LIving Off the Land . . .

This has to have been the coldest, wettest,
(with short, unexplained bursts of really warm days, just to tease and torture us)
longest spring that I have ever had the pleasure of living through (not!)
I guess our not-too terribly cold, hardly any snow winter had to have a downside, right?
Just when I was thinking the mild winter this year was a pleasant bonus earned by the two or three preceding winters of massive amounts of snow, starting in early November and not all gone til, say, April? 
Uh, no.

But anyway, now that I've gotten all my gripes about the weather out,

I am ready to celebrate the beauty that spring in north Idaho brings (finally)

I have a row of lilac and snowball bushes that separates my garden from my yard, and they are all in bloom!
(It's been a long time coming, because last year, we got a really cold snap just as the blossoms were about to burst, and it wiped out all of the blooms)

But who knew, 11 years ago when we planted them, that they'd be over 10 feet tall!

Yesterday, my hubby and I discovered that the lilac were completely full of:

Honey bees!

I mean, every lilac bloom/bunch had probably half a dozen on each. 

Here you can see only two for sure,

but they were thick on each and every bunch. 

And on each 10' bush - we have three of them - they were just as thick . . .

So, we got to thinking . . . we have 5 acres. 

We live in an area with lots of wide open fields where bees can collect pollen.

We have been trying to eat more natural and unprocessed foods,

and we think it's a good idea to actually use the land

for more than to just separate ourselves from our neighbors

(Not that we'd want to!)

As a child, my dad had several beehives and harvested the honey himself.

I can still recall the scent of the honey being cut off the comb

and the delicious flavor of it slathered on my mom's homemade whole wheat bread

Oh, what memories.

Thanks, Mom and Dad!

So this is what we are thinking of: 

Getting our own hives and harvesting the honey

for our food use/storage and maybe a lil' extra to sell.

This is really not a huge stretch for us. 

We garden, we have beef cattle,  calves, and chickens. 

We are "living off the land" already, at least for these few basic things,

so this is just another step in the progression. 

Never really thought I'd be a country girl.

But now that we're here

and it's all happening,

I wouldn't have it any other way.

So, thanks again, Mom and Dad,

 for raising me (with my brothers) the way you did.

It made me the person that I am,

and I know that living this way makes my hubby happy. 

It's all a win-win situation.

 all photos (other than the ones I obviously took) were found on Google Images....Thanks!