can read all the books in the world but never know what you’re in for until you actually start doing it.

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I just can’t seem to find time to write these last few weeks. The above two paragraphs was all I could manage, and there were several days between the first and second! Every moment that I have had with sleeping children has been spent outside painting beehives, reading about bees, or playing domestic catch-up. You can bet cookin’ and cleanin’ have sunk pretty low on my list of to-do’s with the bees’ arrival so close. I will have time to fill you in on our happenings here as soon as all 20,000 or so of my new pets are safely in their fabulous new homes… Today I have to put a guide on all the bars for the bees to build their comb along and make some sugar syrup to feed them. In the mean time here are some pictures of our recent days… wish me luck with the bees!

On a bee hunt: We found two bumble bees in the creeping charlie!!!

April Brings...

2011-04-03T16:28:00.001-05:00

It's April first (well it was when I started writing this) and I have started seeds! Not because I'm organized, and not because I will actually have a garden per-se yet again this year. I started seeds because I have a good friend. A friend who always shares her time, her knowledge, and now even her seeds. She is the type of woman who makes things grow wherever she goes. Flowers, fruits, friendships… She knows just the right equation to make things bloom. I am lucky to know her.

This morning I was in a panic. April first had come bright and sunny, and all my garden dreams remained just that. Pie-in-the-sky dreams. I may have the spot chosen, but no seeds started, fences up, or basic idea of what I'd plant. Um... Vegetables? In essence, Spring has come AGAIN and left me unprepared to start a garden in the soil my husband and I have planted our metaphorical roots in. (Sadly, only metaphorical)

When I look out at our property I am struck at once by two things. How crazy-lucky we are to have so much space in the middle of a thriving city to call our own. And how much work it is going to take to turn all this space into what we want it to be.

When we first moved in the place was like a jungle. Trees surrounded the house, their branches literally reaching over the roof like protective arms. But, the image of protection was an illusion. One good ice storm and... The ferns and foliage grew right up to our doorstep after years of unobstructed growth. The owner before us had grown old in this house, and in the last decade less and less had been done outside. His last few years spent in assisted living, left the property almost totally unattended.

It was beautiful and mysterious... but like settlers carving out a home in the wilderness we have been pushing back on the over-growth. Part of me mourns for the trees, ferns, and bushes we have cleared away. The place no longer looks like an enchanted forest. Actually, it looks a little ugly, but at sunset with visions of the future in our eyes I can see the magic under the surface. We have big plans for how we want to cultivate this space.

And just like all big transformations we have to go through the awkward and often unattractive phase on demolition and construction. I hate this part.

In the end there will be a kitchen garden on the back patio, a new front patio of laid brick so we can sit and watch the kids play from our higher elevation, a tire swing on a tree down by the pond, the pond stocked with fish and maybe ducks, fruit trees and bushes, a garden on the terraces, a bee garden, chickens visible from my kitchen window, a new balcony, a couple of big dogs to chase away the garden-munchers and chicken-snatchers... and on and on and on.

Now we have unspeakably massive piles of brush and fallen trees, a carpet of leaves and brambles, deer and raccoons out the ass (which never the less are always cool too see), a half torn-down balcony, sad stumps of murdered tees everywhere you turn, shaggy anti-landscaping, and a general sense of an impossible to-do list.

Life isn't a destination. It's a journey. This same friend of mine, who gifted me with seed to start (as well as the peat-pots and soil to start them in!) was conversating with me the other day about this very idea. How to come to terms with the gulf between where you want to be and where you are. She had just shared this blog post and it really resonates with this exact idea: that if you can only be happy with all your goals met, why bother? Life would be miserable. The joy is in the process... (right?)

So this spring, I am focusing on realistic expectations, and getting my hands dirty every chance I get. Like right now Lola just knocked off for her morning nap... so out into the fields I go!

And for those of you who where hoping to come here today and see photos of me hiving the bees, I'm sorry to disappoint. The girls' arrival has been delayed a week or two due to bad weather. Boo. But, good on the other hand because I still haven’t named the second queen! ;-)

Long Time, No See

2011-03-31T07:59:00.000-05:00

Hello blog, it's been a while. I'm not sure how to get back started. Dive right in, I suppose. March was a hard month for me/us. I'm glad April starts tomorrow so I can turn the page and MOVE ON! The biggest plague to our joy was literally PLAGUE. I was sick the whole month long and seemed to spread it around like soft butter on warm toast to everyone I know. My sister and mother (who live in Colorado and Florida respectively and I rarely get to see) came for a visit this month that turned into the trip from hell because everyone got horribly sick. Especially my poor sweet niece who was laid so low by a double ear infection I contemplated hiring a priest to come in for an exorcism. Turns out she only needed antibiotics.

So, march was a wash.... and really right now I just want to crawl in a hole and knit. So, that's what I am going to do. Any on-line time I've been devoting to cataloging my brief three years worth of knitting projects on Ravelry. (I've only got up 2011 stuff up so far). I always thought I'd make myself a little scrapbook filled with notes on projects along with photos and thank you notes from gift recipients, but that has never materialized. This shouldn't surprise me as none of my children have a baby books and I can hardly find the time to blog. Anyway, it is far easier to throw a few pictures of each project on Ravelry (I'm Rebeccawing) and call it good. As long as they never go out of business (impossible to imagine) or the Internet doesn't cease to exist (catastrophe) I think my purpose will be served. Sure, future generations won't be able to pour through my cute little scrapbook and wonder who Great Grandma Becca was... but then who knows, maybe the Internet will some how prove to be as much as an archaeological goldmine as my dusty old attic ever could.

Here is some march snaps for posterity:

My Nephew CJ and Lola hit it off.

Actually, CJ gets along great with EVERYONE.

Dora socks from Aunt Cake.

Birthday corsage for my mom... knit while she was here, and a month overdue.

All the pictures of my sister show her comforting a sick child.

a rare moment between cousins

Morgan, hours before the illness set in.

The last snow?

This Moment

2011-03-18T11:18:00.001-05:00

{this moment} – A Friday ritual. A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, wonderful moment. A moment that expresses a special feeling, time, or place. (A tradition inspired by Amanda Soule)

Life: the Double-Sided Coin.

2011-03-16T14:06:00.000-05:00

I'm HAPPY that these leg warmers are off the needles and on her legs.

I'm SAD that the stretchy bind-off I used was WAT TOO STRETCHY and Lola doesn't seem to like them. (Really she could care less about what's on her legs. She is miserable because of what's going on with her teeth!)

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I'm HAPPY that Lola is big enough to bathe with Norm and Georgia... (sure saves time, trouble, and water!)

But, SAD that she's growing up so fast. I swear each child grows faster than the one before.

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I'm HAPPY that my parents are so cool and recored books on CD so that they can "read" to my children every day. I am even more HAPPY that my children love this and ask for the Papa and Grandma books.

I am SAD that they we live so far apart that Papa and Grandma can't read them stories in person more often.

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I am HAPPY my Georgia loves to eat peas.

That's all, just happy. Who could complain about a kid who asks for peas before the sun has even risen?

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I was however, SAD that our balcony is rotting and had to be taken down. (Hopefully to be replaced soon.)

But, HAPPY that Smoochy is going to use the salvageable wood to make me a chicken coop this spring.

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I am HAPPY that Smoochy has taken a chainsaw to a few trees in order to carve out a little place for us to play and to garden.

But, I am SAD that he also took the chainsaw to his leg. My mending basket is full enough thankyouverymuch. (His leg only sustained a minor flesh-wound. Nothing a bottle of rubbing alcohol and a bandana for a tourniquet couldn't cure. Seriously, whatever man-points he lost slicing his leg he made up for when he dumped rubbing alcohol on the cut. )

So, that's life here. What's Happy/Sad for you today?