I’m happy to say that my bees lived through the winter. I “wintered” thirteen hives and eleven survived, which is a very good number.  

Since then they have been busy busy busy! I’ve already multiplied a few of them, and I bought five more colonies, so I now have 23 hives at the moment.  

I am a bit nervous though these days because farmer’s around my land have put many pesticides on their crops, so I may get a few mortalities in the next few weeks. I cross my fingers that most of my colonies were still on the dandilion on our land, which of course is pesticide free!

It seems the movie “The Matrix” wasn’t so far from reality after all. I feel like Trueman, finding out that every detail of my life has been a big lie. And even though today I live an alternative lifestyle and I contribute less and less to the destruction and slavery in this world, it still gets to me.  

Sacred images of childhood like Nutella take a whole new reality. Before, it ryhmed with snacks watching favorite cartoons, great outdoor picnics, early breakfast with my sister when my parents were still asleep, just great moments. Then you learn that when you buy Nutella, you buy its ingredients, you buy  and contribute to the way these ingredients are made. There is palm oil in Nutella, therefore you pay people to destroy huge forest to plant the palm trees, therefore destroying huge ecosystems, contribuing to the extinction of orang-utans for instance.  

You buy a car that consummes less petrol and vegetable fuel, thinking you are taking a responsable step to respect more the environment, and bam! same thing... Vegetable fuel is made from palm oil, thus forests devestated to be replaced by palm oil plantation.  

When does the nightmare stop? When do we get the truth? And when will people start to care? Because for me that is the solution. If everybody stops buying products that encourage the destruction of our planet, we might save it... But unfortunatly I know plenty of people who will tell you it’s terrible that Nutella, Kinder, Nestlé and others are destroying our planet, but in the end they still buy these products every week because it’s easy and it taste good.  

Nutella is just one example in a million. Sometimes I feel totally discouraged. Don’t these people that run these companies have children and little children? Don’t they care about their future? Why don’t we care more about our children and the future generations? Isn’t the survival of our race a good enough reason to make some little sacrifices in our lives, like not eating Nutella?

This is the newest member of our family: a 4 month border collie pup. She is soooo cute! She’s been keeping me busy for the past three weeks: pups crave attention whenever they are awake!!! She almost doesn’t “chew” us anymore, or at least she does it very gently (it is a compulsion at that age!), she sits when asked and fetches then brings back a frisbee. I’m already in love with her!  

Arrrrg ! I was so discouraged when I visited my hives yesterday.  Half my queens have swarmed; new virgin queens have lost their way or are not laying eggs yet. Which translate into more than half my hives are in bad shape. Swarming is a natural proccess. It just happenned a bit too soon for me, I wasn’t ready!!!

I was suppose to separate my hives last week but a professional beekeeper told me it was best to have queens under hand before separating because things don't always go well the natural way. And boy was he right! None of my naturally born virgin queens seem to have made it. All I hope is that my hatching queens, the ones I’ve made, will be ready in time (beginning of next week). Hopefully I'll be able to save a few colonies.  

Wouldn't it be nice if we could train bees like dogs?

I just bought my first beehives this month, eight total. It is so exciting to have bees at home.

I love to open a hive. The minute you lift the roof, a smell of honey, pollen and propolis envelops you. The buzzing is also very impressive. If the colony is big you can feel it in your thorax, the way a base will do it at a concert.  When you lift a frame, most of the bees continue their daily tasks. It is always fascinating to see the birth of a little honeybee, the bee dance to indicate where a good source of nectar can be found, or even sometimes watch the queen lay an egg.  

Taking care of bees is quite an adventure these days. Bees tend to die easily with sickness or intoxication.  Since an average working bee lives only three weeks, the beekeeper must react very fast or else a whole colony can die.  Symptoms being quite similar for different problems, the task is not so obvious.  

Next week I will separate all my colonies in two. This way, if all goes well, I should have 16 colonies by the end of the summer. It is very important to know how to multiply colonies because an average of one third will not survive the winter.  

This year, because I'm multiplying my colonies, we will not get a lot of honey. I hope to get  20kg. If all goes well though, next year I should have much more.  Hubby and I can't wait to taste our honey!

I had 7 objectives planned this month. Last week, my sweetheart made me realize that these objectives would not make me happier, calmer nor more productive. I already work 7 days a week, more than 50 hours, add on a 1h30 commute per day, that’s already more than 60 hours and I haven’t even started doing any objective.  Add on 40 minutes of exercise and 20 min of meditation per day, cooking, cleaning, writing my book...it doesn’t leave much time for anything else, yet alone sleeping!! At that pace I am bound to failure or exertion.  

By keeping my objectives I leave no space for improvisation or spare of the moment events. Everything becomes psycho rigid. I lose track of what’s really important: life, love, happiness. Therefore I have decided to not set objectives anymore. Life should flow. When we try to direct it too much we lose touch with its essence. I need to learn to just let things go and trust Life. It always provides what I need to grow.