Beekeepers! Prepare Your Hives

On Tuesday, May 8 we registered you for a 2-hour class "Keeping Bees in the City" at Green Lake Library. But 2 hours are just not enough.

Fortunately for you we have our upcoming 3-part beekeeping series - beginning in a few days. With an optional field study if you attend all the way through and decide you want to get serious about apiary.

Class 1 5/23/12
Do you really want to keep bees?
Who is in the hive?
Basic starting equipment
Rules and regulations

Class 2 5/30/12
Getting Bees
Equipment for the honey season
Honey Season month by month
Pests and diseases

Class 3 6/6/12
Harvesting honey
Preparing for winter
Second year and beyond

Class 4 (alternate onsite)
Live hive inspection

Of course Seattle Free School is not your only fountain of knowledge. Puget Sound Beekeepers Association will let you know about work parties and apiary sites for you to explore and learn from. Seattle Tilth, too, offers classes on beekeeping. Although those classes begin at $25 and for 2012, don't start until August.

May we suggest you come get a little honey this Wednesday, 6:30 PM, at Green Bean Coffeehouse? (8533 Greenwood Ave N) We can promise you a sweet time.

Traveling Nicaragua

If you attended the Traveling Nicaragua class last night we promised that we'd upload the slides and post the links to further information here.

You can find the slides here.

You can find the blog posts about Nicaragua here.

You can find more pictures from Nicaragua here.

And finally we talked a bit about some resources in the class last night:

Women Welcome Women World Wide

Peublo Ingles

Feedback on Seattle Free School Classes

Have you been to a Seattle Free School class? Did you enjoy your experience? We'd love it if you'd post your feedback on Yelp!


Here's some feedback we received about our recent belly dance veil class:

Xtina is a lovely generous teacher.
Thank you for making this class possible! It creates much good will in our community. -Janine

I really enjoyed the Bellydance Veil workshop! It was incredibly informative and fun. I had never done bellydancing before, so it was all new to me, but it was very lovely and perfect for a beginner! I am considering taking bellydancing classes now because of it.
Thanks!
-Allison

And here's what others have said on TeachStreet (which is now sadly folding).

New classes!

Dorothy's back! Yes, that's right, Dorothy our paper arts (and other talents!) teacher is back and teaching again this winter. In November she'll be teaching Sending “Artful” Mail. Can you see better holiday letters in your future?

And December she brings us “Jeans Never Die” Art. Here's a look at some of the great little storage pockets you'll be bringing to life in this class.





Remember to register at www.seattlefreeschool.org

Chicken Resources

If you can't make it to our Keeping Chickens in the City class these resources should help you get started.



Resources
www.backyardchickens.com – This is a great site for everything related to your chickens. Not only does it have all the info you need to raise chickens but there’s a forum to help you find chickens, help deal with any health issues, you name it!
www.mypetchicken.com – You can order a small number of chicks here and also learn about breeds etc.
Seattle Tilth – Seattle Tilth site of chicken information
http://www.cityfarmer.org/chicken84.html - just some general info on keeping chickens in our the city including some funny stories

FOOD!
Chicken Food

Del’s Farm Supply- multiple locations
http://www.delsfarmsupply.com/

Organic Chicken Food
DeYoung’s Feed- Woodinville
425-483-9600

Hay’s Feed Store- Burien
206-242-8000

Walt’s Organic Fertilizer Co- Seattle
206-297-9092
www.waltsorganic.com

Skagit Farmers Supply
Multiple locations
http://www.skagitfarmers.com/

Bothell Feed Center- Bothell
425-481-8882

Grange Country Store Co-op, Issaquah
http://www.grangesupply.com/
(425) 392-6469

Chicks!
Lande Feed Store, Maple Valley
Monroe Feed Store, Monroe
Del’s Farm Supply, multiple locations
Bothell Feed Center, Bothell
Grange Country Store Co-op, Issaquah
Hay’s Feed Store, Burien
www.shankshatchery.com
www.mcmurrayhatchery.com – lots of rare breeds but have to order 20+ at a time
www.mypetchicken.com – can order as little as 3 chicks at a time!

Yahoo Group- http://groups.yahoo.com/group/seattlefarmcoop/join or their website here:
http://www.seattlefarmcoop.com/

New Article about Seattle Free School

It's not a big surprise that as more people get to know us we're getting less press. We're not the new thing out there and that's just fine with us. That said, we always love it when folks decide we're worth sharing, either to their friends or in the news. With that in mind, check out this great article from Hello Seattle!

Just a reminder to all of our friends and fans out there that we LOVE it when you share what we do with your friends!

Why be a facilitator?

There are a lot of reasons to become a facilitator at Seattle Free School. Many people just want to share their passion. Others know that it will help them with their presentation skills which can apply to anything from giving a speech to acing a job interview. Others want to inspire people to create art. This is Dorothy's reason. What's yours?