Hive check today.

 I checked my bee hives today. 1st time for both swarm hives.  Both doing great! Lots of honey and pollen. I couldn't find the queens but I know they are in there.


This is the big hive. The 2nd swarm came from this hive. These frames are FULL of honey! Not 100% capped yet, but will be ready to harvest in a few weeks! It is SO good too.

                                                   Look at that! Just a beautiful sight to see.

This is the 1st swarm hive. I had to scrape off all the burr comb, loaded with honey. I had to run get a bowl first. They weren't all too happy about this at all. But had to be done. I had to put another box on for them. And I had to inner cover put on wrong, so they were building comb too high. All looked good in this hive too. But they were a pissy lot of bees in here!

This is a frame from that hive. They are hard workers, these girls! Lots of pollen and honey and I think I saw brood.

They other swarm hive looked really good too. It's been 2 weeks today that I caught them. They were building lots of comb and generally happy laid back bees in this hive.

I love this picture.  That's the bowl with the honeycomb, a smoker and a hive tool.

So my bee yard is looking good so far. I'll wait awhile to add another box on the other hive. They still had 4 frames not drawn yet.

I LOVE having bees! I never would have thought I'd be a bee keeper. But I really do enjoy having bees here. I love walking by them, telling them good morning as I'm looking for dandelions. I talk to them during the day when I'm out in the garden. They are just fun to have around. Everyone should have a hive of honey bees.

The last kid...

just left Outback Farm this morning.

Little Sorren went to another farm not too far from here a little while ago. Wow. I had 4 little kids, now they are all gone. Now I will be milking 2 does twice a day. Getting 2 gallons of milk a day. What will I do with all this milk?

I need a bottle calf. And a few pigs. Because we cannot possibly drink all this milk. Or eat so much feta and chevre. Or make soap all the time. I only have 1 1/2 gallons a week going out to friends too. I really need to get certified to sell milk now. I am feeling just a bit overwhelmed right now. I put about 4 gallons of milk in the freezer for soap making. But that hardly made a dent. I am going to have a cheese making workshop here in a few weeks too.

                         Here is a fence full of honeysuckles. It smells SO good around here right now!

I am frantically getting ready for a big show down at Mt. Cove Farm at the old barn this weekend. Friday and Saturday, all day, I will be there with my soaps. And I hope to have some of my pottery too. And I will be spinning a lot of this sheep and alpaca wool for those 2 days. So no market for me today. Gotta go to the pottery studio and do some things there this afternoon.

Y'all have a great Monday!

Making something pretty out of ugly.

I made these 2 the other day. They are both really wonky and I should have just smashed them and started over. But I didn't. So I let them dry a few days.

And this is them today. I feel like they are both really cute pieces of pottery now. Something that can be used. I just like them. I etched little flowers on the inside of the bowl, all the way around.

This one, I used a different tool to get the deeper lines. Then etched little flowers along the rim. Very cute now. Sometimes, you just never know how a bowl or mug or plate will turn out.

This is another bowl I thought I should have smashed. But I made little scallops and added flowers too. Turned another wonky ugly bowl into something that's cute and functional.

The pot with the lid I made the other day too. I had made a different lid for it, but couldn't get the handle to stick. So I watched a few videos on how to make lids and did this one. It's from a video of a guy who was making garlic pots. That's what the holes are for. I wish I had his little hole making tool. Maybe I'll have one some day.

I hope I can do something with that really wonky bowl in the left back now. It was a mess.

Sometimes I feel like I should not be at the wheel. Then some days I can make some pretty cool things. I will not give up!