Keeping Busy.....

For those of us who chose not to evacuate, we were told we could NOT leave our property, if we did, we'd be escorted out of town by the police. That might be a problem for some, but we had plenty to do around our place to keep us busy, mostly Dad, he always has lots of projects and never enough time to do them. We actually enjoyed being 'kept at home'! I thought this was a really cool picture!

Dad loves his little skid steer! We/he hauled all kinds of stuff! I helped a little!!

He also started getting ready to put in a big 'pit' BBQ! Its down by the orchard. If he would've had the block, he probably would've gotten that laid up too!

Did I mention, he also loves his new dump trailer that helps him haul off all the junk?

He's been spending lots of time in his greenhouse! Its looking so good! We've been picking lots of lettuce, green beans, broccoli sugar peas, cilantro and other herbs, and beet greens. We put most of the herbs in the dehydrated and dried them.

He back dragged all the dry grass along the side of our house. This area had lots of old wood and stuff that might burn if the fire came that close.

The fence had come down and people were driving through our property, so he decided to fix it and put up new posts and wire. However, he was out working on the day that the smoke was really bad. The air quality was off the charts with particulates in the air that day. He had been wearing a mask, but wasn't the day he chose to do this, I don't know why.

It was smokey all 5 days we were stuck at home, but we had our ozone machine going in the house, so it didn't seem bad in there.

Moving more stuff, he is getting so much done around our place, its looking lots better!

I spent a couple of days binding our cookbooks, about 180 of them. My friends did all the other work on them, so it was good that I got to do something to help. I also got to fix dinner for some of our neighbors whose wife's weren't there and they could just come over the back way, through the fields. I told Laverl that I was supposed to be on 'vacation'! He stopped inviting people over!

When Bret was here, he raked all the pine needles from around the trees and away from our gas tanks. Then LaVerl wet it all down really good.

LaVerl mowed in the orchard and then irrigated it and the garden.

We've got lots of corn and squash coming up, so hopefully we'll have a good outside garden too.

More piles of stuff he moved to the other side of the big ditch so it couldn't catch fire! When we can finally burn again, then it will be gone for good.

We spent a lot of time watching the helicopters fly by our house with their loads of water or fire retardant. Even though we could see fire on the mountains around us, we never felt threatened where our house is in the middle of fields around us. However, we found out on Friday that our cabin in Milligan Valley burned to the ground, nothing left but the fireplace and refrigerator standing. We are heart sick about losing the cabin, LaVerl and his dad rebuilt it from the old orginal Brown homestead that only had logs about 6 high left. They built an upstairs and another big bedroom on the back. Lots of hard work, but lots of wonderful memories. Oh how Melvin and Martha Jo loved that place! However, we were told, that no trees were burned in our little valley and that the old barn is still standing. We feel very blessed to still have that much.

FIRE and SMOKE in Eagar!

As most everyone knows by now, (my internet was knocked out) the Wallow Fire that started May 29th, down by Bear Wallow is still out of control! It has grown to over 340,000 acres and still has 0 containment! The towns of Alpine and Nutrioso were the first to be evacuated on Thursday, June 2nd. This is what the smoke clouds looked like from our house in Eagar that day.

On Friday June 3rd, we went up to our place at Milligan Valley to retrieve some motor homes that had been brought up for our big family reunion coming up July 4th! The smoke was pretty dark behind the old barn. We wonder if it will still be there by then.

We are hoping and praying that somehow the fire goes around Milligan Valley. As of yesterday, we heard all structures were still there. We also have an old cabin there too and many wonderful memories of LaVerls parents, Melvin and Martha Jo. Gpa loved this place and so do we!

On Monday evening, June 6th at 9:30pm, a knock on the door, flashing lights, and we were delivered a pre-evacuation notice by a police officer! We laid in bed and couldn't sleep after that, thinking about all the things we needed to do to get ready for a fire coming our way! By June 7th, Tues. the skies were getting darker with smoke. The smoke clouds looked like they were filled with fire! By 3:45pm, everyone south of Hwy 260 were issued evacuation orders. Tami took Blake and Chad and left for our place at Roosevelt. Ryne left to work over in Show Low. We had to sign papers because we chose not to evacuate! It was scary because we knew the fire was coming our way. By that evening, this was our view from our driveway, looking towards Jack's house.

This is Jack's house and the mountains right behind him. The fire looked like a river of lava flowing down the mountain. When the wind blew, the fire would flare up and get brighter. It didn't last long before the smoke covered the flames. These are our beautiful mountains surrounding our little town. I can't even imagine what it will look like when this if finally over!

The threat they worry about is these clouds that drop burning embers miles ahead of the fire and start up spot fires everywhere. They look very ominous and frightening. The smoke has been pretty thick here at times. In the evenings it seems to lift a little. Yesterday was not a good day, the wind blew fiercely all day, gusts up to 45-55 mph. Greer was safe, but then the winds changed and it is now in danger again.

This is a day picture, although it seems pretty dark. The sun looked like a bright neon orange ball. I'm thinking of prophecies talking about the sun and the moon turning to blood in the last days.

I took this of an airplane flying right over our house. The bag of full of fire retardant they drop on the fire. They use it to save structures and property. They have lots of big planes now and over 3,000 people helping with the now 2nd largest fire in AZ history. Bret came on Wed. evening and somehow got through the road blocks. He was worried and wanted to come help his dad save the house. Once here, he realized for himself that we are not in imminent danger, but we were glad for his help and concern!

This morning I took this looking back at the Finch's home behind us. The smoke was really thick because they did a lot of back burning right in the meadows going up Water Canyon.

While we were out cleaning this morning, looking out over our greenhouse, I could see flames and lots of smoke. I don't know if this was the back burn, or the fire, but as you can see, the wind was blowing it back, which is really good.

This is standing at Chad's little fence. Yes, our mountains are burning! We feel our town and our houses are safe, but it is devastating to think what this will mean to our community that depends on our environment for our economic stability. I don't know what will happen to our town now, we are in a very sad situation. So as of Wed. we can't leave our property and we don't know for how long, but for as long as the evacuation order is in effect. LaVerl has been finding plenty to do. The next few days will be stressful, but all we can do is pray for God's help in getting this fire under control!

Day at the Zoo

After Zallen passed his hearing tests we celebrated and took the kids to one of their favorite restaurants (Juan's Flying Burrito) and then to the Zoo, where they just opened a really cool animal-themed water park inside the zoo that the kids loved. We also rode the train, the carousel and saw the dinosaur exhibit.

A little trip to Roosevelt

We always enjoy our little trips to our place at Roosevelt. Spring is so nice down there. Our pomegranate tree is all in bloom, we have about 30 apricots on our little tree, and the wind doesn't blow, so LaVerl loves being outdoors working around the place.
The trumpet vine bush is also in bloom as is the rose bush.

We always have a little work do to while we are there. This was our project last time. We had to replace this wall after the water damage from the water line leaking in the ceiling of the kitchen. We like it better and think it adds more character to the place. We just used the leftover wood from the bunkhouse. Its rough and rustic, but that's OK with us.

This was our project this time. What is it??

This is a corroded water cooler pad! We have never changed them since we've had the place, so they were full of chunk from the hard water! They were so heavy, LaVerl could hardly get them down off the roof by himself! We had to pound and hammer on the panels to get the hard water deposits off of them. We hauled off 2 heavy trash bags full! I can't believe the cooler even worked!

Here's the nice finished product! Now when we turn it on it smells like aspen wood instead of the musty, wet, yucky smell! I hope you kids appreciate all your dad's hard work when you turn it on when you're there! We have almost as much fun working and fixing things as we do playing. However, we do enjoy taking our new (to us) boat out on the lake!

This is a great little fishing boat as well as a party deck. We can fit quite a few people and we hope to have lots of fun on the lake. It was sad to say good-bye to the Ol' Blue J, but she's just not running good anymore! We had to put her "out to pasture" literally thats where she is, out in our field in Eagar. LaVerl is hoping to do a little work and try to sell her, but really, who wants a 36 year old boat!!?

Tami Graduates from ASU!

I know Tami posted about this on her blog, but I want to post about her achievement on our blog too. We are so proud of her, it was hard taking online classes while also taking care of this little guy! Baby Blake takes alot of time, but she was able to do both!So on Friday, May 13th, Tami received her Bachelors Degree in Psychology from ASU!!

We were actually at her graduation, however between all four of us that were there watching, (LaVerl, me, Bret & Ryne) we missed seeing her receive her diploma!! She said she turned around and waved at us and none of us were watching her! And that is because she forgot to take her phone and we never could find her in that huge crowd! Then afterwards we walked all over outside looking for her and never did find her! She found Ryne walking to their car!
Afterwards, we met up at IHOP for a little breakfast! Kind of a tradition-we did the same thing when Bret graduated.

Being the practical people that we are, her Dad got her a t-shirt, something that would last, all those pretty flowers die! SO- GOOD JOB TAMI!!

Kaemon's Kindergarten Graduation

Today we dressed up and went to Kaemon's graduation. They did a nice program about all the things they've learned this year, sang songs and Kaemon did great on his speaking part. We hope this isn't Kaemon's greatest life achievement. Then we changed and went to a crawfish boil.