Quiet Morning

Good Morning!! It has been a LONG week. Work wise I'm doing well. Its a fast paced environment so I get home exhausted. Its good to be back doing something though. I'm finding it difficult to getting used to the juggling again. I know that this will come with time, but I hate forgetting things and not having dinner at least prepped at night. Next week I'm really going to focus on that.

The Man and Gabbie are still sleeping and I am enjoying the quiet for a change. I can truly say that I haven't had much quiet time lately and its something that I enjoy. No TV, no screaming baby, no constant talking, no noise. Just the hum of the laptop and occasionally the refrigerator.

Last Sunday we took a long walk around the farm and I snapped a couple pictures. Gabbie had cabin fever BAD!!! She had been cooped up inside for too long. So we bundled her up, put her in the stroller, and took a nice long walk.





We also harvested our honey this week. Its was cool to finally see a result of all our work. Thank the Lord for our mentors! We wouldn't have been able to do it without them. We got around 25 lbs of honey and its a good quality too! its about 16.5% water and it tastes wonderful. As you can tell its got a gorgeous dark amber color which is indicative of poplar trees. The Man has a renewed interest in beekeeping now and we both want to try and expand next season. Only time will tell.




I am currently waging war inside my home. For those of you that know me personally, you know I am scared of one thing in this world...mice. Well the other day I went to open a lower cabinet and one of those nasty things was right there!! Of course I started screaming bloody murder!!! I know I live in the country and I know that it is "inevitable" but I will not tolerate them in my house. I can't imagine how the hell it got in to begin with. I want to call out an exterminator but I know that would be beyond our price range! As we speak my wonderful silent morning has been invaded with tiny chewing and scurrying sounds!!! ITS BACK!!!! I think I'm going to call a local pest company and see what they charge. I know that they're in the attic as well so The Man and Poppa may have some work to do VERY soon. God this is driving me CRAZY!!!

Today we are planning on taking Gabbie to the pumpkin patch. This was an annual tradition when Mabel and I were small. Mother and Poppa took us every year. It is something that I want to start with my children as well. Mother and I are going to do a bit of grocery shopping as well. She needs food and snacks for Gabbie during the week so we are going to hook her up. I will definitely be taking pictures so you will be seeing our day!

I need to get some projects done. My niece Emily will be here any day now and I have to get her present done. The Man is contemplating driving to NC when she is born. Gabbie and I can't go with but I think he needs to. I will just have to wait to see her beautiful face :( So I need to get that done soon that way when we get the call he can take it with. I've start on my Christmas presents and need to get them done too. I can't wait to see what everyone else I making!! It should be interesting!!

The Man is officially done cutting wood!!! YIPPY!!! We have about 2 years worth in the barn! I'm so happy that this big job is done! Its reassuring to know that we will heat this winter! LOL!! He also called and got the propane tank filled just to be on the safe side. Its like an insurance policy for us. Now he can move on to some smaller projects he's been wanting to do. He hung up Gabbie's swing in the back yard. Now we can go out and swing anytime we want!! Gabbie is happy about this!! He built a fire pit out of stone in the back yard. Now we have a place for Thanksgiving, which is fast approaching! His number one project now is to rid the house of MICE!!!!

I'm still hearing our little friend so I think its time to wake him up and at least have him scare the damn thing out of the house! Lord give me strength! I'm too scared to open the cabinet and scare it myself! Pathetic I know! But everyone has a fear, right?! I'm sure I'm not the only one that's scared of mice, am I? I will be back soon, hopefully tomorrow. If not then next weekend, unless I can wake up early one day during the week. Until then you behave and have a GREAT weekend!!

What A Week!!!

I'm exhausted!!! This has been one hell of a week. Work has been crazy!!! So busy!! They have assured me that its usually not like that but wow!!! I can't breath during the day! So that's been stressful. Tuesday I picked Gabbie from mothers and she was kinda cranky. We got home and she wouldn't eat her dinner. I put her down and picked her up 5 minutes later and she was burning up!!! Weird!! Her temp was 100.9! I gave her Tylenol and figured it was another round of teething kicking in. I WAS SO WRONG!!! The next 2 days her fever never broke, she stopped eating, diarrhea, and vomiting. I took her to the doc Thursday morning. No ear infection, no strep, so the doc tested for a UTI. We went to the hospital for some blood work and a antibiotic shot. I knew then that there was a problem. The nurses had to PULL the blood out of her with a syringe!!! After we got all the way home the docs office called to see if she had taken an liquids, which she did not. After about an hour the doc personally called and told me she was admitting her. The blood work came back and her white blood cell counts were through the roof and she was badly dehydrated.

Talk about an emotional wreck! She was a trooper though. She didn't start drinking anything until late Friday afternoon so we had to spend a second night. We finally got out yesterday afternoon when her blood cell count was back to normal. She's now at home and back to herself. We are still dealing with diarrhea but I pray that will soon pass. So yeah... I need a vacation now!!! OR a good stiff drink!! I never want to go through that again. Now I'm not an overly dramatic mom; I know that shots aren't going to kill her but that little girl got prodded and poked so much that when a nurse came in the room she started crying!!! They didn't even have to touch her!! I felt so bad for her! She couldn't play much and she couldn't get down and crawl because of the IV. It was bad! I hope we never have to go through that again. Through it all she still kept up good spirits which totally amazed me. I think we saw her true personality and I hope she stays that way.





She's sleeping right now so I get a bit of a break. I've got my chocolate raspberry creamer and silence for a bit. The Man is at church, we decided it wasn't a good idea for Gabbie to be out and about just yet, so I'm going to enjoy myself for a bit. Don't know what we are going to do today. We were supposed to extract honey on Friday so we may be doing that today. Our mentors will call when they are done with theirs so they can help us. I will keep you posted on that!! Its gonna be AWESOME!!! I'll stop here and use my time wisely. Until next time!

Finally Finished Something

Well I've been working on my sewing projects, among other things. I finally finished one although the rest are coming along pretty well. This was something that I thought of one night and just had to make one. As you know our bedroom is getting a makeover and the dresser needed a little color. I'm not about to paint it so I decided to make a runner for it. To the fabric pile I went and I pulled out a charm pack that Step-Mommie gave me. Our room is red with hints of turquoise and although there is no turquoise in the charm pack there is plenty of red. Plus I love the fabric. It give the room a bit more of a country feel to it.

It was the first official thing that I've quilted. All my other quilts have been tie. I also did a self-binding quilt, which was a first as well. Its not perfect but it does the trick. I don't have any before pictures but here is one of the bedroom now. I'm glad that I'm a Goodwill addict cause I wouldn't have had all this random stuff laying around. Add in some paint and a couple of nails and you get a some-what cute bedroom. I'm changing the window treatment but to what I don't know yet. Definitely something different, too much floral. On the opposite wall is the dresser and a wing back chair that desperately needs to be reupholstered or at least slip covered. The sconces are our IKEA buy. The Man was constantly rolling over and knocking the lamp off the nightstand. I told myself that sconces would be great but couldn't find any that were in our price range and not ugly. I had found some on IKEA's website but they weren't available to ship. So when we went to visit Poppa and Step-Mommie we grabbed 2 and they were 10 bucks each!!! You can't beat it!!!




Here are some pictures of Gabriella I took the other day. I just have to say that she takes my breath away. She's so beautiful.







She's already such a country girl. She loves being outside and loves playing in the garden, especially the peas.




Speaking of country, our bee keeping mentor came out to The Farm yesterday to help us catch the bees up. We have been seriously neglecting them for quite some time now. Luckily for us, they were doing just fine. It turns out that we will have a honey crop this year after all!!! YIPPY!! Come October we will be harvesting about 30 to 40 pounds of honey! I'm so very happy that our hive is doing well. The hive has grown significantly since last year and we may be able to split it in the spring. And to think that we were contemplating getting rid of them. So glad that all is well in bee land!

Well, I think that's about all for tonight. Mother is coming over in the morning to help me get some serious deep cleaning done, so I better get to sleep. Until next time!!

PS I can't figure out how to "comment" back on my posts, so thanks to all who comment. I'm still trying to figure out how to get back to you but I'll get there!

Long Live The Queen

We have a New Queen!!! She's the one in the middle with the long abdomen. Thank the Lord!!! I was really getting scared!! she hasn't started laying much, but she will. Now, hopefully, we can get our hive population back up before winter hits. There has been a definite population drop, you can tell almost instantly. The life span of a honeybee is not very long. We were without a queen for about a month, which means that there were no new bees for a month. Needless to say, it's a good thing we've got a queen!

Here is a full frontal shot of the garden I've been promising for the past month! We're getting to the last days of it now. The corn has all been harvested and put up. The zucchini and squash are done producing, Thank God! We didn't get many purple hull peas this year, which is really disappointing to me because I LIVE for purple hull peas during the winter. I don't have any in my freezer! I think that it has something to do with our garden pest, Templeton, as The Man so kindly calls it. I call it a pain in the you know what! It needs to be eliminated...hopefully it hasn't reproduced. Yes, it is a field RAT!!! Not a mouse, but a rat and it enjoys purple hull peas as much as I do. We need to get the .22 out and have some target practice!



That's about it in our world. Been a some-what lazy weekend so far. The Man was busting up firewood yesterday and moving it all in the barn. Don't know if I told you or not but we invested in a good wood-burning fireplace the other weekend. Now we have to stock pile wood. I was in the house cleaning and cooking. Made some good chili and a blueberry buckle. It was all YUMMY!!!!! Today I have to cut the grass and put up laundry. Yep, I'm busy!!! I think I'm going to try to get in the studio and work. I realized the other day that I've only got it for another couple of months before I have to pack everything up and move in all the baby stuff! It's bittersweet.

Well, I think that's it for now. I'll be back this week with an update....got a baby doc appointment!!! Until then, Ya'll have a GREAT day!!!

Day 2

We went out to check on the bees yesterday afternoon and they were doing very well. So good in fact that they had almost drank a whole quart jar of 2:1 sugar syrup. That's alot in 24 hours! Needless to say I'll be buying a 50lb sack of sugar in the near future.

The Man is really getting into the Bees. I have to tell you all this because he has made fun of me for YEARS!!! And now the tables have turned!

I like bugs. I took an Entomology (the study of insects) class in college and fell in love. I even have my own insect collection which I still add to. So naturally keeping bees was high on my list of things to do. When we bought The Farm I knew it was only a matter of time. The Man, like I said, has made pure fun of me for years...even up to and through the bee keeping class. But the other night after we put the bees in and came back to the house he was so worried about them. he kept saying, "Should we go check on them/" or "Lets go see what they're doing." Its so funny!!! Yesterday when I got home from he work he didn't even hug me! He told me to hurry up and change so we could go check on the bees!! KARMA!!!!!!

Hopefully we'll get out to the hive today...gotta get the package out and the last 5 frames in. If not then tomorrow. I'll let you know how it goes. I promise this blog won't turn into a bee blog..its just the most exciting thing right now! Ya'll have a great weekend!!

Bee Day!!!

All I can say is WOW...it has been a long day!! The Man and I were driving down the interstate with 12,000 bees in the backseat just buzzing away, the queen safely in her cage, which I has holding. We made it home just in time to get them in the hive before it started raining and got dark. We are offically Bee Keepers!!! I am so excited, as you can see from my picture! The Man looks so cute in his veil! I'll be taking more pictures as the hive progresses so don't worry. It has been a long day so I'm not going to be much longer, just wanted to let you all know that all went well, no one got stung, and the bees are home safe and sound! Ya'll have a good weekend!!

Queen Cage...You can't see her...But she's in there

12,000 Bees...Wish you could feel the heat they put off

T-1 Day

Tomorrow is Bee day and The Farm is stressed to the max! We had to have some last minute supplies rushed to us from North Carolina and UPS has lost the box. I just received a phone call from a sweet woman who is willing to meet us here in town with the box! Thank the Lord for good hearted people! Now we will be fully equipped for the bees tomorrow. We're getting them from a local keeper who has been in the business for 60 plus years. It will be an exciting day. I'll be taking a bunch of pictures and will be posting them tomorrow...hopefully. If not then Friday. Wish us luck!!! I'll talk to you then!!