A Month of Celebration
A Month of Celebration
June was certainly a month of celebration!
We started the month of with the celebration of Harrodsburg's 250th Anniversary! We took the kids to see a magic show, and we went to the Harrodsburg Historic Center and learned a few pioneer games! While we were there, we learned the Coopers were barrel makers! (Shout-out to Granny's side of the family).
We had the MOST PERFECT seats for the parade! We opened the windows in Auntie Tay's apartment, and the kids waved at everyone that went by.
The same weekend was my cousin Rhyan and Jadyn's wedding! They had asked if I could do a charcuterie board for the reception! I've never made one so big, but I really think it turned out well! I had a lot of help from Rachel and Ant Trase! If they hadn't helped me set everything out, we would have been way later than we were at finishing it (cough...after the ceremony).
But we heard all good things, and I had another cousin ask about me doing one for their reception this fall. So we shall see!
The next weekend we celebrated Luke's 2nd birthday!Aunt Rachel made dairy-free cupcakes that turned out SO adorable!
I did a charcuterie board, of course!
I was super excited because I learned how to make pepperoni roses!
For dinner, we had 4 different types of chicken salad, and Sam made his DELICIOUS egg salad. Oh my goodness, they were all so tasty!
And of course, we set up our annual slip-n-slide! The kids had a BLAST! Maybe too much so. Cousin Leia had massive bruises on her knees by the end of the night, and she didn't seem to care one bit! We had to ban her from the slide, haha.
The kids got to meet their new cousin Micah for the first time! He is PRECIOUS!
I had a fun time holding "the twins", too!
The very next weekend we celebrated Kelsey's 3rd birthday! And then the next weekend we celebrated Aunt Terri and CC's birthdays, 4th of July, and had Maira's 1st birthday (a few weeks early!) This weekend we will be celebrating Poppi's birthday in Bowling Green and soon we will be celebrating Rorie Jane's birth and Maira's actual birthday! It's busy around here!!
On the farm side of things, Sam's been scoping out nearby auctions because we discovered we can get farm equipment for a GREAT price! He was able to get this giant culvert for a soon-to-be pig feeding trough...
...and the utility trailer to get the bailer home from Bowling Green!
Before.....with who-knows-how-many-year's-worth of dirt, poop, and wood-chips (that one was definitely us) on the ground. Took me about two days to scrape it all out and dump it.
Then about two more days to take the pressure washer to it!
I wanted to paint the walls while they were bare, but the stain ended up being too dark. Still, I think it looked great on the door to the back of the barn!
THEN after going over Sam's MASSIVE to-do list that has been driving him crazy, I found a project that I could handle myself. Adding nesting box access panels to the tack room so that we didn't have to step in chicken poop anymore (or go into the coop at all for that matter) to get the eggs.
Definitely didn't do as perfect a job as the engineering husband would have done, but I was proud of myself never the less!
And after we got the giant random wood pile in, I asked Sam to use some of the trim to frame out the doors! They turned out so cute after I painted them and put the vintage knobs and handles on!
The chickens seem not to care. Now, I just need to figure out how to put latches on so the doors stop falling open.
While I was at it, I also built an organizer for all the t-posts and rebar we had, and Sam helped me to take everything back into the tack room before the party so we didn't have a bunch of junk in the yard!
"Treasures" the kids found while we were cleaning out the tack room!
Now, I just have to finish sanding the new screen door so we can paint it, re-screen it, and hang it! Then no more chickens in the tack room! Yay!
Before we got started in the tack-room, I convinced Sam we REALLY needed to move the swarms before they got too big. Well, we were kind of too late.
As I feared, the bees had already begun to draw comb on the bottom of the frames. I knew it was a possibility, but I also wasn't super worried about fixing it. We have some experience with framing drawn comb.
What I wasn't expecting, was that the swarm we caught in the front field was overrun with hive beetles!
We left the bees closed in the hive boxes from Monday until Friday to reorient their internal GPS system. When we finally moved the swarm boxes so that we could get the bees into the hive boxes, we found 80% of the largest swarm DEAD.
I framed up as much of the rogue comb as I could, cut out the disgusting, rotting, or super invaded comb and set it to the side.
We went ahead and pulled the capped honey (I was afraid the hive beetles would just tear into it), and then combined the swarms into their own hive box.
The hive appeared strong just a couple days later, and I got a lot of advice online to put unscented swiffer pads or dryer sheets in the corners of the boxes to catch hive beetles (their barbed feet get stuck). It's been 2 weeks and it's time for another hive inspection. I'm curious to see how well the "beetle traps" worked.
The honey, Pippa helped me to extract! Instead of a 5-gallon bucket with a spout calked onto it, this year we upgraded to a drink dispenser! Other than being extremely slow at filling jars, it worked great!
We ended up getting 11 pints of honey! Can you believe we've already sold them all?
We are hoping to be able to take some frames of honey from the other hive this fall. We will see how strong they are. Fingers crossed!
The bad comb with the larvae went into the hot tub (aka the crockpot)! We melted it all down and strained it to get some beeswax. There's not a lot of wax in this old comb (so we were just told by our expert beekeeping friends!), but it's not too much of a hassle to get the little that is there out.
Which is exactly what we used it for!
All of this chapstick making has me excited for the upcoming craft fair in September. I made a game plan of what all I need to make between now and then, and I've already started back on the kids' aprons!
The blackberries also ripened this month! The kids, Pippa, and I have spent many hours out in the blackberry patch getting scratched arms for blackberries.
But the jelly is AMAZING. It's certainly our best selling jelly so far!
The teenage ducks grew large enough that we were able to move them to the duck house. Sam's been working extra hard to design a new ramp and dock for them (which we are now in the process of building). We lost a few of the babies during the 4th of July holiday maddness. We forgot to get them water for a couple days, and the temperature got high again. But most of them are doing well! They will be so happy to get out of the coop! We are hoping to have the dock finished by the end of the week.
The other momma duck finally hatched her babies! She hatched 4, so our current duck count is 11.
And although we were able to mow at the beginning of the month,
this lack of rain has been hard on the grass. It looks super dead, and I've been afraid to mow for fear of killing it further.
I'll end this long post with some random cute pictures of the kids (as always)
Our little Spider Man
Bubble mouth!
Snuggles with Pap Pap
Learning how to sit in the bumbo like a big girl!
And learning how to smile!
Playing under our new laundry room table (and sneaking cookies)!
Sibling snuggles!
The leash we had to buy for Luke because he kept running off (please, excuse the finger in the camera lense)!
And softball season ended this month! Rylee had a great time! We can't wait for her to play again next year and this time, Will Will will get to be on her team!
Until next month.......
Pax Domini cum spirito tuo temper sit,
Torey, Sam, Rylee, William, Luke & Mena Grace
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