A Little Painting

OK, I have another post to make but this one was easier. We haven't been doing nothing, but we're slowed down quite a bit by my stroke recovery.

This weekend I wanted to get some more woodenware painted up, in part because the bees are doing so well that I might do some splits in the next week or so. We'll see when I'm up to doing, since I can't really go hefting bee boxes around. At a very minimum, I want to replace certain boxes and give them a bit of reinforcement or repair.

So Noel helped me by setting up this painting area. Well, and doing just about everything else that involved any kind of work.

I took all the frames we had stored in those boxes and stacked them in the pantry so we could wax small strips of foundation into them to guide the bees on comb building. Oh, thank goodness we tidied the pantry up, don't you think? And that's only half of them.

Yesterday we put on a coat of primer (then Noel did another one while I went and spent some time with friends). It was a hot day, so the primer dried really fast, but it's best to let it sit overnight before painting, anyway.

Today we started the colour coat. Noel stacked things up so we could just paint several things at once, which made things go faster.

You do have to make sure to get paint up into the top of the handles. When I was painting last year I eventually came up with a system where I did that first and then did the rest of the box.

Today we worked after the heat of the day was over, which was much easier. The boxes still need another coat of paint, I think, and we have all the fiddly accessories like stands and screened bottom boards to deal with, but everything else is ready.

Including the frames, which Noel somewhat obsessively waxed this morning while I slept in (sleeping in is actually honest to god part of my recovery. I get up at my usual 5am and fiddle around a bit, then back to bed for a while to try to add on at least 3 hours of sleep). With the boxes we'll at the very least be ready to replace equipment for repairs.

In other Hospital Casa Decrepit news, Goldie has another tumour growing on her, and we've had to take a slightly different approach with her treatment. It's not good news, unfortunately, though not all BAD, which isn't too unexpected in a 12-year-old dog. We've still got her on chemo, plus antihistamines and acid reflux medication. Histamines given off by the tumours apparently make dogs very anxious, so her new drugs are making her happier and calmer, and she also has been getting some quality, healing sleep this weekend. She had been losing a lot of weight, but with concerted effort (doubling up her breakfasts and giving her in-between meals) we got some more weight on her this week, too.

posted by ayse on 06/16/13