Another Honeyfest has come and gone. Isaac and I took some time to reminisce about some differences between our first Honeyfest and this one: the 14th annual Lithopolis Honeyfest.

The first Honeyfest took place in 2007. I was pregnant with our oldest son Mason. Neither Isaac nor I had smart phones, and we were resistant to get them. For this reason, we could not process credit cards and we took in quite a few personal checks. This year, we had no personal checks (the times, they are a changin’ I guess)

During the first Honeyfest- every single beekeeper at the festival sold out of every single honey jar they bought. We even had customers begging us to buy our sample jars. (We sold them for a few dollars off). All the beekeepers were originally skeptical that we could sell much honey at a festival where so many other beekeepers were there selling honey. We were all proven wrong!

This year, we had the privilege of spending the Wednesday prior to the Honeyfest with the American Honey Princess, Virginia Allen. Her job duties as Honey Princess are to travel throughout the United States on behalf of the American Beekeeping Federation and promote honey, encourage beekeepers to work together on efforts to benefit the industry, and to teach children and communities about the important work of honeybees and other pollinators. She spoke to the entire 2nd and 4th grade classes as Westfall Elementary and we were very grateful for her time.

Probably the best thing we’ve learned since the 1st Honeyfest is the importance of hiring good help to staff our booth, so we can walk around and enjoy the Honeyfest ourselves. Pictured here are Hannah (left) and Petyn (right). Both have worked for Honeyrun for several years and we are so grateful for their help!

Today I leave you with a fun video our kids made, featuring the mascots of Honeyrun Farm- our animals. They worked very hard on this and we are proud of their efforts. Enjoy!