Year one 2007 In a Nutshell (One Hive Strong)

I purchased my first hive in the spring, scared spitless of getting stung and having bees in my face, I bought the bare minimum to see if I liked keeping bees. I had read Sue Monk Kidd's book, Bee Season. That and a few library books were my only prelude to the adventure. I endured the fear and became comfortable with the bees, careful to work the hive from the back. I harvested about 2 gallons of honey, and enough wax from my simple 'crush method' of extraction to make a couple dozen lip balms of 2/3 wax to 1/3 olive oil. Pretty simple really and I found the little lip balm containers on E-Bay. My hive wintered over despite my inexperience and I checked for survivors on a balmy late winter day. Here in the Pacific Northwest we have a few of those in late February and early March.....well the field bees were out of the hive and I thought my group was smaller than a baseball, so I ordered bees.