We’ve been re-drafting our life lately. What do we need? What can we do without? I always appreciate these moments of transition and these moments of re-evaluation. It refreshes me and refocuses me. Because I need a purpose or a goal to keep me from being miserable, times like this are exactly what I need.

So we are looking around our tiny thumb-print house, and saying “Do we need that?” And we are forming a list (which I also love) of things to sell, things to recycle, things to give away. The first time I moved, I could fit everything I owned into a Toyota Tercel and it stayed like this for a very long time. Everytime I moved,  I would pack up whatever junk I was driving and it would be that easy. Now, even though we’ve only been on the farm for a year, we have STUFF! How did we get so much stuff? It’s astonishing how easy it is to accumulate even though we look around and realize most of it we were given, we didn’t buy it. What a rich society we live in that we can replace things so often, that we have a surplus that goes to our poorer neighbours (ahem, that’d be me) or the recycling centres, or the *gulp* dump!

And to think, we have a baby coming along, and with the baby, comes the acquiring of stuff that we’ve never even thought of owning. Like a stroller, a carseat, a crib, and clothes for another human being. Already, this babe who has not even emerged into our green earth has stuff stockpiled behind the dresser.

So in this quest to simplify our lives, we are also simplifying our stuff. Do you want any of it? Seriously, if you’re interested, I’ll post a list of what we are trying to relieve ourselves. It’s nice stuff. Stuff I’m fond of, but we just have too much. Please, come, take it.

And we are not hoarders… or pack-rats… We move too often to do this…. We just happen to have passed through a lot of hobbies that we are too busy to pursue…

What do you do to purge yourself of your stuff?

I know cats aren’t a super “farmy” animal but these kittens are barn cats that we were given from our bee equipment supplier. And they bring endless laughter to our lives with their hunting exploits (dragonflies, mice, voles, and one golden finch) and their vocabulary for “please let me inside NOW!”

Tonight they were playing Pirate Cats.

yes, this boat will do purrfectly for my seaward purrsuits! Just the vessel for me!

And think of all the tasty fish I’ll catch!

I just need to check below deck on my supplies. (What Ramona doesn’t notice is that Mewes has noticed what a purrfect fishing vessel this dinghy would be.)

Ack! We’re being boarded!

*hiss hiss* You can’t be on my boat. Mewes, go away, we are not friends! You are most un-welcome!

Abandon ship! Pirates!!

Oh well, I don’t like the water much anyway. This truck will suit my needs much better!

What? Do you think you’re going somewhere?

Go ahead and try….

I dare you….

“Disbelieving that interests are only valid if they come with monetary or status gain. We do things for the love of what we do and trust how our needs are always met.”
-The Organic Sister 

I needed to read this quote today.

We’ve been doing a bit re-haul, re-evaluation of what we want from life, what we need, how we want to live, how we want to parent, and how we want to face the world in adventures and impact.

At Backyard Feast, the author and her “Skipper” contemplated living on a boat as a more sustainable, affordable choice but they chose against that.

“Sailing is a light way to live, but you have to get to land to get to your food, and there has to be extra food and supplies that you can buy from those who have more than they need.  Sailing away also began to feel like a kind of opting out of the world’s problems, and ethically I struggled with that too.”

So we didn’t want to throw away that thoughtful glance at living on a boat. Also, there are complication with living on a boat, like laundry and the expense of upkeep. But it is still something we long for in our hearts.

Last week,  I read a lot of the blog by The Moneyless Man, about a man living without any form of currency for the last 18 months. Alternative living like this excites me, though I’m not thinking of throwing away all I know just quite yet.

There are so many different ways to live the 80 or so years we have on this planet, yet most people go to university, (or not) get a job, go into mass amounts of debt to buy a house they won’t own until they retire, work jobs they don’t prefer, (-or hate) and then have to buy things and go on extravagant vacations just to make the rest of their working year bearable. Yes I know, it’s a run-on rhetorical sentence, my English prof would have my head.

I’m not saying that everyone who owns a house and works a full time job is unhappy. I think it’s just important to be mindful of our choices instead of just flowing with the “normal” way of doing things. And that’s what we’re slogging through right now.

What is a sustainable, affordable way for us to live and raise a child? What steps do we need to take now to make that happen?

What do you think of these thoughts, dear reader? Your opinions are highly appreciated.

Just wanted to recognize that Summer is a very busy time. Make sure you’re making time for yourself and what you love. Time is the most precious currency we own!

Slow down and stop smelling so many flowers!

My family and friends have been very patient with me in my eccentricities. When I first brought up my interest in beekeeping, they were cautiously encouraging, not sure their required level of participation. As I’ve delved deeper and deeper into the art of apiculture, they have become more encouraging and enthusiastic, and I suspect this is because they saw “sweet things” on the horizon.

I got my first beehive 3 years ago, on July 1st. I knew I’d have to wait at least until the second year before I’d get any honey from her. But she had a rough first year. Not only because of my inexperience, but also because of the problems with her location. She was in the shade, she was bought late in the year, she didn’t have a lot of natural food. It was rather rubbish for her really. So I was just happy she survived her first Winter.

Finally on her third Summer, I opened up the top super to have a peak and found it was wall-to-wall honey! Well, the box weighs at least 55 lbs, I cannot lift it, especially with my protruding tummy. (Go Baby!) So my Honey helped me and got suited up and lifted the super for me, and found the next super down was also 10 frames of beautifully capped honey. Yeepee!

This is my first official extraction. Last year I tried to extract 6-8 frames but I made the mistake of leaving them where the bees could find them, hoping they would clear off. What? Abandon their honey? Never! Yeah, they took it all back and all I was left with were such chewed up empty frames.

There is a story about a beekeeper, he took his honey supers off his hives, took them to his basement. He spent all day extracting the honey from the frames, and went upstairs in the evening to take a break and watch a film. Meanwhile his well-meaning wife came home and went to the basement. She found it very stuffy and humid. Unknowingly, she opened a window to air out the basement. That night, the bees found all the honey that had been stolen from them and stole it back! All of the beekeeper’s hard work was for naught. He woke up in the morning to find not a drop of honey left in his basement. So the story goes…

Well folks, I’ve seen it happen and was much disappointed last year too.

Anyway, this year, I was more careful. It’s amazing how fast we learn when our sweets are stolen!

This fancy cylinder is an extractor. You can put two frames in and then you spin the basket inside and using centrifugal force, it flings the honey to the sides of the cylinder and drips out the bottom spigot.

The honey is capped with wax, and that’s how we know it’s done. Honey has a “water activity of 0.6.” This basically means that there is not enough moisture in honey to allow fermentation. So honey cannot go bad. If we take honey that is not capped from the hive, it may not be evaporated enough. Thus you could have honey that ferments in the jar. You may notice that if you have honey in a jar for a really long time, it crystalizes. This is not your honey going bad, it just needs to be microwaved. Or you can stick the jar in hot water and the honey will melt again and become liquid. Most micro-organisms cannot grow in honey if you extract it when it’s capped. The “cappings” -wax- on honey is also pure white and makes excellent candles.

Anyway, you have to uncap the honey prior to extracting it.

It’s a sticky process. It’s best to have a bucket to do this in.

Then you put it into the extractor, spin it, then you let it drain into a container with a filter. We used a cheese cloth as a filter to get out unwanted beeswax, bee legs, pollen etc.

This picture shows really clearly how the honey is sometimes different colours depending on the flowers that the bees take from. We found that we had some really light honey and quite dark honey in this extraction.

The next time is either to pasturize it (heating it up) or you can bottle it straight from here.

We have yet to pick up our jars so in the bucket it stays for now.

And now you have learned more than you ever wanted to know about the process of honey extraction. Of course on a commercial scale, it’s a little different but the principles are the same.

In other news, we’ve been planting our Winter garden here this weekend. Peas, beans, cabbage, kale, and leeks among other things. We’re getting ready to harvest our garlic. The curly scapes are straightening up, letting us know they are just about ready to be plucked from the Earth. Since planting them in October, it seems like a wait well worth it.

I just have to mention this, I L-o-v-e gardening in a dress!

And sunhats….

Go on, call me a “Fashionista.” I can take it…..