Minding my beeswax

Tonight I share with you my latest project! Yay! So here we go.There is lots of information about processing beeswax online. I am simply sharing with you what I did. Keep in mind if you ever want to do this at home you must get a separate pot just for working with the wax. You will never get that pot wax-free again.

Here is what is called "cappings" It is the wax they cut off the comb so they could drain the honey off. 

 Then I soaked it in water twice and drained the water off. Then I added enough water to cover the wax

Here it is boiling. Beeswax is flammable so you have to keep an eye on it. I warm up the water to about med-high and once it gets really going I turn it down to nearly low. See that brown stuff? Despite my best efforts it never melted.

You can see my non- melting brown stuff here. It was starting to cool down. At this stage all I did was set the whole pot to the side and let it solidify. Due to wax being lighter than water, it all just floated to the top and hardens. 

This it what that brown stuff ends up like. It is stuck to the bottom of the wax disc. It is called "slum gum". Slum gum is all the random debris from in the hive. Mostly cocoons from the change from larvae to bee.

Here is the top of my pretty wax disc, 

This was my very first attempt, Since then I have been putting cheese clothe over various other recyclable containers and straining the slum gum out. So that is a glimpse of what I have been working on.

Play, beeswax and a sad moment

Quick up date.

Ethan's play is over. Let me just say, it was very rewarding to watch everyone get to see how awesome he is. The lady next to me was a season ticket holder who told me " I hope to see your husband on stage again soon." Thanks, that makes me smile. He worked with a lot of really incredible people. 

I finally made something with my beeswax. I used this recipe. I even made some lotion to give to the cast as a thank you gift. 

We planted the garden last night, OK some of it. My sister let me dig some blueberry bushes up at her house and transplanted them here. Some black berry bushes came along too. 

On a completely unrelated note-

A while back a house down the street caught on fire. A 22 year old man died. Today they are tearing the house down. It made  me very sad to sit there and watch the parents witness the house their son had died in be torn down. That must be really hard. Sometimes I wish there was more I could do for people around me.