Lydia's Newest Adventure!

The day is finally here!

We went and picked up Lydia's new pets!

Honey bees!

Lydia has been dreaming about

and researching honey bees for a long time now.

She has wanted them primarily to help pollinate her vegetable garden,

but she would also like to one day harvest some honey!

She ordered her boxes and bees through a local supplier,

and fellow homeschooling family.
Today is the day Lydia has waited for a long time to get here!
She has truly put her all into this project,
even financing it with her own funds!
HOME!

First step was spraying the bees with sugar water.

This helps calm them down : -) !

Next, Lydia removed the bee food in a can,

for their exit to their new home.

In the next photo, Lydia is holding the cage that the queen was shipped in

(that is also covered with worker bees).

She places the queen in the box, then shakes everyone else out,

and puts all the pieces of the box back together again.

But before putting the queen in,

she removed the cork stopper that holds the queen in her cage,

and replaces it with a marshmellow!

The worker bees will eat the marshmellow to free her from the cage.

(If she was released immediately, she might fly away!)

Last steps on the second box, and Lydia is an official bee keeper!

(Did you notice how in the last few photos she put her bee hat and gloves on? : -)

Egg Hunt!

It was a beautiful sunshiney day!

Nothing like finding eggs hidden all over Papa Bob's JD tractor!

Uh oh . . .can he do it?

He may need a ladder for this one!

(Or maybe just his big brother!)

We were so happy to have Aunt Kelley spend the day with us!

Didn't she do a good job on the egg hunt? ;-)

The Partiers

Today, in honor of tax day :-( we decided to take part

in a Tea Party march and rally at the capitol.

(You might notice our family was down by two . . .

but they were with us in spirit,

as one was babysitting for some friends of ours,

and one was preparing for the delivery of a goat kid)

When we arrived, the gentleman on the far left gave us letters to hold up

that spelled out "WE THE PEOPLE".

His wife spent hours making the letters with real photographs of Tea Partiers through the years.

There was a nice size turn out, even in cold and wet conditions!

Can you spot some of the littlest tea partiers?

Update!

Thank you all so much for your thoughts, prayers and words of encouragement!

Things have definitely brightened up at the Crossroads Country Ranch!

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This is Heidi . . .

She is our pastor and his wife's little baby.

Kyle babysits her while they are away, and in our last post we mentioned that she got sick while here.

She is all better now!

All but one puppy have gone to their new homes, and the skin infection has cleared up! We have had our first goat kid of the season be born!Meet "Prince Charming"! We had another surpirse lamb born to a ewe that Lydia was not totally sure was pregnant!

Kyle made a new sturdy frame for Lydia's greenhouse and she was able to salvage the covering and save many of her seedlings! (This photo was actually taken before the castastrophe while in the old frame.) Our friends, Russ and Joanna Miller from Flagstaff, are here visiting and speaking around the area for 10 days!

AND . . .

we had an AWESOME court hearing on Monday!!! Whoo hoo!

Thank you for all your prayers!