This one's for you, Kim!
Matthew and I live in Roseburg, Oregon now... since November of '06. Matthew is a graphic designer for a Christian media company called Inerseshen. I still work for a tour company back in Minnesota- just out of our house now :) Does that answer your question, Kim?
Today was another crazy hot day. I heard it was supposed to be around 75, but I think it was hotter than that. I was wearing a tanktop and flipflops and was still overheated. Crazy, right? It was beautiful! It's neat seeing our neighborhood come alive with the warm weather. Since we moved here in the rainy winter months, there hasn't been much going on. Now, we have little flowering trees in our yard, kids are running around the neighborhood, everyone's out mowing... it's great! Today I was out on our deck a lot, hanging up some plant bucket things... and trying to outwit the wasps that have been emerging from hibernation. Tomorrow we are going out to buy some patio furniture, and we're really hoping we can actually enjoy the high balcony off the back of our house. But how do we do that with giant stinging wasps hanging around? I've been looking up all sorts of traps, pesticides, and natural repellants on the web. It really doesn't seem like anyone knows what to do with wasps. You can't squish them b/c the others will smell it and come running. You can't swat at them, b/c they will come after you like there's no tomorrow. You can't wear perfume or bright colors... or leave food out for any length of time around them.... AND you shouldn't kill them in the first place because they are 'good' and they eat other bugs. Besides, 'they won't hurt you if you don't come after them'. What!?! How are we supposed to relax with these things flying around us with their creepy dangly legs, googly eyes, and ginormous stingers... building little condos under our balcony railings at rapid rates? If anyone has ideas, please feel free to interject. So far I've put out 2 wasp traps and 2 soda bottles with orange pop in them. They've been there 2 days and I haven't gotten a single one. Apparently it attracks them around the neighborhood enough to want to hang out and party with their friends, but not actually go into the traps.
Tomorrow we're trying out another new church with my parents. I think we have 2 or 3 more to go, before we've visited every church within a 100 mile radius. No, not really... but we have gone to a lot!
Today was another crazy hot day. I heard it was supposed to be around 75, but I think it was hotter than that. I was wearing a tanktop and flipflops and was still overheated. Crazy, right? It was beautiful! It's neat seeing our neighborhood come alive with the warm weather. Since we moved here in the rainy winter months, there hasn't been much going on. Now, we have little flowering trees in our yard, kids are running around the neighborhood, everyone's out mowing... it's great! Today I was out on our deck a lot, hanging up some plant bucket things... and trying to outwit the wasps that have been emerging from hibernation. Tomorrow we are going out to buy some patio furniture, and we're really hoping we can actually enjoy the high balcony off the back of our house. But how do we do that with giant stinging wasps hanging around? I've been looking up all sorts of traps, pesticides, and natural repellants on the web. It really doesn't seem like anyone knows what to do with wasps. You can't squish them b/c the others will smell it and come running. You can't swat at them, b/c they will come after you like there's no tomorrow. You can't wear perfume or bright colors... or leave food out for any length of time around them.... AND you shouldn't kill them in the first place because they are 'good' and they eat other bugs. Besides, 'they won't hurt you if you don't come after them'. What!?! How are we supposed to relax with these things flying around us with their creepy dangly legs, googly eyes, and ginormous stingers... building little condos under our balcony railings at rapid rates? If anyone has ideas, please feel free to interject. So far I've put out 2 wasp traps and 2 soda bottles with orange pop in them. They've been there 2 days and I haven't gotten a single one. Apparently it attracks them around the neighborhood enough to want to hang out and party with their friends, but not actually go into the traps.
Tomorrow we're trying out another new church with my parents. I think we have 2 or 3 more to go, before we've visited every church within a 100 mile radius. No, not really... but we have gone to a lot!
posted by Cristina | 1:57 AM
4 Comments:
Hi Cristina. I'm glad you're able to enjoy the spring weather. I am too and now find myself in the processes of weeding my yard.
As for your wasp problem. You should talk to my parents about their methods. One involves a shop vac and water (my dad's personal favorite).
My mom's method involves good timing (bees ares sleepy and dopey on cool cloudy mornings) and going right for the source. This method I've found to be quite effective, but frightening as well. It involves a long handle and wearing a good pair of stomping shoes. Lets just say I let my mom showed me this method as I was too frightned to try it myself on the several dozens of nests of varying sizes surrounding our former Vancouver home.
Dan's and my first attempt at irradicating the bees around our home must have been quite hilarious as we got all dressed up in safety glasses, hoods, gloves and grubby clothes after dark and used a spray that was recommended to us. I wondered what our neighbors must have thought. We looked ridiculous. The most disturbing thing was that all the bees that fell from their nests from our stream of poison foam that night had not actually been killed. The next afternoon when I was out in the yard I found our house to be surrounded by, not dead bees, but paralyzed bees.
I felt bad for the suffering they experienced, but one of their friends/relatives got me back a couple years later... After completing my morning watering of the back yard, I came back into the house through the bedroom slider and the dangling vertical blinds only to be greeted by a stinging sensation on my upper back. Turning my back to the dresser mirror I see that there is a wasp still on my back. Panicked and unable to remove the wasp myself due to his particular location, I cry out for help to get get him off. Dan who was in a dead sleep prior to this is on his feet instantly, heart racing, and literally blind w/o his contacts or glasses. Unable to see, he thinks a man has broken into our house and he must find a way to defend me until he hears my wimpering words "Dan, I got stung by a bee". At this point, my hero, procedes to put on his glasses and save me from the wasp.
jeepers creepers! i can't believe your peepers are pink too!! do you think it's blog contagious? maybe that's how we both ended up with it! and thanks for the update. i was honored to have a post dedicated to me. (:
Cristina,
We always got wasps in California also. What we had to do every spring is buy a can of wasp poison (or 2 cans depending on how many nests they are building in your eves). It shoots really high and kills the wasps in about 5 seconds.
alonna wins longest blog comment ever! just kidding. I hate wasps! i especially hate wasp legs on fingers. you know what i am talking about... horrible feeling!
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