Bee Chill

In the last couple of weeks, I have learned a very important lesson. I am very popular with bees. Let's just say I've seen two swarms of bees outside my garage and 3 swarms have gone to live underneath our storage container.

I have a developing relationship with our bee lady Monica King and she's great. She's always ready to give me bee advice and rid me of bees. She's got beekeeper connections and I know she's going to be essential in removing hoards of bees from our place.

When Monica came to get the latest group of bees, she told Charles not to come outside because there was a rattlesnake under the bush by the front door. She called a friend who relocated the snake to the mountains. I've also killed two scorpions this week. One in the garage and one in our shed where we keep the trash. Otherwise, the javelinas dump it and make a mess. Thanks for that, desert raccoons. 

We also have an older neighbor that lives behind us. She has three bigger dogs, which are not very personable, that she walks through our yard every day at the end of her walk. When we first moved in, she said hello and mentioned sometimes she uses our yard as a shortcut. I've come to realize she does it...every day.

Last week, after the latest swarm set up camp under our shipping container, our neighbor left a note and a printout of numbers on our front door letting us know we had a bee problem. Thanks neighbor. If you're concerned, don't walk through my yard. Ever again. 

We've also had a lot of things breaking recently. Our front door wedged itself closed on a screw that was coming up from the threshold. Charles fixed it, but when he got home and couldn't open the front door, he had to come in through the garage. Our front gate fell off because of termites or wood rot. Our kids messed up the door on their closet track,which Charles also fixed. Strangely enough I also find random screws around our house that have worked themselves free from their homes. I usually don't have any idea where they came from, even though I look around with great aplomb.  Our faucet started leaking again, but Charles fixed it. Luckily, he's a pretty handy guy and he lives here.

Overall, it seems like summer in April is quite dangerous. Welcome to Tucson!

Besides it being a dangerous place with all the biting things, it is also a beautiful place. 

These roses are growing in our back yard. It is a lovely surprise to see what blooms around our house that the previous owners planted. 

This is a dolly I saw last week. I was pleasantly surprised to find out the toys around here put themselves away. This doll probably heard about the snake.