Despite my frustrations, there is a fair amount of produce from our garden.  I am still amazed at the size of the fodder beets that I am feeding our critters.  The pigs and chickens seem to love them.

I am getting an insane amount of golden tomatoes.  The ones in the hothouse are large for cherry tomatoes so I thought maybe they were another variety of tomato.  But yesterday I found the tag hidden by all of the growth, and they are also Golden Nugget tomatoes.  They are just much bigger in there than the ones in the greenhouse or on our laundry line.  

I am at the end of the season for the cauliflower and the cabbage.  So I want to use them. I  decided to make Piccalilli and use some of our cauliflower, golden plums and zucchini.  Here it is in the brine yesterday.

Doing chores yesterday I saw these two barn swallows on the fence.  It is unusual to see them sitting still so it was nice to see them.

I was picking blackberries in the afternoon when I received a text for a Level 3 evacuation of our family’s cabin at 3:24 PM.  I hadn’t expected that because it seemed like the weather was favorable and Goose Prairie was more of a risk than we were.  Here is the fire map from Saturday.  We are near Edgar Rock.

In fact, my brother had gone up there to grab some precious-to-us items.  But now he was out of cell phone range.  I called my mother and stepfather. They were unable to get ahold of him.  I started freaking out.  It was weird though because I could find no other reference anywhere to this evacuation, and they hadn’t receive any notices either.  So I was really hoping it was a mistake.  But I couldn’t pick blackberries anymore.  I went in the house, did some clean ups and took a bath, trying to calm down.  I ended up peaking at my phone and realized that it was real.  I started wailing and crying.  Tom had gone to an appointment, but Ryeleigh had been sleeping on the couch.  She came over and licked my face,  She seemed to understand my anguish.  I did hear from my brother finally at 5:57, and he was OK.  So I was less freaked out by then but still terribly worried.

Back to the produce, we also have lemon balm, for the first time.  I made Lemon Balm Spritzers using Swerve instead of honey.  They were good.  I did add some gin to one of them, the one after the bath.

For dinner yesterday I thought I would made Roasted Tomato Sauce for pizzas.  It was really tasty, quite garlicky.  Both Tom and I were a little put offer by the color so we added some purchased pizza sauce for a more orange color.  It worked out really well on our pizzas.  Now I have three more jars of it.  I still had more cherry tomatoes so am freeing them whole for the future.

This morning the fire had grown significantly to the east but still was not any closer to our cabin.  So I proceeded with chores.  I also pulled the Piccalilli from the brine and drained it.  

I made the sauce for it and heated it all up.  The long peppers I still have from my Game of Throne cooking came in handy.

Then it went into jars.  I will try some in a week.

For lunch I made an Asian Cabbage Salad, to use up some of the cabbage.  I had hoped to use some of our carrots.  I used one tiny one I found after the carrot pillage.  But Tom had to buy some carrots for me yesterday.  I was a very nice change to all of the cole slaw I have been eating lately.  But took forever to prepare, particularly shelling the edamame.  

Speaking of using our produce, I racked the rhubarb wine (on the right).  I was finally able to keg the plum wine from last year.  I struggled to get it to ferment to dry but finally was able to by diluting it and reintroducing yeast for the 4th time.  

Of course, my mind is not in any of this.  I am terribly worried about our cabin.  This evening the fire is inching ever closer to it.  I have always had comfort that the cabin would not burn due to the other cabins, homes and businesses nearby.  But they might not be able to control this one with all of the dead timber and lack of resources due to all of the other major fires burning.  Please, please send your prayers and fire-suppressing thoughts our way.  We (as well as so, so many others including Conconully) need them now.  FYI the best mapping site in my option is at mappingsupport.com.  And the webcam at Whistlin’ Jack’s is helpful too as it is nearby.  If they are OK, we are probably OK.