:: ReQueening My Bee Hive ::

After the full inspection of my hives with my mentor on Tuesday we discovered one of my hives was very much behind. We located the queen and found she had only laid 3 eggs and the worker bees were creating what are called "Supercedure Cells".

They create these as a way to replace the current queen due to either the lack of her laying or just getting old. In this case; since my bees are so new she was most likely not fully mated when I received her; therefor not laying like she should be.  Here's another view of the queen cell...

Thanks to the local bee club I was able to get into contact with a member who had an extra queen from the shipment we had just received. A quick trip to Monmouth to pick her up & we were ready for the duty of re-queening.
Once again, a friend came over to help me. It's so nice to have an extra set of hands and eyes since I'm such a "new-bee".
We located all of the supercedure cells and removed them because we don't want those to fully develop, emerge, and then possibly kill the new queen we are putting in. Next we located the current queen that needed to be removed. We both felt bad at this point, but she had to be squished. I rolled her into an bit of the burr comb and wax as to help hide her scent until I could take and get rid of it away from the hives.
We followed the same procedure as when we first installed the queen cages the first day.

A worker bee saying hello & hopefully in the nicest way possible.

The queen will remain in the cage for a few days in order for the workers to get used to her scent and hopefully except her as their new queen. I'll check on them again on Sunday to make sure she has been released and all is well.
Meanwhile in my 2nd hive, things are looking great!

 During Tuesdays inspection we found brood, pollen, and lots of happy bees! We did not open that hive yesterday but there was lots of activity happening outside the hive so I got a few shots of the girls flying back in and even spotted one with a bit of pollen in her sacs.

I leave you today with this food for thought ...

For me, learning about bees has been so much more than just waiting to harvest their honey.
Happy Thursday everyone!

:: My 1st Bee Install & A Garden Update ::

On May 23rd at 8:45 in the morning my two packages of bees finally arrived! I placed my order through the Monmouth Bee Club. A club that I am very excited to be a part of. It's an amazing group of local beekeepers who are welcoming and forthcoming with answering any sort of newbie questions.

I ordered two 3# packages of bees because I have two hives. Each package contains approx. 12,000 adult worker bees and 1 mated queen. The club altogether ordered around 200 3# packages totally approximately 2,400,000 bees that traveled from Georgia to Illinois in the back of an F150. It was a sight to behold for this first timer!

It was a bit unsettling having 24,000 bees in the back seat of my truck coming home but I made it!

A neighbor and friend, Billie come over to help me install my packages. She had just gotten her bees this year as well so I am so thankful to have someone learn along with me. (In this photo it may appear as we are in a deep conversation about how this bee install is about to go down, but in reality we were talking about how it's nearly impossible to itch your nose with the bee hood on! It's serious stuff people! LOL!)

Thanks to another neighbor and amazing mentor to both Billie & I, we installed my package a bit differently than most. It's a bit more gentle as well. Instead of spraying them with sugar water and shaking them into the hive we removed enough frames to slide the bee packages into the hive box. After the queen cage is out and placed between frames we opened the top piece of the package and covered up the hive box to allow the bees to come out on their own. 

We inspected each of the queen cages to make sure the queen was alive and doing okay.

I wish I would have gotten some more close up pictures, but I handed my camera over to Chase and asked him to stay a ways back because he doesn't have a suit to protect him. Once the feeders were filled with sugar water and everything was closed up, we left the bees to do their thing and hope the queen would make her way out within a few a days.  

The following Tuesday our bee mentor stopped by for a quick inspection to make sure the queen was released. We found the queen in the east hive and they had been busy building foundation but no eggs yet. We didn't locate the queen in the west hive, but they were building foundation like crazy but again no eggs. At that point it had only been three days so I was told not to worry just yet. I worry every day that I'm going to go down to the hives and find no bees, but so far so good! Today, he is coming back to help me do a full inspection! I'm super excited!!!

The pasture they are located in has been full of beautiful clover and I'm hoping they love their new home. 

Minus a few seeds that refused to come up; which I'll be replanting this week, the garden is growing fairly well. 

Between ball games, weddings, photo sessions, and the end of the school year craziness; the kids have been fantastic help keeping it all going. 

The lettuce and radishes that we planted in Coe's garden box are doing great. 

And the strawberries are overflowing! 

 Infact, last night I sent the boys out to pick some and they returned with NINE Pounds!

We had strawberries and ice-cream after supper and there is strawberry jam making in our afternoon plans today!

I hope everyone is enjoying this amazing time of year!

:: Weekend Recap | Camping & Making Memories ::

We've been looking forward to this last weekend for a long time & it was a great one.
A busy one, but one where so many memories were made!
I should start by explaining that our little campground is back in our timber. Just far enough from the house to feel like a get away & at the same time close enough to run up and do chores or get that ten thousandth thing we forgot.

We began setting up Thursday night because the weekend was also filled with a tball game, 4 photo sessions,

 2 graduation parties, and 1 bee delivery! (I'll talk more about my bees in a post later this week.)

 Again, camping close to home has it's major perks; like hot showers!
Friday night was just us. We had hotdogs & brats, enjoyed the fire for a bit & hit the sack (aka air mattress).

Saturday & Sunday brought the big fun! Some friends came to camp with us & the kids couldn't have been more excited. They rode bikes, played in the creek & found a SNAPPING TURTLE ( I bold that because the excitement that came with their announcement of finding said snapping turtle became the theme/laugh of our whole weekend),

played on the rope swing,

colored,

welcomed home my nieces track team who took 5th in two of their relays at State,

did a few fireworks & sparklers,

and we ate A LOT of food! I don't even want to begin to imagine how many calories we took in.

It was a great weekend! Even if it did rain on us & my washer and dryer haven't stopped running for two days. Yep, it was a great weekend! Thank you Salmon's for being a part of it!

:: Our Story & Celebrating 13 years of Marriage ::

So, the story goes ...

It all started in 1997 when I fell in love with this boy in Ag class.

He was ornery, rebellious and the only one my Dad actually had a "talking to" before we went out on our first date. But, he was and still is the most compassionate & caring man I've ever met. We were inseparable from that moment on.
After High School we had big plans; get married, build a log cabin and fill it with lots of babies. (Okay, so I had plans to fill it with at least 4-6 babies but he said 1. We compromised and stopped at 3! Phew! LOL!)
In May of 2001 we were driving down backroads and came across a house with a barn that was for sale. I remember saying "Oh, it's so cute! I love it!" It was small but it was just what we were looking for.

After what seemed to be the longest process ever; on July 17, 2001 we bought our first home & the 85 acres it sat on. Thanks to a whole lot of help & sweat from family & friends we made it HOME.

On May 18, 2002 we were married & welcomed baby number 1 that September.

 While things didn't happen the exact way or in the exact order we had "dreamed"; I wouldn't have it any other way! We now have 3 amazing kids and I'm proud to say I am married to my best friend.

Yesterday we celebrated 13 years of marriage & over 18 years together. We didn't buy each other gifts, but we did spend the entire day together building fence & working on a little play area for the kids down at our campground.

The little playhouse Aaron built when the boys were little and it's been sitting up by the house where no one really played in it anymore. It's perfect in it's new home at the campground.

I also insisted we needed a sandbox for them to play in since the one up by our house gets used SO much! After some contemplating on how to make one (and keep it free) it dawned on me :: a tractor tire! My grandparents had one that we played in for years. A quick call to a friend and we now have a sandbox! Score! 

And last but not least, a swing. The kids all voted on a simple rope swing with a knot. Perfect & easy!  A call to another friend (whom my hubby likes to give a hard time to for keeping things; but who also within minutes came through on the rope!) For real, friends are the best & our kids as well as theirs are going to have SO much fun on all of this when we camp! I can't wait for this weekend!

Once the boys got home from school we started on the fence building. Yet another project I asked to get started and Aaron is making happen. He's pretty amazing.

We got the fence posts finished and ready to stretch the wire. 

It was a beautiful, productive day & I'm thankful for every moment.