Bees!

We had a bee swarm today. Honey bees, thousands of them came over our garden (just after we'd convinced the children to play outside), and buzzed about for a while before settling on our neighbours house. The neighbour was out at the time but my immediate neighbour had seen what was happening from his window. Between us we decided that we'd call Essex bee keepers association and ask their advice. We finally got hold of a lady beekeeper in our village who said she'd come over to try and help. Unfortunately by the time she came, the bees had decided to move in to the cavity wall holes in our neighbours wall. Alison (beekeeper), tried to smoke them out but they didn't really want to go, so we assume they were waiting on the queen bee. The neighbour whose house it is, at the time of writing this, said he thinks they've now moved on. If not we might need another bee expert tomorrow as it warms up again! It was very interesting if a little dramatic. I've learnt a lot about bees today!
In other news, we've been on a gardening tidy up. After church and bee-gate, the mini pinks helped mr pink with some jobs and made a "wildlife" pond from their old water table. It's a work in progress at the moment. We've also cleared some space for a mud pie kitchen in the vegetable patch. Hopefully by the time the school summer holidays are here, there will be lots of interest in the garden.