Thursday, May 26, 2011

the queen is free!

yesterday, we inspected the hive (hive #2) that we packaged last week...the queen has been released from the queen cage! it is amazing to see how much the worker bees have done in only 1 week! they have been out foraging everyday, and have 3-4 frames covered with comb! when we removed the queen cage, part of the comb was stuck to it. in the comb are tiny little eggs...so the queen is doing a great job!

beautiful new comb! inside is pollen and eggs from the queen!
we have decided to split hive #1! we are going to have 5 frames of brood and honey (frames with queen cells on them) and put them into an empty hive. within a few days the new queen should hatch...and then we will have 3 hives!

Thursday, May 19, 2011

hiving a package of bees for our 2nd hive...

today, we drove to "trail's end farm" in richmond, ri and picked up a 3 lb package of bees with a russian hybrid queen! this package is for our 2nd hive. here is a video of us doing the installation...my poor bee-aphobic sister served as the camera man. this was the first time doing this... so we went on what we learned and from other people advice! usually, when hiving a package of bees you literally shake/ dump the bees out of the box into the hive...we have had terrible weather here lately. it has rained for almost 2 weeks straight (and the forcast call for rain till sunday). so we were literally doing this between rain showers, our bee supplier told us to just put the whole box in the hive and let them come out on their own. so thats what we did. we will check them out in a few days and make sure the queen has been released and add the rest of the frames to the super!

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

honey oatmeal raisin cookies!

~1 cup (2 sticks) softened butter
~1 1/4 packed brown sugar
~2 eggs
~2 tsp vanilla ext
~2 tbsp honey
~1 1/2 cups flour
~3 cups rolled oats
~1 tsp baking soda
~1 tsp cinnamon
~1/2 tsp ground ginger
~1 cup raisins

using a stand mixer cream together softened butter, brown sugar, eggs, honey and vanilla ext; in a separate bowl combine flour, oats, baking soda, cinnamon and ginger; add 1/3 of the dry mixture at a time to the wet ingredients; once mixed together, stir in raisins...bake at 350 degrees, for about 12-15 minutes.

Saturday, May 14, 2011

birthday, bees, peas & chickens..the month of may!

6 years ago today, at 7:08am, i was blessed with a second healthy baby boy! a little sweetie with blonde hair and sparkling blue eyes...my doctor said he was one of the most handsome boys he had ever seen. he was born with his hand up over his head "waving hello"... yesterday, i asked him if he could stay 6 years old forever and always be "my boy"....he told me that he couldn't stay 6 forever, but he would always be my baby :) happy birthday "DD"! mommy loves you so much & you make my world brighter everyday!

in bee related news...our package of bees (for our second hive) has been delayed for over 3 weeks now, because of the terrible weather in the south! we finally got word that our girls will be here next weekend! yayy, i cant wait! yesterday, we attempted another hive inspection on hive #1...i say "attempted" because we had a smoker malfunction...and by malfunction i mean it would not stay lit and SMOKE...we have tried different flamables in the smoker and for some reason we can not get it to smolder for longer than a few minutes?!? anyone have any smoker tricks?...so, i pulled the cover off, and without the smoker they were pretty irritated and stung me through my jeans on my leg. so we decided to let them BEE and come back another day with a working smoker.

"johnny" our ri red rooster!


our chicks are 9 weeks old, all healthy and loving being outdoors. i love watching them...they have such personalities :) AND we have peas, beans, raddish, butter~leaf lettuce, and strawberries all coming up in our new raised beds! other exciting news...next week there is a livestock auction that i am looking forward to! i almost have my husband convinced to let me get 2 goats...maybe "feta" and "cheddar" will come home with us next weekend!

peas!

Tuesday, May 3, 2011

my recycled feed-bag totes!

my husband bought me a sewing machine last christmas and i finally have it up and running! i have a few feed bags that i have been saving because i wanted to try to make a recycled tote. i haven't used a sewing machine since home-ec in junior high! so my stiches aren't perfect, but i can live with it! these feed bags are made of very strong plastic and are perfect for groceries...plus i love the animal pictures!
- cut the top & bottom of the feed sack off, clean the outside and inside of sack with water or lysol wipe
- turn inside-out
- decide where you want the center of your tote to be...trim extra off
- sew 1 inch hem around top of tote
- i made a squared bottom, but you could close the bottom however you wanted
- attach handles

Monday, May 2, 2011

sad day...

i read a quote on another blog that said, "when you keep livestock, expect to have dead-stock"...well, yesterday was a sad day around here...one of our 7 week old chicks died unexpectedly :( it had no signs of illness or injury...it just died! my poor 8 year old son was the one to find her (everytime he comes home he runs to the coop to see them). this was kinda the first time we had to have the "life & death" discussion with him, he is quite a sensitive boy...so it was hard. he gets really attached to all the animal. it broke my heart when he told me that he wished he could of saved her. i told him that sometimes these things just happen...and we should be happy about the other healthy chicks we still have. poor kid...it's alot to think about for a child. especially for one so sensitive and loving.

follow me...i follow back!!!