Greene Gardens

By Lisa Lewis of the Greene County Master Gardeners

Bee Idioms: How Did They Start?

Bees are a vital part of our vegetable and flower garden life cycle. Over the years, several sayings about bees worked their way into our everyday language. Here are just a few.

Make a beeline for: The 1908 Davenport Daily Ledger reported that Gustav Stengel, Sr. of Rock Island, was thrown from his sleigh when his horse became frightened, turned abruptly, and made a beeline for home. Bees head out to a source of nectar after watching a forager bee’s wiggle dance or a bee returning to the hive fully laden with pollen and nectar. Bees fly rapidly in the shortest, straightest line available, ignoring any distraction.

A bee in your bonnet: This idiom traces back to Virgil’s Aeneid from 1553. The phrase “hede full of beis” means being preoccupied with a strange idea that conjures an agitated state one would be in if a bee was buzzing around inside one’s hat.

The bee’s knees: This phrase traces to the late 1700s when it referred to anything stylish, especially something small and delicate, such as a lace collar or the tiny joint in a bee’s leg. In the 1920s, other groovy sayings, like the “cat’s whiskers,” “snake’s hips,” and “flea’s eyebrows,” revived this saying.

Spelling bee: A “bee” is a meeting of people working together for the common good of the group since at least the 1700s. For example, Americans would join a husking bee to strip corn. The phrase expanded to include many purposeful gatherings like Scripps National Spelling Bee.

Put the bee on: This saying meant asking someone for money, often with a pitiful, woe-is-me tale. It goes to the American frontier days when churchgoers would organize a “bee” to gather donations to pay the preacher.

Let’s end with a few silly jokes appropriate to our topic.

What does a bee use to style his hair? A honeycomb.

Why do bees hum? They forgot the words.

What do you call a wasp? A wanna-bee.

SOURCE: Steinmetz, K. Time Magazine. Behind the Bee’s Knees: The Origin of Nine Bee-Inspired Sayings. August 7, 2013. https://time. com/3897638/bee-inspiredsayings/

Kristen Haywood, Family Consumer Science Teacher and Sewing Teacher

from Southeastern Greene School District, is providing life skills to her students that will help them for years to come. While many school districts have discontinued the opportunity for its students to learn basic home economic skills, Southeastern Greene continues to offer sewing as an elective for students in grades nine through twelve.

In her Family Consumer Science class, Kristen shares basic skills with students grades seven through nine. Those skills may be sewing on a button or repairing a rip. When it comes to learning more advanced skills, like putting in a zipper or even threading a sewing machine, that’s where the high school elective class comes into play.

In our world today, sewing may seem like it’s a lost art, but it’s not. A growing number of youth and adults across the country are returning to sewing, crocheting, and knitting as a source of relaxation and creativity. Here in Southeastern Greene, there is interest among students in the district to participate in this class, where students are graded according to their skill. Projects are also based on student skill level. Kristen plans for the