Hello all, greetings from the Froehle {pronounced: Fray-lee} family of Southern Illinois.
We are a husband and wife{author of this post} team (along with our two young children) that are new to the world of beekeeping, who are looking forward to participating in the forum & sharing our experience with those who are interested. My husbands mother raised bees when she was younger and helped point us in the right direction for beginning this journey, which has taken off wonderfully, so far.
We have started with two hives; my in-law's group is in a top bar hive and ours a Langstroth; and we both started with package bees and tools from the Walter T. Kelley company (Please note this is not an advertisement, just information ^_^) My husband and I bought our hive, while the in-laws have built theirs with plans acquired elsewhere on the 'Net.(I will begin posting pictures of our hives when the restriction is released for our new membership) We hived our bees on this last Tuesday evening (May 6th, 2013), using the method as described in Beemaster's video on YouTube, which worked very well for us. We would have hated to try and shake all those bees out through the hole in the board, and we are grateful that this method really seemed to limit the stress on the bees and us during the installation. The ladies in both hives were doing well when my husband checked on them today and you all can expect more posting on how things are going with our families hives.
Sweet days to you all!
~TFF~