Bees, Mud, and Home Again! Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday

Monday was our last full day at the ranch.....although we spent part of that day in Waco.

It was the first time Louis Dean had been off the property since we arrived 8 days ago.

We ate a big lunch at Luby's and did some errands - as in picking up a prescription refill for me.

We use Walgreen's - both at the ranch and at home.

They are very kind and helpful in refilling whatever we need at either location.

We  got back in time for Sherry and I to do our October beekeeping chores.

First, we put together some new frames to replace some of the damaged ones as well as fill the vacant space when we took out the internal feeders.

I'm always excited to go out and work with the bees.

We were both in really good moods and it was wonderful that it wasn't hot!

We checked the supers and Sherry lifted the bottom brood box.

It should be heavy with honey and bees and it was. 

Beekeeping is a fascinating thing to do.

I've learned so much but nowhere near as much as Sherry has.

She does most of the work - like bucket feeding them once a week.

Everything looked good!

The bees were calm and I even took my gloves off to take the pictures this time.

Some beekeepers do not wear full suits and I have seen some videos where they wear only a headpiece and maybe the top part of a suit. Others do not wear gloves. I guess they may be more experienced and know their bees.

One couple in our group have several hives and one hive was so aggressive they were nearly afraid to go near them. Our president said he would switch out hives with them because they were fearful of their grandchildren getting stung. I asked them about that at the bee meeting last week and they said the bees calmed down and are no longer a problem. They think they were re queened.

Sherry is always learning and reading and keeping notes about what is going on in the hives.

She's going to print out hive inspection papers for us to keep track of all that we do.

We celebrated our job well done with a bottle of Red Cola from the Dublin bottling plant where Dr Pepper used to be bottled - before they sold it.

This is a different recipe but still uses pure cane sugar.

Dean brought it back for me when they got home on Sunday.

He likes it but this was our first time to try it and we like it, too.

Tuesday morning I woke up in the girl bunk to the sound of water dripping.

I opened the window thinking something was leaking only to realize it was raining.

We knew it was in the forecast but thought it would be later in the afternoon.

At first we were taking our time getting up and having our coffee fully expecting the little shower to go away - but it just kept raining. Not heavy but still.......it was getting muddy and that's not good when you are trying to get out. We decided to get a move on and it didn't take us long to pack up, load up, turn everything off and get in the truck.

We were a little worried about driving in the mud but if we didn't leave now it might be days before we could get out since heavy rain was coming that way.

We made it!!!!

Yay!

He got a LOT of mud on the tires!

But most of it came off as we drove down the gravel County Line Road spinning those tires!

We stopped in HIllsboro for a late lunch and Louis Dean was one happy guy!

It had already turned cold and rainy so he kept his big coat on and ordered coffee.

There's just something special about onion rings!

We ate those and took most of our meal home with us.

We left the ranch at 1:30 and arrived home at 5:30.

No surprises!

By 7:00 I was in the den with my feet up sipping a cup of Earl Grey tea by the fireplace.

Louis Dean took a nice long hot bath - with bubbles!

We watched back to back episodes of Bull and then went to bed with the sounds of rain, thunder and lightning. That makes great sleeping weather!

The front yard was littered with 'kindling' from the pecan trees this morning.

It was still raining so I went outside during a break and put the gutter extenders on.

So far so good! NO water or damp places in the house!

I spent a couple of hours this afternoon filling all our pillboxes for the next four weeks.

It's best if I concentrate when I do this so Louis Dean was in his music room and I had Alaska The Last Frontier on TV.

Mine....

I'm thankful that we are relatively healthy and grateful for modern day medicine.

Our boxes have both prescriptions, over the counter, and vitamins and such.

His....

I'm also thankful we only take morning and evening medicine!

I keep all of it in a small suitcase I can roll in and and then store away - taking out only a week at a time. It put me in mind of the nursing home where Lillian lives and the one who wheels this huge cart with every one's medicine in it and dispenses it door by door as she goes down the hall.

I had not thought before what an enormous responsibility that is.

I've taught Louis Dean to take his own medicine and by that I mean I do not even hand it to him.

He has to get it and take it so he can be responsible for himself.

And also to LOOK at it before he takes it.

His blood pressure pills are the size of a piece of lint so he's learned to count how many pills and make sure there's not two of something.

Even though he is borderline diabetic - he's not on any medication for that.

Over all we are both in pretty good health....although you wouldn't know it to look at our pill boxes!

It was 4:00 before I left the house today to shop for a few groceries at Aldi.

I'm fixing Hungarian Goulash for lunch tomorrow and Kimmy and June are coming.

Summer will be here later in the afternoon so she will sit outside with us to hand out candy.

We may need a heater for the front porch!

I like shopping at Aldi and the unique items they have seasonally.

Today I bought an assortment of cookies plus this wine from France.

It was only $5.99 a bottle while the supply lasts.

I decided to chance it and bought four bottles to fill up my wine rack.

Sure enough - it's really good!

While Louis Dean brought the groceries in, I went out and covered some of the flowers with blankets and towels. It's to be 31 degrees here tonight!

Louis Dean hauled his monster Aloe Vera plants in from outside and they are all in his music room.

I guess they will live there until spring.

Tonight we went over to Brenda and Billy's house and picked up the Rainbow vacuum I bought from the estate sale for Brenda's parents. My Rainbow was seriously crippled up and this one is smaller and not nearly as bulky as my old one. I'm so happy to get this! I am going to try to keep it as clean and nice as Mary did.

I wish I had taken pictures of Brenda's house.

It is beautiful!

She has incorporated lots of things that were her mom's.

For every item she brought in - she took one out.

What a great idea!

Next week I will be changing out my closet to the winter season and I am going to be ruthless!