Bee Killers!!!

Right now I should really be helping Stephen develop some 500 photos that are due tomorrow but I needed a minute to rant!!!!
A couple of years ago Stephen happened into trying to save a hive of honey bees. Now for those that are unaware honey bees are disappearing at a rapid rate. With bees disappearing the price of produce is climbing. This issue will only get worse until bee keepers across the world can bring the bee population back to a rate high enough to pollinate enough produce to meet the consumer demand.The last bit of information that we read indicated that bees are under government protection. To kill honey bees could cost you a nice hefty $500.00 fine! I suppose we need to do the research and verify if that is indeed still the current law. With our with out government protection one would think that with most local news channels buzzing about the missing bees most people would be aware that killing a swarm of bees is not a good idea!

At the time that Stephen saved his first hive there where two other people with him. Those people wanted to rob the honey from this enormous hive and let the bees fly off and either find a new home or die. Stephen's one good Samaritan hive is now 8 hives buzzing up our back yard.

In the process of all this I got sucked into the bee saving missions. I have learned quite a bit about bees, their life cycles and their purpose in this world and find myself as focused on saving them as Stephen is.

One of the men who was there when Stephen got his first hive lives only 2 houses down from us. Today there was about a thousand bees laying dead in this man's drive way. We heard of this because a local cop stopped us and ask if we knew what was going on and why those bees where dead. Of course we had to go see what was going on.

Apparently the man's wife saw a swarm of bees in their drive and instead of calling some one to remove them (most people charge for this service, we NEVER charge for removing bees) .. she politely takes a can of bug killer and sprays the swarm!! THIS IS SOOOOO WRONG TO DO!!!!

Stephen was so mad, but just informed the man that what his wife had done was against the law.

There where still a lot of bees swarming around and we couldn't find the queen in the pile of dead bees. So we picked out box and I went into the house to find some lemon grass oil. We happen to store the extra boxes next to he bee hives, so in order to get to them we have to walk right in front of the 8 active hives.

I came out of the house with a q-tip that had half a drop of lemon grass oil on one end of it. (Lemon Grass Oil attracts bees). As I walked in front of the bee hives bees pretty much swarmed all around me and followed me to where Stephen was waiting with the bee box.

We then went to where the dead bees where and set up a box with this q-tip inside it. I of course had lemon grass oil on my hands. I wanted to recheck the pile of dead bees for the queen. As I was looking for the queen bees where buzzing me.

The photos above are of the bees going into the box to get the lemon grass oil. We are hoping to catch enough of them (and the queen) to save the swarm.

Tuskahoma Oklahoma

I took the time to upload more photos than I normally do because I just couldn't choose which ones I like best ..

We went to Tuskahoma Oklahoma on Friday night. Tuskahoma is the Capitol of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. Apparently Choctaw put on an amazing festival every year. This is the first year that we have known about it. It was a drive to get there but for 10 bucks a tent you can turn up on Friday and stay until Monday. Its a lot like the Magnolia festival we here with a couple of big differences. First of all no on camps at the Magnolia festival and second a night at the Magnolia festival always cost us an arm and a leg.

The festival at Tuskahoma is pretty close to absolutely FREE!! yes a said free. You have to pay for camping ($10.00) and your food (which you can bring your own, buy it there or go about 5 minutes down the road which is really cheap) and if you want to play carnival games ( where you win stuffed animals ) that cost, But the rides are free and the concerts are free.

I have no problem saying no to carnival games, I always have felt that they are a rip off but the rides, well its impossible to take a child to a carnival and say no to the rides.

This week end they had Billy Currington, Wynonna Judd, Gretchen Wilson and a few others. Just for the record this is my 2nd time to see Gretchen Wilson at a Choctaw event and it confirms to me that I just cant support her music, I love some of her songs but She has lost my respect. Choctaw is very anti-alcohol. Their reasoning may be debatable (they feel that Indians are very susceptible to become alcoholics but they support gambling which also can be an addition) but rather or not Choctaw have a debatable reason they are the one's who hired her and she should follow their request.

The first time I saw her was at the Casino and my daughters and I met Gretchen Wilson back stage, she was three sheets to the wind and left her dressing room trashed with beer cans. This time she pulled out the whiskey on stage and her and her band members drank it in front of the crowd. I am not against drinking and had a glass of wine tonight but she was told she couldn't drink but openly did any way. Needless to say I have lost respect for this woman and won't purchase her CDs any more.

Other than just not respecting one of the singers and taking cold showers we had an amazing time this week end. I however will not complain one bit about sleeping in my own bed tonight! lol

Yesterday we had a stroll through the arts and crafts building and then Stephen wanted to find a place to go swimming. We got directions but we ended up some where other than the swimming area. We really have no complaints about getting lost. The whole area is so beautiful we enjoyed just driving around for a while. It rained for just a few minutes and then we took a few photos.

First there are a couple a photos taken from the window of the van as we drove 50 mph across a bridge.





Then here are a few that we took just after the rain stopped.











I was driving back and I saw this amazing view through some trees, so I stopped, backed up and went back to get a few photos..




Then finally there are a few of this man in the arts and crafts area that was using this odd tool to whack on a rock that eventually becomes an arrow head. I found it interesting and I also found the man interesting.

Alexis Rae

ok for those that don't know my life story, I got married right out of high school to a man that was almost 10 years older than me. Yeah dumb teenager!.. My now X had two children a 4 year old boy (Steven) and a 2 year old girl (Summer). The very weekend that I was moving in the kids where coming for a week end visit. That visit lasted until the kids where 15 and 17! One longggggg weekend. My X drove over the road for several years and then worked nights when he stopped driving over the road. I always worked a full time job and managed what eventually was 4 children. I may as well have been a single mother of 4 for many years.

Even though I didn't give birth to Steven and Summer they are my kids and always will be. Today they are grown and have children of their own.

Yesterday Summer gave birth to her second child. Talon Joe was her first baby almost 2 years ago, yesterday she brought Alexis Rae into the world at 6lbs 15oz.

Steven has a daughter, Cloey Lane and is about to have another daughter in the next couple of weeks. Cloey is 3 years old so for the last 3 years there has been a battle of wills over what they should call me and now my husband too. I am way to young to be a ganny, nanna or grandma, pluss they have their birth mother to name as well. Steven and Summer's birth mother told me yesterday at the hosptial that if she is being called granny then I better anny up and get a "grandmotherly" name! lol.. I just feel like I am not old enough and not ready for that kind of name.. I have to sort out something quick because the kids have started telling them to call me "mimi" or something .. I am only 34 I should not be worried about "granny" names yet!!!

However the granny name does not change the fact that I have the most beautiful grandchildren in the world!!! So welcome to the world Alexis Rae and I promise to get a name sorted that suits us all before Alexis can talk!

The photos above are my son Steven, his wife Carissa and Cloey, then Talon Joe holding his sister Alexis, next is Summer holding Alexis and the rest are Alexis as it was her birthday!

We had a strange visitor in our flower bed today

This morning I decided that it was past time to weed the flower beds. The last time I did this was for the 4th of July!! Yea umm we had as much grass as flowers. Shelby was gone to a friend's house, Katie was in her play pen with Stephen and I and Sara was making random appearances at the door. I think she just wanted to remind us that she was here and totally bored with the whole gardening thing..

At one point Sara ask what was this huge bee thing, I assumed it was a honey bee (because we have several hives in the back yard). I didn't think much of it after that But then after several hours in the sun we had a much needed water break and I sat on the front steps. I saw yellow and black and again though it was a bee.

Stephen pointed out this "bee" to me and we both realized this was no honey bee. I was so amazed just watching this thing buzz around.

It just happened that the cat had been attacking me (in a playful way) earlier and I had taken a photo of her, so my camera was just inside the door. Lucky for me that the camera was there because I impressed myself with a couple of the photos that I managed to get.

I did a little research and found that we had a Snowberry Clearwing Hummingbird Moth in our garden! Apparently these are moths that look a lot like a bumble bee but hovers and flies a lot like a humming bird.

any way I was amazed by the moth and impressed with the photos that I managed to snap.

sometimes a new look is just hard to find

So Shelby is the one person in our house that is bold enough to go REALLYYY short with her hair. I some times think about it but well my ears are way to big!!

Shelby's hair is better short, its extremely straight and healthy but if it ever grows past her shoulders it starts to get thin and ratty. There is nothing like spending an hour after every bath trying to untangle that mess while she cry's because it hurts.

Shelby finally talked me into letting her go reallly short a year and a half ago. It took her a good year of asking before I gave in. She went short and spiky in the back and left the front fairly long. Its a hard look to pull off but for Shelby it just fit her.

We really should buy stock in the Got 2 B hair products. The first thing we used was the Got 2 B Glued, from there I think we have tried all their products. The Glued is the best spiker ever and I like some of the hair sprays and gels to.

Honestly since she got that hair cut, I have never taken her any where that people don't stare and people always comment that they love her hair. She always gets "cool hair", "I love your hair" and "mommy I want hair like hers!!".

The first photo is one of my favorites of Shelby, yes there is something drawn on her face, it was left over halloween make up and we where playing around with it. Several people have said she looks like Twiggy in this photo.

When it starts growing out its a bit difficult to do anything with and starts looking a mess. But after the same hair cut for a year and a half she wants something different. Its a bit hard to go different from SHORT!! She found a photo of some girl with her hair cut except the bangs where cut short also. We did it tonight, I think Stephen isn't happy with it but Shelby is and well its hair and will grow back. I suppose we will still be supporting the Got 2 B collection because its the only hair product that holds Shelby's hair. With out the Got 2 B Glued her hair would never stand up. My mother would have never let me do any thing like this with my hair and I always said that with the exception of coloring it black they can do any thing they want. I wont let them color it black because its difficult and extremely damaging to reverse. My kids have had all lengths and pretty much all colors of hair. This summer it was purple streaks. Its been pink streaks and blue streaks, what ever its all temporaryy and hopefully a phase they will grow out of by the time they are ready to get jobs!

As for Shelby's new look, I think I like it and really wish I had the face for it, simple and easy and hassle free!!

where does the week end go?

So Stephen and I went fishing Friday night. We staid until late then went decieded we needed some fishing gear. We made a run to Wal-Mart and got new poles and a few gadgets. Saturday morning we where up early and back at the river.

It was so strange being at the river when the water so really low. The fish where every where, and jumping up into the air like crazy. There where several people out fishing at 6 AM but no one was catching anything. This young guy offered us his left over bait and one fairly large catfish. He had been there over 12 hours and caught one fish!

I actually saw several large fish surface for a second, then duck down and come back up to do a big flop but none of them seemed bothered to even nibble at our lines. I finally gave up and took a wonder down the river bed.

There are some amazing birds that tend to fly low and right over head. Of course when I remembered to bring my camera none of the birds flew close enough to get really good shots. I only took one lens and really was wishing that Stephen had brought his camera and his big lens. I have put a slide show on the side of my page with the photos that I took (oh and one photo of a fish that Stephen caught Friday night).

Spent the rest of Saturday with my niece, her husband and their 4 year old son (Keith). It was Keith's birthday. The boy is really into the Transformers at the moment. It was fun to see him get so excited over his presents. I am glad they are back in Oklahoma for the moment but honestly I am not sure she will last long. The thing about my niece is she has been in California for several years and she is very independent. I really don't think she will be happy back here where family is so close. Not that she and I don't love our family but neither of us are the clingy type and most of our family is clingy or at least in your face types of people. I don't think it will be long until she ventures at least to OKC or Dallas.

We spent this morning working in the yard. Stephen finally figured out what the huge flowers are that we have for the fist time this year. Hollyhocks. Those things are huge (7 to 9 feet tall) and beautiful while they are blooming but once they bloom they look really shabby. I wanted to find out if we could trim them of if they where the type of flowers you let bloom then cut down until next year. Turns out we can trim them so Today I did just that. I still have yard work to do but it just got way to hot. We escaped the heat by coming indoors and spent the rest of the day moving Katie in with Shelby.

I am not sure that I will sleep tonight because this will be the first night for Katie to sleep outside of our bed room. She is 14 months old and I am just not sure if she (well maybe it should be I) am ready for her to move out!

I am exhausted though so we will just see what happens.

tooooo tired and sunburned to move

So we had our 4 day week end and its almost over.. Saturday we photographed that wedding and honestly with the drive and long day what else could we have possibly added to the day....well nothing else really..
Sunday we did a couple of quick things around the house, then spent the rest of the day at the lake with the kids.
Monday we spend the day doing some shopping that REALLLLLYYYY did not need to be done, for example we spent way to much money in Lowes..more on that later.... we also had lunch at a new place that we found in Durant. It is called 2nd Street Bakery. Stephen and I both had the chicken salad which reminded me a lot of this chicken salad that we had at a wedding and I worked out what all was in it so that I could make it for some other event. Lets see if I can remember....
boiled chicken breast ( chopped into small pieces) or if your like me and in a hurry a couple of cans of chicken.
walnuts
grapes ( cut in half)
celery
a package of the Hidden Valley Ranch dressing (mixed as directed on the package)
chopped onions
hmm that is every thing, or at least what I can think of..any way it sounds odd with nuts and grapes and ranch dressing but its really really goood
The bakery had a selection of breads, we tried the pepper jack bread and it was really good! so we brought a loaf home.. I am now wondering where it is and what sort of excuse I can find for having some now.
Any way after our splurging we headed home for some WORK on our day off... We spend the rest of the day unloading the stuff that we bought, Stephen and Shelby ran to pick up some free supplies for the project we where about to do and then the hard part started.
I had less than great AC in the van the year before last (when I was pregnant with Katie) the AC would blow nice and cool for a few minutes, then the darn thing would switch to heater and no matter what you did the heater would not go off, so most of the time I just left it off so that I didn't have to deal with he heater.
Then last summer we where driving along with the AC on because Katie was a small baby and I was scared she would over heat. All of the sudden we smelled smoke and then the AC went off for good. We could feel air trying to come out of it but the blower wasn't working.

This ment that most of the summer and all of the winter I had no AC or heat. We didn't bother to fix the van because we just used Stephen's car really. I was the only one that was really having to deal with it. After having a look on line at some auto parts stores I just couldn't bring myself to go get the stuff to fix it, the price was about $300.oo for the whole blower unit.
For some odd reason we went to Auto Zone on Monday and Stephen was checking out when I suggested we just find out what the motor only cost and at least get that for now. I have been reluctant to take Katie any where in the van because it has been so hot. My idea at the time was that if Auto Zone wanted to much we would stop by the salvage yard and check their prices. Turns out the motor alone is only 5o bucks so we got it.
Once Stephen and Shelby got home we worked on building up a flower bed/goldfish pond and still to come a walk way.. Then we started on the van, the motor was easily seen but extremely hard to remove. By the end of the night we had the entire dash off the van. What we discovered was that the wires coming off the blower motor plugged into this blower regulator that had shorted out. The whole thing looked like it had been on fire at one point.
I had also been having weird problems with the speedometor, which we realized was all due to this shorted out part.

Then my daughter-n-law calls and wants me to walk her through re-installing windows on her computer so instead we went to Auto Zone, then to get the computer so I could bring it home and re-install windows.
Auto Zone really turned us into O'Reilly's customers. Stephen walks in at 6 minutes until closing and the guy never looked at the part just told him to go to the dealer cause he don't have the part. We went to O'Reilly at 2 minutes until closing and they said they could order the part and have it in 2 days.
I was up until about 2 am working on the computer and then taking my daughter-n-law home. So 8am came to quickly for me but we had to try and find this part. So we went to O'Reilly in Sherman and found the part for fairly cheap.. After a quick stop at the salvage yard to get the connetors (apparently no auto parts store carries the connectors called pig tales) we finally headed home to sort out the AC in the van.
It took a long time to get the part on and put the entire dash back together. However it was well worth the time because now my AC and speedomitor works!
While Stephen was doing that I was mowing and working in the yard. Darn its amazing how much better our yard looks with the grass cut and the flowers trimmed. We have been so busy that the flower beds have been left to grow way out of the acutal beds. I attempted to mow and weed eat in the back yard but that's gonna have to be Stephen's deal, his darn bees came straight for me when I turned the corner with the lawn mower going!!
Finally we finished our so called time off with a project that was all Stephen's idea and soooooo worth all the work!!!!

All I could say was WOW

Stephen and I finally took two days off work so we have a 4 day week end, its such a rare thing for us to just have a few days off with nothing pressing to do. So Saturday we traveled about 2 hours from home to attend and photograph the wedding of a friend in my unit (Nancy). I choose to offer to turn up early and assist in any way I could, I made this offer because Stephen and I had a small informal wedding and still found ourselves struggling to get it all together on the day of the wedding.

Nancy is the type of person who gets along ok with every one and rarely has an issue with other soldiers, but I wouldn't say she socializes much with the unit. During annual training this year we actually got to stay in a motel and had evenings free. I never saw her hanging out at the pool or anything like that. But if you take the time to talk to her and get to know her she is an interesting person with an interesting life story. In many ways its a real shame that many people in our unit don't know her personally, they only know her by the work she does in her job to support the unit.

I would have to admit that Nancy and her new husband Jim had what was the most "red-neck wedding" that I have ever attened. However as informal and "red-neck" as it was the people attending where happy people, and there was no real wedding day drama. We turned up (after getting lost) in the back woods of Coalgate Oklahoma, at a cabin sitting on about 100 acers of deer woods ( you know where men gather to hunt deer and drink beer) . Stephen was instantly ready to sell every thing we own and move into a cabin in the woods! This was a man's place and only brave hearted women dared to enter at the risk of a cold shower and no real sign of true air conditioning (AC). Now they had a small AC in the cabin, however when your cooking food for 85 people in a small cabin the stove overpowered the AC and the only chance of cooling down came from a cold beer that could be found in any of the many ice chest on the premises. Nancy, being the bride also had the fortune of a small travel trailer with amazing AC for her and her bridal party to pretty them selves up in.

When I say this was an informal, red-neck wedding, I am talking about beer mugs instead of champain flutes, and Bud Light Lime instead of chamain, cow paddies in the isle, deer horns mounted every where, a preacher dressed in camo from head to toe and a big "yeee hawww" as the bride walks down the isle. Now I was told before hand to turn up dressed casual, some of the bridal party were gonna be in capris, Ok I had on black dress capris and a nice top, OMG I should have taken her at her word and done as most of the other guest and turned up in short and a tank top, I was smoldering and my clothes sticking to me! Honestly I think that for what some would for sure call a very "red-neck" event, this was a fun and interesting event, where every one had a good time and no one felt out of place.

I am only adding 3 photos of the wedding, I just want to give you a general idea of the how things where, later when we have downloaded and edited all of them maybe I will add a few more.

We pretty much spent yesterday relaxing at the lake and spending time with the girls and my oldest daughter and grandson. The most eventful moment of the day was when Talan ( the grandson) had to get a hair cut. I swear one day he will refuse to come see me because every time I see him I cut his hair and he HATES it.

This morning we slept until about 8 AM and sad as it is we felt we had slept in. So as we slowly moved around and started our day Stephen wonders out side in his shorts and shoes only to have a look at his bee hives. It only took him a few minutes to come running in saying that the bees where swarming!! Now Sara and Shelby have gone to their sister's to spend the night so lucky for me Katie had just fallen off to sleep for her morning nap. So I was able to grab my camera and go see what was up with the bees. I am sure Stephen will post a blog about the details of the swarm and what happened before I got out there. I can only tell you what was going on when I got outside.

I was concerned that one of our hives was trying to swarm off. As it turns out our bees where minding their own buisness and doing their own thing, none of them where trying to fly away. Apparently its fairly common for swarms of bees to be attracted to places where bee hives are kept. Now I am not a bee master of any sort, but I have picked up a few bits of information along the way.

When I came around the house to where Stephen keeps his hives, I didn't see a swarm of bees and was wondering what all the fuss was about. Stephen was working quickly as possible to ready a hive for this new swarm and I must have looked puzzled because he pointed out the bees to me.

I have always been diligent in planting flowers every spring, and often I plant bulbs that will come back year after year. Every since Stephen's first visit here he has helped me with this task. Now days (every since he started with the bees) Stephen is even more into the flower beds and plants that I ever thought about being. Almost all plants we have are pre-annual plant that specifically attract bees. Needless to say we have a lot of flowers planted all over the yard.

This swarm of bees had landed for the most part on two large flowers. I am not even sure what these flowers are, they resemble a sun flower but they do not produce sunflower seeds. There where so many bees on these two flowers that the flowers where pulled down almost touching the ground.

Stephen prepared a hive for the bees and then broke off the two flowers and dumped the bees inside the box. Again I am not a bee master but I do know that once a swarm finds a new home there are certain bees that began to "fan", basically they rapidly flap their wings and emit a scent that says "this is our new home, come move in"! Almost instantly upon being dumped into the new hive there where bees fanning on top of the hive. Stephen didn't even have the lid on yet and they where fanning.

Stephen and I stood and watched as the rest of the bees migrated from the grass around the flowers into the box. It was like they formed a line and slowly moved into the box. I was amazed at how nature works and how these bees just followed the leader and moved into this have while several bees stood at the entrance and fanned the rest of the swarm into their new home.

Stephen is currently out there looking to find and mark the queen and trying to insure that the bees do not try to swarm off some where else. I really am hoping that this swarm takes up perminate residence in their new hive. I was so impressed by the bee's natural instinct and the way the work, I just want them to stick around.
here is a couple of photos, I will post more later