-Posted by Isaac

It was a slow week on the bee farm, mainly spent cleaning extracting equipment and putting mouse guards on the hives. But on the other hand, it was peppered with several big happenings. I'll fill you in.

First, relatively joyous news comes in the form of our second buckwheat crop. This was the last extracted honey of the year. If you'll recall, the first pull of buckwheat in August turned out somewhat brown, not the thick black it should've been. This round was much better.

One of these posts I'll get around to talking about our buckwheat endeavors. But not now.

Secondly, we were surprised this week to find our candles featured in the gift guide section of the far reaching Electric Co-op magazine.

And this happy surprise comes on the heels of another magazine's feature article.

Jayne and I are both Wittenberg alums and the alumni magazine people seem to love what we've got going with the bee business. This is our second feature article in a decade. Or maybe that's just what you get with a small liberal arts school only an hour away. I think I'll go digging for that other article and fill you in... future blog material.

More news- a big arrival. To keep up with the anticipated Christmas rush and the tidal wave of candle orders, we finally shelled out for a real wax melter. This week it arrived in it's full 10-gallon glory.

Maybe one of these days I'll get around to setting it up. Hopefully before Christmas.

Last, and by far the biggest- another arrival! This time in the form of little Arlo James Tilley, eight lbs, three ounces. 

Justin and sister Becky had a baby! Their first, and the newest addition to the Tilley Farmstead labor force. Sorry I don't have a close-up of the little guy, but he's beautiful and healthy, everything in the right place. The happy couple just got home from the hospital yesterday, so no, you won't see them at the Worthington market this week. I'm sure they'll be there soon enough. Becky acts like a tiny delay like having a baby won't even break her stride. Hehe... All I can say is, welcome to the monkey house Becky.

I remember, barely, about ten years ago we had a fledgling little honey business and all the time in the world to make it grow. We had been making one good business decision after another: Let's move to Montana... Let's move home... Let's buy a house... Let's get a real job... Let's quit that job... Let's dump every penny into beehives... Let's get into the farmers market... 

Let's have kids! 

As it turned out, that last one was a horrendous business decision.

In a good way, I mean.