Hives and Coffee

We had quite the eventful weekend. We attending our beekeeping school - something that we've both been looking so forward to, for a few reasons. We learned that we know more than we think we know, we learned more of what we didn't know and we feel more comfortable than we ever have about adding bees to the farm...and we picked up our hives! That's right - we picked up two full kits (with tops, inner covers, bases etc.), along with two additional brooder boxes and four honey supers - we should be all set in getting these bees settled in and producing honey. We've heard mixed opinions on a honey harvest - some people have said we can expect a small honey harvest this fall and others say we should leave the honey with the bees...I say, we let the bees guide us. No sense in stripping them of their food, just to spend the winter wondering if they have enough food - but if they go crazy gangbusters and have enough yummy goodness to share with us...then we will gladly take a bit of honey off the top. This past weekend, we were able to build the two main brooder boxes with all the necessary pieces to get our hives up and running - we'll build the additional pieces as we have time.

Drake, Master Carpenter

Hammering in the frame foundation.

Ratta tap tap...

More frame building.

Look at that beautiful completed frame - can't wait until these are covered with bee brood.

Fancy beewear!

Cora modeling my bee jacket lol.

Oh, wow - the living room was quite the mess.

Stuff was all over the place.

Cora is helping hammer a brooder box together.

Building our hives, lid and brooder boxes.

Mark and Drake putting together the boxes.

Proud father and son moment.

Look at that awesome completed hive! We have two just like this and will be adding additional brooder boxes and honey supers.

We are officially ready for our honey bees. We'll be getting two nucs in the middle of April.

In addition to becoming bee hive owners this past weekend, we also were surprised by (yet another) new baby!!! This one is a buck Oberhasli/Angora cross. His name is Coffee and he is Itty Bitty's baby. He is absolutely adorable. He and his Mama have figure out the whole nursing thing, all by theirselves. He is just as sweet as can be.

Mama Itty and Baby Coffee...I love his smirk in this photo.

Time to eat!

Coffee

Coffee!!!

Coffee!!!!!

Coffee!!!!!!!

Coffeeeeeeee!!!!!

Itty and apparently something I'm going to need more of around here...COFFEE!!! LOL

I'm going to knock on wood while I write this, but we've had four mamas give birth to six babies and everyone has done amazing. I'm so proud of all of my girls and their beautiful babies. Soon we'll be milking Mabel and Flora (once we wean the babies) and we'll be able to have milk and cheese (and soap?!) from our backyard. We'll also be shearing the fiber animals in about a month or so - before the hot weather rolls in.
Milk, soap, cheese, honey, fiber...soon chickens will be here for meat and eggs...this place...it grows on ya'

Mama Mabel

It happened! I'm so freaking excited!!! Mabel gave birth to two beautiful baby girls this evening. Both girls, both healthy, both nursing, both walking around...everyone is quite tired, as you can imagine. Of course Mabel chose when I wasn't even home to give birth and all of us missed the actual act. I had to run Cora to Dayton for a trip to the ENT (survey says...she needs her tonsils and adenoids taken out - no shocker there!) - they are hoping to get Drake and her scheduled on the same day (if Drake indeed needs his taken)....more to that story later. 

I had last checked Mabel and Flora around 1:45 this afternoon and while I noticed that Mabel was especially grumpy, I thought we had a little time. Although her whoha looked glossy - there wasn't a noticeable drip/ooze coming from it. I asked my daughter, Kait, and her boyfriend, David, to check the girls before Kait went to work (if Mark wasn't home yet). Gage and Drake checked her around 3:30 and....nothing...no babies. BUT, by the time Mark got home at around 4:35...two babies were surrounding Mabel!! I was still about an hour from being home (GRR...I missed it!). I got a text from Mark "Two Babies! Call Me!". I started to cry in both celebration and frustration that I missed it. Cora and I spent the trip home high fiving each other, dancing and singing along to the radio - both hoping that the hour trip home would pass by quickly. 

When we got home, Mark was waiting in the driveway with a pair of boots for each of us....and then, we laid eyes on those sweet little babies...Now, I'll share them with all of you...

....and here are some of the most adorable videos you'll ever see...



Fate2010

Anyone who knows me at all, knows that I'm not a religious person in the typical sense. I'm not Christian...I don't "Bible"...but I do believe in fate and signs and alternate meanings in things. I try to read what fate is telling to do and where it wants me to go. Sometimes I'm dead on and other times dead wrong. Let me just share the last few days with you and perhaps you can read into my fate as well.
As I said before, I was invited to my company's All Staff - which I also heard referred to as "Some Staff" (since they cut back on invites due to size of the company - too funny!). Only program managers (PMs) were expected to be invited to the event and I somehow got on the list!!! My PM asked me to help our marketing team put together a portion of their slide show for the All Staff meeting. I created a couple of slides describing how our field staff approaches our events. As terrifying of a thought getting up in front of my entire company and giving a speech is - I knew that if the speech went well it will put me in a better position...more in the forefront of everyone's brain and perhaps open up doors for me with other programs. The speech went great. Although I couldn't tell you what exactly I said and how I said it (I think I blacked out a little bit) I know that people seemed engaged with what I had to say. I was approached by other employees (higher, much higher up employees) thanking me for giving them insight into what our field staff experiences.
Prior to standing up for the events portion of the speech, I was also given the HONOR of being named the Volunteer of the Year and received recognition for all the hard work that Mark, the kids and I have done for our community. In addition to this honor, I was named the Community Service Team leader and am now going to play a greater role in our company's impact on the environment and in all communities that our company has representation. I am extremely excited about this.
However, I felt a little like All Staff was turning into the "Shelby Show" :-) It felt good to be recognized on both a personal and professional level. I feel good...I feel confident...I love my job. I know that some people have found our restructuring challenging - but I understand that with growth like this there is bound to be great changes and being across the country in the field shields me from much of the challenging part of the restructure. I feel like greater things are on my horizon and to quote an email I received, I feel like I "definitely made yourself known this week in Portland."
In addition to all the wonderful strides in the workplace - I was able to meet up with two of my favorite people. My girl who helped my connect with my company in the first place and another girl I went to high school with and haven't seen in 14 years! It was great to spend time in Portland, drinking, fooding, laughing, farmer's marketing, laughing, laughing, laughing...I wish Mark could come out to Portland with me though - just the two of us - so I can expose him to that part of my world.
So after all that...here is where some of the fate part comes in...prior to going out to Portland there was talk about a potential program in upstate NY. Which would be great! But Florida would be better - any where south would be better. So the first conversation I have - a potential new program...in Florida!!! On that same day, the high temperature was the same in Dayton as it was...in Florida (Mark is tracking temps with his class). On that same day, I received my new credit card...the first step in building my credit to potentially buying our farm (...in Florida???).
It is less than 8 weeks until Mark's graduation! Less...than...eight...weeks!
Wheels are turning faster now.
Oh! I forgot!!! I checked the garden after being gone for a handful of days...blueberry and strawberry blossoms galore, green pepper starts, more watermelon and cucumber starts. Oh!!!! BABY!!!! It is looking good out there.

Where will fate take us?

It's 145 days until Mark graduates...145 days! If you only knew how long of a process this has been. I mean, Mark has only been going 6 years (not bad if you think that most people do it in 5 years and we've moved to Florida and back, had babies etc.) but school has just been such a big deciding factor in our lives...I am incredibly proud of Mark for sticking with school and not giving up. He's an amazing father and I cannot wait to see him teach his very own classroom full of children. He's trying to figure out ways to integrate "green" lessons with science and math - imagine children cooking their afternoon snack in solar ovens that they made by hand! ...and I am so excited to be even the slightest part of all this.
We've been thinking about the garden a lot lately...my girl in Portland has hers already planned out...but (as usual) life has been crazy busy and I haven't had the chance to complete my excel sheet (maybe today?) - that's right people, I use an excel spreadsheet to layout my garden. Mark refers to me as "planner girl" - I HAVE to have a plan. I want the garden to be both pretty and functional and couldn't stand to look at it if my tomato plants were planted all haphazard throughout the garden...Last year, we built the trellis for the beans and cucumbers out of gathered sticks - this year I think we will do more of the same...but want to make sure that they are done earlier in the season. We'll share spreadsheets and pictures when we have them ready. Right now, our garden is sleeping soundly with a layer of leaves on top. Our potted plants are looking pretty sad - but I'm hoping that they will spring back to life come late March, early April...I've never done the container garden and am hoping that these wintry, cold, snowy days haven't affected my blackberries, raspberries, strawberries and blueberries. I'm thinking of getting a couple of small fruit trees to start in pots and then by the time we have our home - we can plant them in the ground and enjoy the fruit. Fresh apple pie anyone?
So here's a question - if you could live any where you REALLY wanted to...where would it be. Think of it though - think of all the things that you need to consider...could you find work, is a local university important to you (to further your degree or just take some classes), what is the climate that you prefer, could you AFFORD the housing there? That is where we are at right now. The program where I work will not be around forever...perhaps it will last until the end of this year - or maybe squeeze another year out of it and then...who knows? So what does that mean for my career? I absolutely love what I do - I love the interaction with people, I love the flexibility, I have a great boss - I'd want to stay with the company as long as they have a position available...but where IS that position? Could there be another move in our future? We talked with the family last night and all came to the conclusion that Ohio really isn't what we thought it would be. I guess we had a case of the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. We felt drawn to Florida originally because we are all water people - we love to dig our toes in the sand. However, when we came home for a visit - we felt drawn back to Ohio to be near family and have the four seasons. We know that fate brought us to Florida and back to Ohio - we are here for a reason. Soon we will have the opportunity to move on (if we choose) and frankly being here in Ohio (to reference Big Fish) we are all "drying out". Everyone is open to moving - we never know how the kids will react to something like this - but they all seem up for the adventure. So where will fate bring us next? Still in Ohio - just outside of where we are now? We know that this city doesn't have the land we would need to do what we want...We'd have to be pretty far north or east of where we are. North Carolina? South Carolina? Georgia coast? Florida panhandle? Oregon? (ok...Oregon might be a little far...but if that is where fate is telling us - then we will follow) - We do feel that the next move will be the last. We see us buying the home/barn of our dreams, filling our pantry with foods from our land, building/rehabbing to fit our needs/wants, having amazing indoor and outdoor spaces for us to enjoy.
I feel like we talk about fate a lot. For us...that IS our religion. We don't believe in the Bible or the typical "Christian God" - but we do believe that there is a plan out there. We are supposed to be in certain places at certain times and cross paths with certain people - every moment is one to learn from, to grow from. I have a tattoo on my arm - it is Sanskrit for "Everything Happens For a Reason" - we very much believe this. I have the tattoo - because when times are tough, it's not always easy to remember that - that moment is happening FOR A REASON. Looking at my wrist has gotten me through some really tough times in the past.
....hmmm so where WILL fate take us?