Watchful eye of the beekeeper

This morning I watched Martha, one of our beekeepers, walk out across the pasture and stand about 15 feet from her hives. She, and the other couple that also have hives in our pasture, come and look in on their bees a few times a month. Sometimes they come in with full bee suits and smokers to do seasonal maintenance but mostly, like today, they come in just to observe from a distance. A few days ago she was out to rearrange one of the hives. As I watched her peacefully observe I imagined that she was checking in on them. The moment was so peacefully perfectly still and I couldn't help admiring the beauty of the relationship between the bee and the beekeeper.

While we don't get any honey from these bee hives, they do provide a valuable service by pollinating all of our fruit trees. Really it wouldn't be much of an orchard without them.

There is much that we want to do out here and much that must be done. Having our own beehives is on the list. We'll get to it soon hopefully.

[EDIT: Later in the day after this original post, all three beekeepers showed up to inspect one of the hives. Earlier in the week they split an overpopulated hive into two hives. When they were done they reversed the locations of the two hives so that field bees returning at the end of the day would populate the new hive in the old location and balance out the two hives populations. They came back today to see if the new hive had a queen in it. Despite getting out a magnifying glass they couldn't find her but there are a number of queen eggs, hopefully one will take  up her crown. :)]

Spring musings

The pear trees are unbelievably gorgeous right now. most of them are in full bloom and the bees are loving it. The days have turned mostly warm now but the cool breeze and the occasional rain remind us that we're only just out of winter now. The air is full of bird song, multi layered conversations I'll never understand but am thrilled to hear each and every day.

The grass in the pasture grows again at an alarming rate. Last year we had to have it mowed, all 3 acres of it. At literally 6 feet tall it was quite a fire hazard. This year we have arranged for a shepherd ( sheep owner? livestock guy?)  to bring his flock here to graze it down. His sheep will be here for about a month contained in a portable electric fence that will be moved around to knock down the whole pasture. Clearly addressing the fire hazard is the primary concern. Thankfully this will allow us to do that but turn the resource of the grass into something beneficial for the land in the form of manure.

For now life is good and the weather is beautiful!

First crazy woodpecker of the season

Today we heard the first crazy woodpecker pecking away at our roof antenna. I have been wondering when he would return. :)

Spring is in full bloom here. The wild cherry trees, the pear trees, and some of the apple trees all full of beautiful white blossoms. Meanwhile the first little tiny leaves are emerging from their winter slumber. Pasture is also growing by leaps and bounds. in the next few weeks someone will bring 30 sheep here to graze it all down. Maybe next year it will be our sheep eating the grass. :)

Everything in bloom

Everything here is in bloom. So nice to see the end of winter fade away and be replaced with new life. hooray spring is near!

Flood!

 

This past Saturday a huge storm rolled in after several days of moderate rain. By Sunday morning our creek was totally choked with water and a fallen tree provided the last straw and the creek jumped it's banks!

 

This is our springhouse with almost 2' of water. The creek is there in the background and is usually considerably lower than the springhouse. Fortunatly the spring pump and breaker box stayed up above the flood line!

 

This is a view looking our our front gate. The whole neighborhood flooded but came just shy of actually filling people's homes with water.

 

The workshop (on the left) also just barely escaped flooding.

 

 

The flooding started in the far corner of this photo and was about 1' deep across the lower part of the photo.

 

Another shot of the springhouse and the creek. So Much Water.

 

Looking upstream from the springhouse. It's clear that we'll need to unclog the creek before next winter. So many trees and blackberry bramble restricting the water flow.

 

 

The springhouse again, this time as the waters started to recede. Thankfully the rain broke and the county came out to help remove some debris from the creek which helped the water level drop quite a bit.

 

Our neighbors who are oh so glad to be on a 3' tall foundation!

 

 

Despite this ugly scene our whole neighborhood managed to escape unscathed by the flooding.

 

 

This is out on the main road where the creek empties into a drainage channel. I've never seen it so high!

Home at last!

 

It's been a long year but this is finally our home! Last weekend we moved our stuff in and turned our rental house back over to the landlord. We've made a lot of progress on getting unpacked, the kitchen is mostly functional and the kids room is play-able. The rest of the house is coming together a day at a time. We have lots of indoor projects to do in the next few weeks, mostly related to organization, putting up shelves, etc. This works out well since winter is really starting in (you can see the frost on the field above!) This weekend we'll be getting some cover crop seed spread in the garden and doing some big compost pile maintenance along with building shelves in our bedroom closet and unpacking more boxes. :)

This morning Nicole and I sat on the porch and watched a doe walk slowly across the field. I feel so much peace here, it's hard to imagine how I lived any other way in the past. :) 

With Thanksgiving just past I have to say that most of all I'm thankful for my family. My beautiful wife and two joyful children. Having us all together in our new home is what we've been working toward all year and it feels amazing.

More plumbing and a new back door

  

The new septic line was leveled out and buried properly, hooray for functional septic parts!

 

Here's a bit of PEX piping sticking out where the washer goes in the mudroom. PEX is awesome, so much more awesome than copper.

 

Here Joel is working on the shower. We decided to just get the pipes replaced and come back later to re-tile everything. Get it all working so we can move in and deal with aesthetics later. 

 

 

Here's the set up for the bathroom sink, incoming water and outgoing drain.

 

This is the maple tree in the front yard. The garden is there in the background. 

  

This was the back door. It was a cobbled together special with many things wrong with it, so we decided to replace it.

 

 

While we were at it we decided that a wider door would be nice too. Here's the door opening with the old door removed but not yet widened.

  

My dad showed up in the middle of the door replacement to watch and help. Here Joel is smoothing out the thinset that we used to seal the bottom of the door frame to the concrete.

 

Joel put in ton of work this day to get the door installed and functional. I think he's proud of it, can you tell? :)