I need a vacation day from my vacation day!

Well, we are cancelled. I had my monitoring appointment yesterday morning and the only thing my RE saw (besides a "fluffy" 11.9mm lining) was a 20x3 follie on my left (blocked) side that he said looked like it was deflating. I was using opks and hadn't gotten a positive so he doesn't think I O'd, although I had a ton of pain on the drive down to the RE's office yesterday morning. He kept checking my uterus and when I asked why, he said that he was looking for a yolk sac because it was so strange that my follies just disappeared that there was a chance I was already pregnant with a late implanter from my last cycle, but there was nothing there. He suggested that I test when I got home just to be sure, which I did and of course it was negative. Damn him for even suggesting it. Or damn me for even asking!

While we are working on getting funding for IVF, he suggested that we retry for IUI#4 next cycle before my insurance changes, so we will probably do that. Just something to do in the mean time!

We worked in our gardens all weekend, so I got a pretty bad sunburn (even with sunscreen on) and when I got home yesterday, I decided I just wanted to sit and watch TV. Our businesses were closed for the holidays anyway so it seemed like the right thing to do! As DH and I were just hanging out, we heard a plane. We live on the edge of the Tahoe National Forrest with no airports near us, so when a plane flies overhead in the spring and summer there is only one reason: Fire.

I checked for fire updates on my phone and DH went out to look for smoke. There was a fire near a campground close to our house on Friday so we were already a little stressed from that. As soon as I read the fire updates I ran outside. There was a fire near the creek a few acres from our property! When I got outside I couldn't see our neighbor's house (roughly six acres away) because there was so much smoke blowing over it. DH jumped on his quad to go wake his mom up (she's a day sleeper because she works nights) and I went in the house to get everything ready to go.

We live on a very small, winding, one lane road. It winds up and down the canyons and over a one lane bridge over the creek where the fire was, so we decided we would be evacuating out the back way: a small dirt road that runs through the mountains into the back side of town, 11 miles away. When they issue evacuations here, they give you five minutes to get your stuff and go, so I had to find all the cats, pack a suitcase, get all the pictures together and ready the horse trailer in case they told us we had to go.

DH took off on his quad to go find the fire. There was a spotter plan flying above but no firefighters on scene so he and one of our neighbors wanted to see what they could do to stop the fire from spreading. Mind you, we live in very dense forest and it was a windy day, so while we could see the smoke coming out of the canyon, it was hard to see exactly where the fire was. DH went down the 4-wheeler trails, past our neighbors house and when he came around a corner, he almost drove straight into the fire! He said that it was a wall of flames in dense manzinita and brush. Thankfully, no trees had caught yet but it was pretty bad. Just as he was turning around to try another way around the fire, firefighters showed up and a plane dropped retardant, practically on top of all of their heads!

The firefighters got the fire completely out after about an hour. We, along with all of our neighbors, unpacked our most important belongings and breathed a sigh of relief. Due to the fact that our house is on the crest of the hill leading down to the canyon, most of our neighbors, with their packed up cars, had pulled up in front of our house to watch the firefighters do their work, hoping and praying that they would get it out.

It. was. terrifying. I have decided that if this is what our summer is going to be like, our birth certificates and marriage license as well as the deeds to our property and insurance policies are staying in the glove compartment of our car. I plan to spend the afternoon getting everything that isn't replaceable in one place, so we can grab everything quickly if we get evacuated.

Oh and the cause of the fire? A new neighbor had a burn pile (on a non burn day) that he hadn't completely extinguished before leaving his home. When he returned, he found that it had spread and called 911. Dumbass. Oh, and did I mention that he doesn't have his well in yet, so he had no water?

I didn't get a chance to take a picture until after it was mostly extinguished: