Fire!

We live in a small area called Spring Cove tucked right into this, erm... little cove up against the mountain.

MY mountain.

I love looking out of my office or sewing room windows to watch the changing beauty of this long ridge. So you can imagine my distress when I got up to close the windows and saw this!

I'd smelled smoke in the night but wrote it off as lingering from Friday afternoon's lightening fire up on the mountain just north of Maple Mountain (that is behind our house) that was put out very quickly with water dropping helicopters.

Apparently teenagers playing with fireworks, in an unauthorized area, started this blaze just one street west from us at about 2 am. Fortunately, they were smart enough to call 911 when they realized what they'd done! (Poor stupid kids! I'd ask them what they were thinking, but obviously... THEY WEREN'T!) Folks who live up on the mountain-proper got a wake up knock at about 4 am telling them to be ready to evacuate.

I can't say enough about all of the many people who sped into action to save the many homes that are located on the foot of this mountain! There was a perfectly choreographed team of workers who got this fire under control.

This big orange dragonfly-looking helicopter was my favorite!

They set up a staging area just down at the high school for all of the responding agencies. They had a portable pool, about the same size as an above-ground pool, where the helicopters would hover and refill their water tanks.

When this fellow opened his *bombardier doors* a huge waterfall would plummet to the ground, dousing the fire. It frequently looked like water shot out of a cannon.

Then there was this dashing little fellow! He was much more methodical. He would circle around and hover over the hot spot then let go. I observed that he had the ability to release all or part of the load.

As soon as the water was dropped he was right back into high gear and speeding away for another fill-up. I didn't realize until I looked at the photos on my computer that he had this cool paint job on his 'copter! I love how he flies so fast that his paint is dripping!

Many of the neighbors brought out their lawn chairs to a shady spot to watch the show. One group even had a pizza party! Finally this little guy joined the fray.

He had the same kind of upside-down-badminton-birdie shaped bucket.

This pano from my sitting spot belies the size and scope of MY mountain and the fire. Each of the peaks has a small ridge with a canyon on the other side. The fire burned up the draw to the left of the middle peak and around the back of the mountain. You can see the red line of fire retardant that was dropped while I was driving (hence, no photos!) It was so interesting. I watched the duo of tiny spotter plane and huge tanker making repeated drops. The spotter plane would fly first and drop a marker (of water?) that the tanker would use as his drop area.

I just heard on the local news that the fire has burned to 145 acres and is 15% contained. This call was a little too close for comfort.

Thank you again to all of the people, in the air and on the ground, who responded to this fire.

Somebody's Got a Screw Loose!

OMSH! I think that is me!!

Yesterday I wanted another ceiling fan, this time in the master bedroom. I just like how they move the air around on hot days. Somehow it makes 78* a little more tolerable.

Since I had previous experience last year, I knew that I could easily install this one. But is seems that I'm a little challenged when it comes to the screw part! (Sheesh!) Last year a posted this-

Okay true story… I was installing a ceiling fan today when I lost one of the mounting screws. I looked everywhere for it. Finally I had to go down to Sunroc and buy two screws that would work. I just took off my bra...tink, tink, tink... guess what I found? (7.29.13)

Because of that experience I wanted to be oh-so-careful, but somehow my Grammie-hands just can't handle the job like they used to. I needed to move the bed out of the center of the room so I could install the fan, of course that exposes all of that wonderful, long pile, brand-new, never-been-walked-on carpet that we installed several years ago.

I was very methodical, but, yup, still dropped a few screws, but they were all big and easy to find. Finally I get the screws that hold the cover over the lighting fixture and dropped not one, but two of the three screws! Great coogily-moogily! I glanced around hoping for an easy find, but these weren't normal sized screws they were teeny- not even a 1/4" long! (Are you kidding me?)

So I-

• Got out my high-powered flashlight. Ha! I found one!
• Used the strong magnet on the flashlight... no luck.
• Remembered reading that a way to find small things is to put a nylon stocking over the end of the vacuum hose. Yeah, not so much... I loosened my grip slightly on the stocking and the vacuum ate the stocking!
• Laid down on the carpet to get the horizontal view- erm, no.
• Tried each of the above several times. All to no avail.
• FINALLY, I started vacuuming very slowly and as soon as I heard a click on the beater bar, stopped and found the teeny screw.

I suppose that *All's well that ends well* but sometimes I like to have just a little less drama with my DIY projects.

Blueberry Cheesecake

I think Camille's friend, Jamie, says it best about this luscious dessert!

"Oh my stars 'n stripes... that looks amazing!"

I found this a year or so ago on Pinterest and it is a definite Pinterest WIN! I've made it for the last two 4th of July celebrations here at mine house!

I've had several requests for the recipe, so I will share it here. Mind, this isn't my recipe- I got it from a Polish blog! I've added some notations in the recipe if you don't cook metric or don't have a scale.

Blueberry Cheesecake

Ingredients

Crust:
100g (1cup) crushed whole wheat cookies (store bought or home-made) (I used graham cracker crumbs)
1 / 2 cup oatmeal
3 tablespoons of brown sugar
pinch of salt*
7 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted (*I just use salted butter and omit the salt)
1 tsp vanilla extract

For the filling:
40g powdered gelatin - 3 pkgs (I found this is the best amount even though it isn't 40g)
1/4 cup water
400g cream cheese, softened (the better part of 2- 8 oz pkgs. About 14 oz)
250ml heavy cream 30% (a generous cup)
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 cups blueberries, washed and drained

For the topping:
250ml heavy cream 30% (a generous cup)
3 teaspoons of vanilla sugar (I used 2 tbs of super fine sugar and 1 tsp vanilla)
1 cup blueberries, washed and drained

Crust:
1. Place oatmeal and crushed cookies (or graham cracker crumbs) together in a food processor. Pulse to grind up the oatmeal. Add melted butter and vanilla. Press into the base of a 20cm
round x 9cm (8”x 3”) spring form pan and bake at 350°F (180°C) for 12-15 minutes. Remove from oven and cool completely at room temperature. (Or be like me and stick it in the freezer!)

Filling:
2. In a small saucepan soak the gelatin in 1/4 cup cold water (for about 10 minutes), and then put on a
    heat and warm up stirring until dissolved. (Do this in saucepan, not microwave! yikes what a mess!)
3. Mix together cream cheese and sugar in a mixing bowl with beaters. Slowly add heavy cream, and
    mix well. Add vanilla and lemon juice.
4. Purée blueberries in a food processor and mix with cream cheese mixture.
5. With mixer on low slowly add the warm gelatin, after ingredients are combined let it stand for a
    few minutes until it start thickens.
6. Pour evenly into the chilled base, smooth the surface and refrigerate for about 4-5 hours,
    but best to leave overnight. (or do the freezer thing again)
7. Before you unlock the spring form pan, run a knife around the edge of the cheesecake to loosen.

Topping:
8. Whip the heavy cream with vanilla sugar. Cover top of the blueberry cheesecake with whipped
    cream and blueberries.

Enjoy:)


http://www.malacukierenka.pl
(this recipe comes from this Polish blog!)

Sometimes You Just Have To Laugh...

Today I went to Desi's house to get a perm. (For those of you who may not know, Desi and Camille have been best friends since kindergarten and she is like a second daughter). Her little kids were going to go right across the street and ride their bikes in the parking lot at the school (which they call the park).

It brought to mind a story about my Tony. When he was just about the same age as Emmalie we lived just kitty-corner to the park and he used to love to ride his new bike there. I told them that I was watching out the window when I saw Tony crash his bike into one of the logs that were at the park's perimeter. I saw him get up and he started jumping up and down and crying (but I could'nt hear him, I could only see him). When I met him halfway he was bleeding badly from a cut on his head. (Poor little guy! You know how head wounds bleed)

TONY WITH HIS BIRTHDAY BIKE APRIL 1979

Emmalie was sitting at the counter eating a donut I'd brought and chimed in, "Did he die?"

I thought about it for about 2 seconds and answered, "Yes, but not from that!" And then laughed. Desi catching the sick joke, joined in. Finally Emmalie wanted to know what was so funny. So explained to her that he'd died from a drowning accident 2 years later.

There may be those who will judge me harshly on this one. I'm just grateful that, for once, the *dead* question didn't feel like such a punch in the gut. (But I cried as I wrote all of this!)