Removing our unwelcomed guests

We discovered honey bees in the wall of our kitchen bay window last Saturday morning.  This was the second time we've had then in roughly the same spot.  Last time, we had them exterminated and never had the comb removed or did any bee proofing.  Well, two plus years later, they returned.  Turns out that new bees are drawn by the pheromones the old ones left.  A few years older and wiser, we opted for a live removal, bee proofing and repair.  Finding the bees wasn't as easy as I would have liked.  And as our contractor K took off layers of wood, we discovered we had more rotten wood than we thought we had.  But he finally found the bees, the comb and some honey and went to work vacuuming them out.

He used a shop vac with a "bee filter" on it.  After gathering the bulk of the bees, he checked for a queen.  It's all about the queen where honey bees are concerned.  If you have her, all the rest will follow.  Satisfied that he had her, our contractor set the boxes out to gather the rest of the hive.  As you can see in the photo on the right, the bees gathered on the box where the queen was, where K simply vacuumed them into a separate box.  (He'll later combine the bees into a box, reset the combs into a frame and deliver them to a beekeeper in the area.)  K's estimate for this hive: about 3000 bees.  Sure didn't seem like that many...

The job was mostly done by the time I picked JHP up from school.  I went out to talk to the contractor and take some photos, but John wasn't interested in joining me.  But he couldn't stand not to see what was going on either.  The kitchen window didn't show him what he wanted to see, so he went to the bathroom and carried his big heavy step stool over to the back door, where he could see all the bees safely from behind the door.  I didn't know he could actually carry the stool.  I imagine now I'll see it all over the house.

The exposed house is covered with plastic sheeting while we make some decisions and some phone calls on just what to do next.  Since things are somewhat exposed, do we go ahead and replace the windows there that we've been talking about doing for months?  Or just repair the outside and worry about the windows later?  Decisions, decisions.

-EBP-

Read more...

Lots of good stuff

We made it to Froberg's on Friday to pick some strawberries.  It was a totally different experience from last year.  I think we went Good Friday last year and so it was SUPER busy.  But this year, we arrived early and had lots of space to ourselves.  Last year, the berries were huge and ripe ones were easily found.  I don't think we travelled but about halfway down the row before our buckets were filled.  This year, there were lots of berries, but they were smaller and many were rotting on the plant.  It's been hotter earlier this year and it's been dry, dry, dry. 

 Last year John was really into picking and did a wonderful job of picking this good ones. This year he was just at good at getting the good ones, but he lost interest quickly.  In fact, he got more of a thrill out of running up and down the empty rows than he did picking the strawberries.  But he was still glad we went to pick is "favorite fruit."

Later that evening John got a package in the mail from Grandma and Paw Paw.  Even if we'd wanted to save it for Easter, there was no way John would have made it through the evening knowing there was a package with his name on it in the house.  So, we let him open it, mostly for our own peace of mind.  As you can see, it was an Easter basket in a box, complete with a cute little stuffed lamb, some candy, a card, a coloring book, and a little handheld game.

 In addition, there were a couple of eggs with some goodies.  Among the goodies, some money.

And taking after his father, he know exactly where his money belongs: the BANK!  In his case, it's one of his piggy banks.  Believe it or not, without any encouragement from us, he loves to put his money in his bank.  I know one day that will change, but for now, his little stash will continue to grow.

The rest of the weekend has been kinda low-key.  We did try out a new Mexican food restaurant last night.  It has a cool play area for the kids and great food, too.  And tonight, we went to have some family photos taken - by a professional!  I actually won a free mini-shoot from a newer photographer in the area that I met recently.  It was a bit awkward for me since I'm usually behind the camera, but the experience was an enjoyable one.  Can't wait to see how they turn out! 

The only other remarkable thing about the weekend is that John did not nap yesterday or today.  I think that made it 4 or 5 out of 7 days that he did NOT nap this week.  He can make it until bedtime on no nap, but sometimes it's not pleasant.  Typically, when he's beyond tired he just starts acting obnoxiously silly and won't listen to anything you say, which leads to unhappy parents.  And that turns into an emotional mess of a boy when all is said and done.  It can be painful for all involved.  We are still enforcing quiet time, but I guess I need to rethink our procedure to encourage the quiet part.  Maybe this week will be better.

-EBP-

Read more...

Hunting eggs

Last Saturday we went to a Easter Egg Hunt at the church where John goes to school.  It was a warm day and we played around a long time before the hunting actually began.  But as you can see, although John was red-cheeked, he was quite excited to be waiting for the hunt to begin.

 I had to laugh at his approach to hunting.  He ran through lots of eggs to find the ones farthest away and most difficult to find.  Gotta check out this video to see him in action. 

He did come home with a decent amount of eggs.  Thankfully, it was mostly gummies and tattoos.

A nice man offered to take our photo.  John's looking dazed and I'm squinting, but at least we were in it  together.  (Daddy had decided to stay home and mow.)

It's been a busy week.  It was the last week for my Wednesday Bible Study and today was an event at church that I photographed.  And when I wasn't attending, I was getting ready for both events in a variety of ways.  Mix that in with John going to school, a baseball game with Barbara, and thinking about the bees that moved into the kitchen wall (AGAIN) and I'm one tired woman.  One bright spot is that my FOUR volumes of 2009's blog came in the mail yesterday.  Only one glaring error I've discovered so far.  Can you see it?  You might need to click the photo to see it larger.

Tomorrow we'll go pick strawberries at Froberg's where we went last year.  So, look for some new photos in the next couple of days.  I'm smart enough not to promise them tomorrow, though!

-EBP-

Read more...