Montana Christmas

Christmas in Montana:

A reflective collection of soft, somber grays...

The Flathead River and Columbia Mountain


Clear, piercing blues...

the road to Essex

Frozen moons and brilliant whites.

hovering around zero - frostbite skiing

Then at last... a warm explosion of light and color!

Oh Christmas Tree!

What a beautiful time of celebration and love...

Merry Christmas to All

A Reminder

So I've been watching CNN at the gym lately. There have been several news stories regarding the effect of military deployments on the children left at home. Yeah, probably not the best stories to be watching on this end of J's deployment! One of the biggest points made was that is IS affecting, particularily for three categories of kids: teens, girls, and reservists/families away from military bases. We've got two out of three covered - at least we don't have a teenager! The incidence of anxiety and depression skyrockets in those three groups. Another major factor was the attitude, support and abilities of the parent at home running the daily ins and outs of life. Wow - that hit me like a ton of bricks! So much of my children's success and mental well being is related to how positive I can make this experience for them. Hmmm... that got me thinking... What are some ways to keep this light hearted, positive, even... dare I think... fun?

Here are some ideas:

1. I've decided that when I talk about the deployment, I couch things in positive terms. Such as, Daddy is leaving to mobilize, but we get to see him in less than two months after that - that's no time!

2. We get to go back to California where Kara was born for an extended vacation to visit him before he deploys overseas.

3. Summer will be here and we'll take trips, visit family and friends, and do a lot of fun summer things. Then the school year will be full of activities and exciting learning.

summer garden

4. We'll grow another beautiful, productive garden.

5. We will see Grandma and Grandpa alot (hopefully).

6. We will get a webcam to talk/see Daddy daily online.

Other ideas?

My son recently grasped the reality of a deployment for the first time. He said, "What? Where is Dad going?" He wondered why dad would be leaving us for so long, and I was put on the spot to answer that question. I told him, "Jaegar, your dad would stay here if there was any way he could, but he serves our country to protect us - his family - and the rest of the people around us. We can be proud that Daddy is such a good man, does his job so well, and loves us so much. He'll be back before you know it, and then we'll have a big party!" Jaegar seemed satisfied enough with that answer, and was on to the next topic. Daddy is not abandoning us, he's serving us... and that is something I want to reiterate to our children daily.

A New Season

Morning moonset over Big Mountain from our front yard

Well, its been a long time. After the loss of the entire hive last June, I kinda gave up bee blogging, as that was the primary focus of this blog. However, I've decided to shift gears a little, just for the current era, and focus on our life as we prepare for my husband's deployment and our consequent life left behind. I've debated this for awhile, and concluded that this is local living at its best or worst or most realistic or something... just with a little different, world conscience twist. I imagine this as carthartic - there are so many thoughts and experiences occurring even now, months beforehand - for me, personally, it will be valuable to be able to look back at this journey, and see that it really wasn't so overwhelming after all.

And here they are... my sweet military family

Barack Obama announced recently that 30,000 additional troops will be arriving in Afghanistan this year to support the surge needed to eventually turn the country back over to itself. This has profound consequences for many of us in the United States, and my family is one drop in the bucket of affected lives, not really unique, but a story nonetheless.

Its not like we are new to the deployment experience... we've done this twice before. J was in Japan, Guam and had plenty of close calls in Iraq. We've weathered guiding our child through daddy's absence. We've had the hurried, sad goodbyes and the glorious, almost surreal returns. However, this time is entirely different. In the past J was active duty, and there was a support system of other military families undergoing the same event. It was more normal, if that's even possible. I was able to move back to my hometown and have the support of my family loving and encouraging and simply keeping the loneliness at bay. Now we are an island, a reserve military family in a sea of civilians - no comrads in war, no family to depend upon. It can be a harrowing thought. Alas, I'm reminded that we really have it so good - our blessings are overflowing! I'm not a single mother, struggling to make ends meet - God bless those women! - we're not really alone. Perhaps part of this experience is a lesson for me, a lesson in empathy for the widows and orphans of the world... Let me embrace that, and be thankful for the trials in life. I love the Bible verse: "...Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope..." (Romans 5:3-4). The suffering is not really suffering after all...

Oh Christmas Tree!


Now we try to accomodate J's increasingly busy schedule. His phone conferences and weekends away, his three plus week FEX, his full time civilian job on top of that, and the stresses that he bears with such dignity, despite nights of waking up for hours with racing thoughts, despite missing out on the slow simple things. There is no better person to hold his position... he is a leader and will serve us all to the highest standard. I love you, J.

The Arrival of Summer

A note of thanks to everyone's kind words and helpful insights regarding my unfortunate hive loss... There is such kindness in the world...

There is a magical thing occurring. Warmth, long lingering light, everything alive and growing.

Summer in the Flathead.

I have spent so much time outdoors that I find it difficult to sit at this computer. But the beauty of the evening enticed me into, at the very least, viewing my photos. So now here I sit and remember and wait with growing anticipation for the coming morning...

The kitchen window - first the white serviceberry blooms, then the white chokecherry blooms, now the white mock orange blooms... the beautiful white succession.

Baby Kajsa enjoying summer in the yard

A summer evening panorama

The garden... so many salads, so much broccoli, so many spinach and turnip greens frozen away for the winter... now turnips, cabbage and even a beet!




He sits there, on one of his two main perches, framed by the heavy firs and mock orange and glacial blue river... I realize I love it here... I have the vast blessing to live here.

I am content.

Catastrophe

Catastrophe. Destruction. Devastation.

It all looks so idyllic. It has taken me a whole 24 hours plus to ready myself to blog about the incident. Yesterday, I made my rounds as usual... observing new garden growth, shaking my head at my tomatoes and their disappointing blight of some kind, smelling the hillside's herbs and flowers, then noticing something I couldn't quite place... down the hill, something askew, something off... something... oh the drop in my stomach at the slow realization, at the immensity of what was already impossible to undo. no... a quiet whisper... My dad happened to be in town, and I quickly nursed the baby, handed her and my son over to grandpa, suited up and headed down the hill.

The sinking feeling overcame me... I momentarily wanted to run, didn't want to face the gruesome reality. But the moment passed and I methodically prepared to confront the carnage. Nothing, not a thing I could do now but survey and salvage as much as possible, if possible.

It was obviously a bear. Not just any bear - THE bear. The same albino blackbear that loitered here last year, that strewed the neighbor's garbage about several weeks ago. I know this only because it came back late again in the afternoon, to lick up the scraps I suppose, and my dog gave me ample warning in growls. I ran out and yelled that mangey, yellowish, LARGE (much larger than last year) creature back down the slope.

To confront such a loss is so disheartening, so sad. So many bees lost. Every single topbar scraped clean of comb. The remaining comb pieces scattered about baking in the hot June sun, the young larvae and new emerging bees already dried and shriveling. I couldn't believe the efficiency of the ants. A steady line of ants were carrying eggs, larvae, dead workers out and away, cleaning up the scene before I even knew it existed.

I carefully picked up each small fragment of comb, searched with a small glimmer of hope for the queen and placed them back in the hive. One by one. Most comb simply gone. The few bees still alive were scooped up, and gently lowered into the hive. They were so disorganized, so frenzied, so angry. I cannot even count how many stingers were on my clothes, how many bees I witnessed dying on me as I tried to rescue them. The once gentle bees fighting with their lives...

I never found the queen. I'm fairly certain she is in the belly of the albino bear.

Well, this is life in its most natural sense. I have learned so much through this process... the biggest lesson being PUT UP A WILDLIFE EXCLUSION FENCE IN BEAR COUNTRY. Its up now, thanks to my husband. Its up and ready for another colony. I will check the survivors tomorrow. Check to see if there is any sign of cohesion, any sign I could possibly requeen them this late in the game, despite the complete absence of comb, despite the great stress, despite the minimal number of bees... there is always hope, even in the greatest of losses. I know... its only bees... but the lessons are applicable in all realms, and I am strangely thankful for that.

Evening Diversions

There is an odd feel to the air tonight, to last night. A moon rose veiled by a smokey-thin red cloud cover - no fire, no smoke in sight. The wind howled lowly, constantly through the fir boughs and cottonwood branches, bending the birches across the river into one uniform, uncomfortable southwest angle. There is a jitter in the air, like the energizing O3 increase before a thunderstorm, but I don't sense that kind of storm. Typically my half amputated middle toe lets me know when a storm is coming... its true what they say... "I can feel it in my bones", in my case, my toe bone that's no longer there... but not tonight. Tonight its something different... and I like it.

New Comb

I checked the hive again yesterday. Not a lot new to muse over this week. The seventh bar has been built upon - new translucent pale-cream comb, so different from the brilliant yellow dandelion comb of the early spring. Still beautiful, just in a new way, a more peaceful, angelic way. I am noticing one anomaly that may prove difficult in the future: the bees built a double comb on the sixth topbar, knocking off the spacing ease of the first five. I almost destroyed comb between the sixth and seventh bar before I noticed that the seventh bar also has two combs... hmmmm... at least its straight comb, not wavily attached to multiple bars. I should still be able to remove and access future topbars... I hope.

Good Brood Capping The old combs are darkening from yellow to gold to swarthy sunflower to dazzling dirt. They are FULL of larva, capped brood, drone cells and new eggs. One thing is certain, Flower knows how to reproduce!



The final object of writing interest this evening: Garden salads. Yes, those greens I longed for for months, dreamed of during the long whiteness of winter, thought of which I would never tire... those greens. They are just beginning to overwhelm me. We have been eating salads every day since that first exhilirating salad last week, and the salad keeps on coming. I've given several bags of greens away, but they're reproducing like rabbits, or, well, bees. Tomorrow I am harvesting spinach and possibly turnip greens to freeze, then probably will be compelled to eat yet another salad for dinner. So many salads, so few salad permutations. Tonight I got creative with what was hiding in my kitchen... here's a blanket recipe for tonight's salad - a little different, a little more exciting:

Tonight's Thai Shrimp Salad

1 can coconut milk (though I think ideally coconut cream)
a couple Tblsp brown sugar
quartered button mushrooms
fish sauce to taste
Curry paste or a garlicky seasoning to taste

Bring to low boil, cook mushrooms. Add
Shrimp
Cook until shrimp are pink and add juice of
one lime
and a handful of bean thread noodles or rice noodles

Add to Salad:
Garden greens
thinly sliced Green Onion
thinly sliced onion or shallots
thinly sliced hot pepper (serrano in my case)
thinly sliced lemon grass (if you have it on hand)
peanuts or cashews
about one inch finely grated ginger
fresh mint leaves
fresh cilantro
water chestnuts

Basically anything in your kitchen that sounds good... :) Enjoy!

Chaos Versus Cleanliness

The Progressing Garden

I've got to admit, I'm a dichotomy. Maybe everyone is, really. There is a part of me that appreciates structure, yet a more pronounced part that yields to the chaotic. You won't find perfectly rowed monocultured vegetables in my garden, instead a cacophony of interplanting companions... a dash of herb there, and splash of mustard here. That's my dad rearing up in me... his garden has always been a resplendant display of gently organized wildness. I also love writing music... not just writing music - feeling music onto those straight staff lines... letting it ebb and flow in its own meandering mode. Maybe that's why I find myself drawn to the undeveloped - the natural so often... there is more intense beauty there than in any clean line I've ever seen... My chaotic side is the most prevalent... perhaps more so because I married an engineer? We naturally balance eachother's stronger attributes? We subconsciously fulfill a piece of a the whole?

A Beautiful Broccoli Beginning

However, overarching all the espressive chaos, I DO savor orderliness - the structure of a day, a week, a season. There's a time and a place and reason for all those events we base our lives upon. The time to plant, the time to rest, the time of the last frost, the time of the first frost, the time to get my daughter up for school, the time to read our bedtime books, the time to learn, the time to share, the time for noise, the time for quiet. All the little times working together to form a life... all purposeful, all divined. I am so happy to experience it all, to be able to express both aspects.

Chaos in the Peas

Proper Pepper Propping... Perfect!

Order... Chaos... What DOES tend to incite my order analities is my desire for a clean house - I get that from my mom... her structure and cleanliness kept us kids healthy, well loved, safe. Her home was, still is, unabashedly clean. I relish the feel of fresh shining floors under my feet, of smooth white bathtub walls, of sparkling stainless steel kitchen sinks, not even a streak of mineral deposit or grease... I may not have all the paperwork filed away, all the little piles of this and that in their proper places, but, darn it, my house is scum free!


Super Shine!

I make my own cleaners - I have since my daughter was a baby seven years ago. I just can't stomach the thought of any extra chemicals assaulting young cells. Here are my cleaner recipes... they work just as well as the toxics, if not better!

Baking Soda Scour Paste: baking soda mixed with just enough liquid soap to create a thick paste, plus a couple drops tea tree oil

Disinfectant Spray, Window Wash, Multipurpose Cleaner, Wood/Tile Floor Cleaner: white vinegar plus 6-8 drops tea tree oil per small bottle

Wood Polisher: 1:1 ratio white vinegar to olive oil

Well, enough of this random post! :)

Hives and Produce

Inspecting for the Queen

How glad I am! For the last week, anxiety has welled up at the thought I may have inadvertantly swatted the queen away last inspection. After reviewing the queen photos and noticing her long black shape, I recalled swatting a long skinny wasp-looking thing away from last week's comb. Was it the queen?! Could I have been so flippant? Waiting, waiting, waiting to find out... then, on this inspection I saw plenty of new eggs, capped brood, larva, no new queen cells - all good signs of queen health. Finally, I found Flower yet again, diligently poking in and out of the cells. Phew! The anxieties of a beekeeper once more relieved!

A Followerboard Comb

The bees have built this bedraggled looking comb once again on the first followerboard. I pried it off last week in the hopes they'd build only upon the bars, but its back. I'm not sure what the purpose is, as it is accessible by only one side, not uniform in shape at all, and storing only nectar. I decided I'd leave it be now... it must be a food store at least.

The rest of the combs look good - definitely progressing appropriately. There are now six fully built combs, with a seventh beginning. The sixth bar holds a new find - a double comb full of either nectar or honey... I'm too inexperienced yet to differentiate. I am hoping this doubled up comb does not create difficulties in later comb spacing but left it alone for the time being. My interference does not seem to help much, rather hinder - the bees know their comb building much better than me!

Double Comb

Yesterday was a day of the new. New gardens planted, new plants sprouting, new food. My son and I planted the summer garden... lets see... cucumbers, crooknecks, zucchinis, butternut squash, pole beans, bush beans, more tomato and peppers, basil, dill, marigolds, nasturtiums, sunflowers, my celery seedlings (started months ago), corn, some more mesclun mix. Then we harvested a delicious salad for dinner - FINALLY! The salad was a mix of spinach, mustard, little tiny radishes, young turnip leaves, mesclun mix, lettuce, green onion, chive, terragon, lemon mint, and some purple leafy plant my dad previously scattered about. It was... flavorful!

First Garden Salad of the Year

The sun has been shining with an increased intensity lately - it makes me feel joy and ambition, and it seems to incite similar attitudes in the garden. Each day I watch as new things appear and old things advance... potatoes are sprouting all over the place, spinach leaves double in size nearly daily, peas are now able to be trellised... oh, and weeds are finally threatening their mass usurpation. No worries there, however - I just can't seem to stay away long enough to let the weeds abound. I find myself drawn out there morning, noon and night. Drawn out to wander, poke around, beg and plead new seeds into sprouts, nibble older things here and there... My kids are just as enticed by the greenery and know nearly every plant by name and taste and danger level (no potato leaves, kids!). The thrill at seeing one of our honeybees alighted upon a tomato leaf! The titillation of a spicy mustard leaf upon the tongue! Its all so sensory, it has to somehow advance young brain development.

The Finished Salad
A few additions - tomato, cheese, garbanzo beans and leftover chicken, and the salad was a complete meal!

Hive Inspection II

Serviceberry Blooms = Happy Bees

It is springtime... warm, shorts, bare feet springtime. Suddenly everything has awakened. Stubbornly slow leaves now unfurl in an afternoon. Cherry blossoms appear one day and bloom the next. The whole slope down to the river is covered in thousands... millions! of white serviceberry flowers, all arriving within the last couple days. I walk back to the garden and am happily assaulted by a sweet, fruity fragrance that must be savored... it will only last a moment til something new will take its place. Its so intoxicating I could walk circles around our house all evening. The bees must smell it too - they are actively pursuing the spring show, and (for this week anyway) are healthy and happy.

Comb Number 1

I inspected the hive Sunday afternoon to find five topbars with well developed comb and a sixth bar comb beginning. The eggs have progressed, and some areas are capped. There are new eggs in all the comb, more nectar stores, more pollen stores too. I am venturing a guess - I think the five combs are the brood comb, and honey comb will begin soon on the other bars. These bees have a lot of work cut out for them - not only feeding themselves, but feeding and raising brood, collecting extra food, and making wax combs. All this entails adequate food stores (even wax - its a by product of digestion), so this warm blooming weather is vastly appreciated.

Some capped brood, nectar and pollen

I found her! (look for the green dot)

The kids and I voted: my son's suggestion wins - the queen's name is Flower. This inspection, I wanted not only to find evidence, but to find Flower herself. On the third bar I saw it! The green that shouldn't be there in all of that yellow and brown and black. My eyes immediately made out the long thin shape surrounding the green dot and realized Flower was there crawling about the comb, fulfilling her lifelong baby making duty. She darted (and that's not an exaggeration - she was quick) around the comb so I had to carefully shift hands and turn the bar to watch her. I observed the workers almost piling upon her, protecting her from my prying eyes. Is this normal queen threat behavior? I decided to quickly return the bar to the hive lest I lose my most prized bee, so Queen Flower was plunged back into the safety of the dark before the hive became too stressed.



Comb I pried off the first follower board. No brood, just food.

Images of Spring III

Indian paintbrush

One of the bees landed here, 100s of yards from the house

The neighbor's cherry trees

Images of Spring II

The Flowers, The River

My oldest daughter watches ruby throated hummingbirds dance in the young serviceberry blooms

She decides to reach for the highest flower and take a picture at the same time

Images of Spring

Dandelions in the Lawn

My daughter found these mushrooms growing in the manure pile

Borage from the strawberry patch


My hail-battered spinach

The perfect compliment to a spring salad... still waiting