With not many more days left until Christmas is upon us, I thought I would tell you all about my letter to Santa detailing the potential gift ideas he may want to consider. Stay tuned for some very hopeful gift ideas from someone who thinks he’s been good all year.

It has to be said our British weather is so changeable, I’m looking out at another sunny morning but the forecast for tomorrow is of more heavy rain. We have to be grateful that we do enjoy such changes in the seasonal weather, I’m not sure I would want to be stuck waiting for it to rain for months on end and I feel for those people out there who are desperate for a change in the weather conditions they are enduring.

It’s been a very busy week this past week, we’ve had lots of honey orders to get out and as we’re a small commercial outfit we mostly bottle and label as we go, batch processing around 100kg of honey each time. I did have a bit of a panic with my labels, there were several issues and I had to speak with the label printing company several times to resolve the situation but we got there in the end and the labels arrived with enough time for us to get the honey labelled and delivered on time. I do hate being late and not delivering when I say I’m going to, it doesn’t matter if you have the best excuse in the world, if I’ve promised to do something then I really want to make sure I’m not letting people down.

But, we managed to get the deliveries out and continue to push out the orders as we get ever closer to the weekend before Christmas, if you’re listening to this on Patreon on release day, it makes that date just one week away now. I’m heading over the the US to visit my youngest daughter Beth and spend Christmas with her and Paul, her fella and his family. Beth doesn’t know I’m visiting so I’m hoping it’s going to be a nice surprise for her, maybe I’ll get a chance to record a podcast and perhaps a video while I’m away but if not there will be a brief pause between Christmas and the beginning of the New Year. It’s amazing that I’ve reached podcast number 90, creating a weekly podcast has been quite a feat and I hope that it will continue long into the future. I really appreciate the support and comments I get and on that note I’d like to say hello to Bradley Sargent and his partner over in Australia who dropped me a lovely message just last week. Hi Brad, I hope you’re well and I wish you a very Merry Christmas.

I’m out visiting a new landowner later this week to discuss setting up a new apiary for next season, it’s a terrific location and I’m hoping to record some videos of use getting it prepared and bringing colonies over in preparation for the start of next season.

I’m also heading out this week to delivery some Christmas gift boxes to a few of the current landowners who very kindly allow me to keep my bees on their land, without them I’d really struggle to find secure locations and it’s always nice to turn up with a box of goodies to say thank you.

Talking of Christmas gift boxes, I thought today I might offer up some suggestions for last minute Christmas gifts you might want to suggest to family and friends if they’re struggling to think of something you’d like.

Can you believe that top of my list this year was a 3M full face mask and filter set so I can treat my colonies with the Oxalic Acid sublimator in total safety. If you’ve seen the pictures on social media you’ll know I’ve already been given it and have been trying it on for size! I have to say, last year I used a half face, disposable mask and thought that was ok but having now worn a full face mask it feels a lot safer.

So, let’s pretend I’ve been really good this year and Santa is going to be very kind to me. Top of the list would be a new honey room with an extraction line. It’s not too extravagant really, just a small extractio