Bob was a mensch and came with me — here is a nice photo of us from the class CD at the dinner — I won one of the New Mexico raffle baskets — a chili Ristra.
Sept. 19, 2012 Pulling the honey
We “pulled the honey” today — very labor intensive, mostly from Bob’s end — You take off the “shallow supers” that are full of frames of honey and VERY heavy. You brush off the bees, and put the frames into cardboard boxes covered with a wet towel to keep the bees from going back on the frames. Then you close the hive back up. Neither of us were stung, eve though we were taking their winter food 🙁 But after a bit they all went back home. They will have plenty (so we are told) to carry them through the winter.
The shallow white and wood colored boxes were full of honey frames until we took them away.
The next step is to rent an extractor and centrifuge the honey out of the frames and then strain it and collect it in big buckets with a lid and a spout at the bottom. We will take a sample to our mentor and supplier to test for moisture content, buy the buckets, the strainer and a scratcher (to get the caps off the honey cells) that looks like a small rake.
We will also buy some bottles for the final step and I also ordered this label for our honey. Look for it in your Christmas stocking 🙂
50th high school reunion, Rapid City, SD. Sept. 7,8 and 9. 2012
Bob and I drove out to the Black Hills (an experience in itself — one does indeed look forward to “Wall Drug” after hours in the car without much to look at). The reunion itself was actually quite fun — seeing all those people again 50 years later.
Click on the link to see the moving experience we had watching a bronze pour in Hill City, SD (then read the little poem I wrote when I came back home)
bronze pour
I am glad I went
Glad I saw all of us – who went to school together,
To see what became of us as we grew up and grew old.
I could see the basic essence of that young man or young woman
Now brought to maturity and polished with the seams, mistakes, rough edges
smoothed out, burnished over like the making of the bronze we watched together.
Everyone was just the same – what they were underneath – then in young bodies now in old ones.
It was reassuring to see all of you, my same age, my mirrors, my past, my remindings.
Touch base again, maybe for the last time.
Sept. 9. 2012
Hatch green chilis August 15, 2012
Got our shipment of Hatch green chilis (Big Jims) today – USPS flat rate package —- I long for this time of year in Santa Fe when they roast these chilis in big wire tumbling baskets outside the grocery stores. The smell of green chili roasting is worth the cost of shipping from Hatch NM and doing them on the grill — a little rusty — did not remember exactly how to do it and had a big flare up — Now I just found Julia’s (Meeks) recipe for green chili chowder — the Santa Fe Family Center staff entered this one in the chili contest. We didn’t win but a lot of people liked it. Have to go to the store and get the Miso and the white cheddar cheese. It also has potatoes, the green chilis of course, and red onions…..
Garrison Keillor at the DFL picnic July 16, 2012
Garrison flies into the twin cities (click on this Youtube link to see a little movie of Garrison – if it doesn’t come up, right click on the link and choose “open in a new window”)
Garrison Keillor eats at the picnic. He said, “If you a Democrat … and what they give you is a plate of beans …you eat it and are thankful.”
A little video of our local DFL picnic with Garrison Keillor. He nearly made me cry about being a Democrat — how the affordable care act is a decent and honorable thing to do — He said 10% of the people use 90% of the health care and it’s true — because we know those people… the baby that is born with lots of congenital problems, the young woman with Lou Gehrig’s disease….. he said in America we do not throw these people in the ditch.
7.11.12 poised for flight
About a second after this photo was taken all five chicks took flight out through the garage door. I think I startled them and felt bad. They were flying around the yard and driveway. Three came back to the nest for one night, but haven’t seen them since. I hope they made it.
July 8, 2012 birds and bees and prairie — and Bob’s airplane
Starting to get crowded in there
Bees are doing better — they were hanging outside the hive in the incredible heat — must be hotter than hell in there — they look more normal today
bergamot and fragrant hysop in bloom
Echinacea – aka purple coneflower
Bob says, “It flies on Tuesday.” He pulled the Coachman out of the woods — Oshkosh is two weeks away — and brought the engine out of the basement. Son Bob put it together in Las Vegas with some of his buddies.
6.28.12 Dr Seuss barn swallow chicks
They think they are hiding… but you get the picture
June 27, 2012 birds,bees and garden
Thanks to the Martinez family for redoing my ornamental garden.
Alfredo and his sons, David and Michael, dug up the grass infested front yard garden that I was unable to do anymore…. bless them
the Buddha and the marigolds
garden “after” — about a month from the makeover
after
Bob says, “it looks like I know what I am doing.”
lots of bees — very peaceful — can you find the queen? — we never can….
I don’t think we have bluebirds this year, but we do have barn swallows in the garage — right above the door to the house…… neither of us had the heart to clear them out. So we leave the garage door a bit open even at night and when we are gone .. they fly right under.
always…the prairie. You can see butterfly weed (orange) the prairie sage, wild bergamot and fragrant hyssop about to bloom and the new hive in the background.