A Nice Walk, Harvesting Honey, and Picking Apples or How The Weekend Flies!

As the kids get older, it is hard for all of us to be together at the same time once the school year begins..

and so it was when we headed out for pizza on Friday night.

No Sorcha.  Sigh. 

She was off having fun with a friend watching a

Lord of The Rings Marathon

(why didn't they ask me?  I'd have gone!)

and then zipping up to The Cities to Como Zoo.

(ditto) 

But we managed just fine.

We love walking Levee Park after Godfather's Pizza.

The evening was BEAUTIFUL!

 So we also went to Penguin Zesto!

Saturday morning was tempting to stay in bed and get

caught up on sleep...feeling a bit post operative come the end of most days and that's all I can think of...WHEN IS BEDTIME?

But I had a learning opportunity I did not wish to miss...

HONEY HARVEST!

Our neighbor a few miles east of here, Krolls, invited me over to 

see how things work and help out!

 Here's the comb right out of the hive (which Mr. Kroll had brought in the day before....no bees in the garage!)

 Here he is using a "hot" knife to uncap the cells.

 The next station is to pick at any uncapped ones and to remove any dead bees or baby bees.

 This is the extractor where 2 trays go...

The handle is cranked to spin the honey right out of the combs...

so simple a child can do it...so that's the job I got a bit later!

 Here is the golden honey pouring out of the extractor....

Then it is heated slightly so it will pour through the cheesecloth

easier...it was a bit chilly Saturday morning!

And VIOLA!  That is it!  Each bucket holds about 40 pounds of BEAUTIFUL

GOLDEN
HONEY!  

They were hoping to extract 300 pounds!

WOW!

 Here I am working the extractor...

 The hives (minus most of the trays)

 Sawyer was a good little worker!

Meanwhile back at our little farm...

APPLE PICKING DAY!

 We have horrible luck with apple trees...

 Anything that can kill or cripple an apple tree,

we've experienced...

Rust, Drought, Flooding, Late Killing Frost

Rabbits (girdled ALL the trees a few years ago)

Tent Caterpillars, moles,

 and 2 huge pines 

SQUISHED FLAT two of our trees...

drove them into the ground just like nails!

One two separate occasions!

Yep...just bad luck!
So you can see why we are so happy when Fall

comes and we actually have apples!

 Not the original apples we planted over 15 years ago.

But the apple type that grew from the root stock.

One tree is super sweet....one is super sour...and one did not produce a single apple!

 FUN!

 Even Pippin got in on the adventure...yep he ate the WHOLE thing! Funny dog!

Sorcha helped, too, but the pics just didn't turn out.

Sorry Sorcha.

This is the simple life I LOVE LOVE LOVE!
Feeling blessed!