Whatta guy...

So today, I needed some mommy time. I had to have a break from my "sick but getting better" children. I needed to breathe the air outside into my lungs and I needed to waist a little bit of money on some stuff I didn't need. I had too.

And my guy let me :)

I went walking at the park for an hour blasting some praise music in my ears, to become refreshed (didn't get to go to church today) then walked around Angel's Antiques for 2 1/2 hours!!!! I got lost in there! I bought some books...I found some Dr. Suess... and Kathy and Joyce I got some little house on the prairie books for .50 cents! I am going to start to read them to them this week when they are 100%. Right now my kids just want to watch movies and eat red popsciles. And that is okay if you have the swine flu.

Back to my guy...(let me back up, when I left I had 2 sinks full of dishes) so I came in from a church meeting after my time shopping and when I walked in the dishes had been done! :) Not only did he let me leave for 5 hours today...but he did the dishes!!

I used to write "I love so and so" on my notebooks in high school but they never did my dishes... So since he is such a wonderful guy, and he loves God more than me, and he gave me such cute kids, and HE DID MY DISHES....Here you go honey...

I LOVE CHRIS GEORGE ...4 EVA

And I never wrote that on a computer before about anyone but you!!

yup...I do. Now I'll go make you some brownies...and I'll do the dishes.

Recovering

It has been a very long and sickly (is that a word?) week at our household! Chris was out of town and our children came down with the H1N1 flu. Late night fevers, not wanting to eat, and not wanting to let go of mommy. It was very exhausting!

I remember feeling this tired when they were babies and having to get up all hours of the night and feed them. I like my sleep too much now...so I will let my sister in law, Tyler, and my friend Lane (who I found out is pregnant again!!) have them so I can hold and babysit them and then give them back at the end of the night so I can go to sleep. :) I have paid my getting up in the middle of the night dues.

The town held an event for Ty Garner tonight..we couldn't go obviously, but I heard it was a lot of fun. It is amazing how a community of people can come together and support and love on a family in need. My prayers are with Karen, and her children! We have been praying for them since the morning of his accident.

Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; Save me, and I shall be saved, For You are my praise.

Jeremiah 17:14

Hopefully he knows that so many are praying for him for peace while he is recovering.

Well, Off to make another prune cake...no one will eat prunes (but me) in this house so I hide them in the what mommy calls the "spice cake" :)

Goodnight.

Notecards...

Thanks for responding to the question everyone! It seems that Fall has taken the hearts of all of us. Autumn is my favorite as well. Like Joyce, I am originally a Yankee from RI, who desperately misses the mass of maple trees changing color and apple picking.

Congrats to Marleen Frick!

She will receive the note cards! I called Chris and said pick a number 1-11 and he picked #9...

Hope you all have a great day and look for another fun giveaway coming your way soon :)

Angela

Giveaway!

I am working on a website that will be up soon. It will be about my life with bees, cooking/baking using local honey, how to keep bees, my favorite books, some postings about my family, etc, etc. On the website, I will from time to time have some giveaways of some of my favorite things. Some things will be from my local community and others will be from all over. So here is a preview of what is to come!

On Friday at 10am - the winner will be announced and receive
a set of 10 3x3 hand made Bee and Flower note cards!
(They are in the picture above)

***Note: at first my husband asked me to give away one of our animals, but I told him no one would post a comment so I thought the note cards were a better choice!! No one wants a puppy that pees on the floor... among other gross things! :)

I love little cards like this. When I give a jar of honey or homemade vanilla extract away for gifts I like to use a little note card tied to it. It Gives it that extra detail to a special gift.

All you have to do is answer with a comment on my blog page to the following question:


What is your favorite season and why?


I can't wait to hear your answers! I love learning about people. So pass the info along to your other blog buddies so they might win the note cards too. Oh, and my husband is going to pick a random number for the winner :)


Blessings!

Pig Fly?

I think Sophia has it. I heard her up early and then she crawled into my bed saying that her tummy and her leg hurt. Being a parent I know now that kids try to do anything to get another cookie, play out side a little longer and crawl into bed with mommy and daddy. But a fever seals the deal of not making up excuses... and she has one. We have a lot of mom' s calling us saying their kids have the "flu"..."THE SWINE FLU"...uh,oh...call Fox News! My child may have the Pig Fly!

So, she is eating Cinnamon rolls (thanks to Pioneer Woman's Tasty Kitchen) in bed watching Sesame Street. Hopefully this will not really be the flu but just a sweet excuse to cuddle in bed with my 5 year old who still likes to be nudged in my neck when she's not feeling well :)

Mondays...

I remember I dreaded Mondays as a kid. It meant the weekend was over. I had to get up at 6:30am get ready for school and make sure I was at the bus stop by like 7:00am or somewhere close to that. I remember I liked Sunday nights so much b/c my dad was usually home and my mom would be catching up on laundry or cooking.

In RI, we didn't have central air so we had our windows open all spring,summer and fall. I remember fall the best in RI. That crisp cool air, the maple leaves crackling coming to their end and the smell of cinnamon...

I LOVE the smell of cinnamon!!!

I was still cleaning up my house from a very unsuccessful yard sale I had this weekend and I went out to throw the trash out around midnight. If any of you were up then you know what the weather was like! Fall is coming, Fall is coming! This Monday was one of the mornings that I will put down as a great one. Cool, breezy, lovely...so I took the kids to the library, then walking, then we were off to find toads and water bugs at the creek at monkey park. Then we learned about Noah and his ark! I love Homeschooling my spider monkeys! (That is what they now want to be.) Well, maybe then, they will let me get rid of all 50,000 pairs of princess shoes we own...spider monkey's don't wear them, do they?

It's a great Monday.

Prune Cake... Its truly Fabulous!

I made it today. Its from the Pioneer Woman website. Something caught my eye (s) on the fact that she said that this cake was so good that her husband and her kids had no idea one of the main ingredients was in fact boiled, mashed up prunes. So I had to give it a try, just like I am going to give 2 miles tomorrow morning a try because that is about how much I am going to have to walk to get that taste of heaven off my thighs :)

Below is the link to her page for her recipe. She's my new gal to get recipes from. I was referred over to her website for homeschooling, and little did I know how much more I would get. If you try it let me know what you think! I think we should call her and have a girls weekend getaway at her lodge. I'll bring my massage table and barter out with her for letting us stay!


http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/12/make-this-cake-today-trust-me/


One more thing, Chris had two pieces. He only ever does that with his moms yellow cake with homemade chocolate icing...if that gives you an idea of how good this was :)

Initiated into the Bee Brotherhood (or sisterhood)...

So, it finally happened.... I got stung.

I went out to "plug" my bees to move them tomorrow morning (you plug them inside their hive so they can't get out when sunrise happens, that way you don't leave any behind when you have to move them) and when I did, she got me. I had really thick jeans on which tells me this one was determined to be a suicide bomber. She went in for the attack...right above my knee on the nice fatty part of my leg!!! To bad their venom doesn't destroy fat tissue because that would be the only nice thing about getting stung by a honey bee. Yes, it hurt. But I guess I had this one coming.

Ben, my Beekeeper Sensei, has been in question of me being a real beekeeper because I have not yet been stung. He always says "You will, and its gonna hurt." I have been doing my best not to get "hurt" and tonight it was just destined to happen. I feel like we are even now (me and my bees) because I robbed them last week. Yup, a whole gallon and a half of honey. So I look at it as I deserved it. I called Ben to let him know. He chuckled and said "All right!" Now you are officially in." (In the BeeKeeper Brotherhood)

So, rest asured that I am putting this one in the books as a "red letter day". The day I got stung by a honey bee and the day I became a true beekeeper :)


PS: Chris was in the car the whole time laughing at me! So, no "honey" for him :)

seven years (*Sigh*)......

I am in love with "The Pioneer Woman"!! I love her recipes and her photography. I am addicted to her website! I am going to try her prune cake! She lives on a cattle ranch I think in Oklahoma.

I sometimes want Chris to be a cattle rancher/Farmer/cowboy in the wild west roping and wrestling down cows....then again....he would probably hurt himself. He told me when he went to a ranch in CO that he rubbed all the hairs off his legs after an hour of being on a horse. They still haven't grown back. (Te, hee, hee) He makes me laugh. He's a goofy guy...

We have been married 7 years today :) Did you know that 2 people can eat at Logan's for $13.99 from 3-6pm!!!! We had an appetizer and dinner for $21.00!!!!

Happy Anniversary to us!

PS: I love Chris George

Cooking with Local Honey 101

So, here I am at my first blog! I am Angela, and I am a wife, homeschooling mom, and a beekeeper! My passion for bees came about when I saw an independent film about farming and it made me want to move to the deep country roads of Alabama, be outdoors with my family all day, and have a big farm with a historic house, lots of animals, and a big ole garden! Well when I came back down to earth (but I can keep dreaming) I realized that there was something that was outdoors that helped farmers and agriculture in general, and didn't cost a lot to start, and my kids could learn with me....KEEPING BEES!! So I did.

I went hunting for a beekeeper in my little Mayberry of a town, and found what I was looking for. Ben... an ole' timin' beekeeper who was 80 years young and had over 40 hives! The best part was he was willing to teach me to be a real beekeeper! I spent many Alabama summer days scared to death of getting stung and listening to his stories about growing up in the south. As we went into his hives and extracted honey in his storage shed with a window air unit, we poured honey into bear shaped jars so he could go and sell them at local farmer markets. All this information about bees and honey that I had learned from him over a years time, sent me on a creative mind frenzy (you know what I am talking about) and I wanted to be able to share something with my family and friends like how Ben had shared with me.

Hmmm, an idea! How could I get people interested in beekeeping, supporting local beekeepers, and understanding the importance of bees?? AH! An idea! HONEY! Everyone (well almost everyone) likes honey! And, you have to eat...so eating, yeah, and cooking, hmmmm, oh okay! COOKING WITH LOCAL HONEY! Ben told me his family and other beekeepers used honey in place of sugar when cooking and baking! Breads, cookies, salad dressings, marinates...you name and you can use honey! So, in this day in age we have become concerned of the non-nutritional value of white sugar, and all of the high fructose corn syrups we are consuming...honey is one of the most natural, "green", pollinating, sweet taste to hit your tongue... and its got stuff in it that is good for you! Its the way to go! So this is my blog about being a beekeeper, goodness of honey, cooking, being a homemaker, homeschooling, and I get to share all of it with you! So, why Queen Bee? Well the hive doesn't work with out her. She is the one that gets the hive going (she lays the eggs among other qualities) and her family supports her! My favorite quote about the bee is;

"The bee is more honored than any other animal, not because she labors, but because she labors for others."

St. John Chrysostom said that and its perfect! I thought about how selfless bees are and what team players they are. They work together and they see the result! I strive for my family to honor God that way, and I think of the Queen Bee as a title like the Proverb 31 woman. It's my dream to be that!

I hope you enjoy my blog in the future and be looking for www.queenbeeinthekitchen.com coming soon!

Have a blessed day!