Honey Harvest

During the past few days, we learned a lot about bees and honey.

Why Learn About Honey?

One of RJ's classmates was staying in a house that had a beehive. The bee-man inspected the hive and said that the queen was gone and there was 50 lbs of honey left in the hive. So, it was time to harvest.

Sara was in the right place at the right time and got 5 trays of honeycomb.

The Process

After scraping off the bees wax and setting up cookie cooling racks, we had a full night of excitement watching honey drip on a cookie sheet.

The honey had some impurities in it, so the next step involved pouring the honey through a strainer. This was a process that happened overnight.

Step 2: pour honey into strainer

The next day, Sara poured the honey into storage jars.

Step 3: pour into containers

After all was said and done, we got 2 big jars and 1 small jar of honey.

Next Steps

For our bedtime story, we read the Berenstain Bears "The Big Honey Hunt." After researching the costs, hassles, potential problems, and complexities of housing bees, we came to the same conclusion has Papa ... the best type of honey comes from a store.

How to Grease a Garage Door

Our garage door started squeaking. The noise was coming from the 20 foot track with the rotating inside that lifts the door. While at Home Depot, RJ suggested purchasing some WD-40 to lube the track. Doug said "Naw, RJ. You gotta get something with higher viscosity."

The next day Doug put some axel grease on the mechanism. The squeaking got much worse at precisely the spot where the grease was applied.

In a desparate move, Doug retrieved some WD-40 from the basement and sprayed down the track. No more noise. Humph, the kid was right.

Playdate fun?

The boys patiently waiting for their turn on the trampoline and one of them decided they should do their homework while they wait. That was definitely not RJ's idea! RJ, Lucas, Milo and Jacob

But, doing homework with others has its advantages. 

Whaddya get for number 5?

Surprise Visitor

We had a surprise visitor this week! Mr. Jim was in town and stopped by for a visit! We were sooooo excited to see him!!! 

 

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

 

Sara got to volunteer in Julia's class for Dr. Seuss Day. Julia was pretty excited to have her mom at school (outside only).  The kids had fun making oobleck, playing Dr. Seuss says, stacking cups and painting Thing 1's hair!

Skiing Fun?

 

This was our Saturday morning view around 10:45am from the top of the mountain.

Luckily, everything cleared up by the end of the day. I didn't get any pictures of us skiing in the pouring rain Sunday morning. 

No lift ticket ... no problem ... hiking the truck trail

Skiing and Skating in McLean

Our Whitetail house was rented this weekend. Fortunately, the Chateau Todd was open and only 0.2 miles from our house. 

Here is RJ going on the main jump. 

Julia skis trail 2 ...

Ice Storm and Porches

The ice on the north side of the house didn't melt. The kids did some skating practice.

Doug wishes he had put in a bigger porch