beeswax
-
This Little Light of Mine: Beeswax Candles
I recently gifted a dear sister-in-law with two homemade beeswax candles. This has prompted her to do a blog post about beeswax candles. And that has been a major kick in the pants for me to share my candle adventure here. Making candles is so easy! Just melt and pour. NOT. It took me over Continue reading
-
Making lipbalm: one way to avoid doing schoolwork
A box of honey has been spun and the cappings have been melted into a sunny yellow disc. With the school year looming, I am desperate to spend these last few days enjoying summer projects before the first steps into the school building erase these ten glorious weeks of summer. Or maybe I am just stalling Continue reading
-
Up to our ears in wax
Beeswax. We’re up to our ears in beeswax. (I’m so tempted to recount an earwax story my sister told me about a certain niece’s boyfriend, but I’ll behave myself. Family members have here enough data to figure out the source and ask her–if they dare.) Actually, it’s not the beeswax but old honeycomb that we have in Continue reading
-
On Labor Day and Hobbies
Work should not rule one’s life. I say that one week into the school year with a three day weekend to run errands, take a nap, exercise, and play around with beeswax. But I mean it. And I’ll mean it in October when my body is screaming at me and I’m stressed for time–although I Continue reading
-
Honey Harvest 2012
If there’s anything more satisfying to a beekeeper than seeing buckets of harvested honey, it is seeing that golden sweetness in jars. It’s a little bit arrogant on our part to take pride in a good harvest since the bees make the honey, but there’s enough work on the part of the beekeeper to justify it. Continue reading
-
Preparing for the honey harvest
Today was an exciting day as we got the hives ready for harvest. Today’s tasks: to put bee escapes on the honey boxes and put entrance reducers on the front entrance to the hives. The goals: (1) to get the bees to exit the honey box without getting back in, and (2) to try to prevent robbing Continue reading
-
Lip balm
Making lip balm is one project I’ve been wanting to do with our beeswax. It is relatively easy and foolproof. The success of a lip balm has more to do with preference than with messing up a recipe. (This reminds me of a time when I made chocolate truffles as Christmas gifts. The raspberry truffle Continue reading
-
Purifying the beeswax
The most obvious advantage of maintaining bees is to have honey. A secondary advantage is to have the beeswax. It’s an amazing product with so many practical applications. Last year we harvested our first honey. This year we want to find uses for the wax. The first step is to get the wax from the Continue reading
Slightly Off the Grid 