What a S(*&$^ Show! Fire BAD!!!

Hello, little Peanuts. Those of you that follow me on Instagram may have seen my post with our “CONTROLLED” burn.  Well, let me tell you a story. Fire BAD!!

As you may know, we hired North Pacific Land Management to start our land cleanup. It helps with forest fire management. (Getting rid of dead trees, thinning them out, AND helps us have healthy trees)

NOT a quick fix

This has been a two-year cleanup.  Last year they started, came in, and cut down trees, as in semi after semi of trees logged out.  This is part of our contract. You can thin out our land which will help us to have healthy trees. It will help our smaller trees thrive. Our remaining large trees will get healthier. The trees will now be 20 feet apart instead of on top of each other. This has never been done on our land and it needed to be done.  They couldn’t finish last year because the snow arrived early.

Right now, the land looks like crap, with trees on the ground. Lots of mulch. LOTS of stumps. Just like a little homeless, neglected mountain. It’s not pretty. AT ALL.  Then there are two HUGE! I MEAN HUGE stacks of debris to burn. IN A controlled burn. It’s in our contract. After the control burn the tree masticator will arrive and ground up the stumps and underbrush. Our little piece of heaven will be BEAUTTTTiful!!!  Here is what a tree masticator will do:

I’m getting ahead of myself. Back to the BIG piles of debris. Taller than our THREE-STORY house. We are talking THESE are TWO VERY LARGE burn piles.

The Day Began Like This:

The day of the “CONTROLLED BURN” started just like any other day on the mountain. Quiet. Then the smell of smoke. Hummmm out to the deck The Husband goes. Then I get a text (Don’t JUDGE US! It’s a damn big house!!) from The Husband saying “North Pacific must be here. Burn fires are going” Ya know me! OUT I go to stare at the fire. Ohhh and Ahhhhh at our very tall, LOUD “CONTROLLED BURN”

I immediately posted a video on Instagram, thanking the Heavens that this was a “CONTROLLED BURN” cause this is scary!! (I know you are waiting for me to get to the “CONTROLLED BURN” punchline…… I’m getting there, just be patient. I GOTTA tell a STORY here!!

So, I post the fire. Standing at the back door of my craft room.

Then I go off to my class on making a Glass Windchime, happy as a clam. Our land is going to be AMAZING!!

The class was 4 hours long. The chime is made of bottles, glass, beads, and hung on a piece of driftwood. It’s stunning! See?? (am I making you crazy right here?)

Cause, when I was telling my son Zac about the “CONTROLLED BURN” and injected the picture of the chimes he said “MOTHER! Get to the POINT! WHAT does a CHIME have to DO with A FIRE!?” GESH!!! Where is his patience?!

ANYWAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY, here is the part you’ve been waiting for.

After the class, I start up the mountain and get flagged down by a neighbor saying we almost lost our house. Ummmm SAY WHAAAAAAAAAAAA??? The fires were creeping up the hill towards the house. “Wait a minute! Nooooo, because this is a CONTROLLED BURN” Well, NO. It isn’t. There is NO one watching this fire, so we called the fire department and it’s a good thing we did!

“Well, no that can’t be right!”  CAN IT!? Wait?? What?!

Fire trucks. MANY, MANY, MANY Firemen work to stop the fire. Because THIS WAS just a BIG OLE fire. With no supervision. What a cluster #*&$ this is.

Firemen to door for a statement. “Who lit the fire?!” WELLLLLLLLLL WE THOUGHT it was North Pacific Land Management. Well, it was an unattended fire. Now my head is about to explode. Was this arson?!? HOLY MOLY!!! WHAT THE ……….

So, I start calling NPLM and no answer, answer machine is full. We start texting NPLM asking if they started the fire, we finally received a response: “We did. Why is the fire department there? We don’t need a permit until May 10th”

WHY!??!?!?!  BECAUSE the fire was marching up the HILL that’s WHY the fire department is here.

Now, I’m unsure of who, fire department or NPLM but someone worked on the fire all night. Moving logs, spraying water.  Which I canNOT stress to you how GOOD it was that the fire was all the way out. Because that next day the winds reached 30 MILES PER HOUR!!!!!! This could have been catastrophic. It’s been raining since then as well. So, the fire is 100% out. Here is what the two burn areas look like now.

AND the second fire area:

God and ALL of our Guardian Angels were with us working OVERTIME protecting us, our home, AND our neighbors!!

Now, here are my questions for you: Because the fire department was called (Which I imagine that NPLM thinks we called) do we think NPLM will actually come back and finish the project? Yes, we have a contract. But that same contract also stated that the fire would be a (one last time!) “CONTROLLED BURN”

Second question will we get a bill from the fire department?

ACKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK I’m serious I canNOT make this stuff up!!