Hello, My Name is Emily

I never thought I would write a post about being evacuated due to immediate fire danger.  Let alone twice.
I got the call from S about 4 on Friday saying that we were evacuated.  Again.  I was in the middle of trying to get as much information as possible when I heard tones go off in the background with S saying hurriedly, I've gotta go, we're being dispatched to go fight it.

It wasn't beyond me that I was having a baby a week from that day.

Awesome.

I've been really concerned (rather horrified) these last few weeks watching the fires in Colorado Springs.  I remember thinking just last Wednesday Well Thank Goodness we've already had our fire.  It can't happen twice.  Still think I'm crazy for being superstitious?

S said in our minute long conversation that this fire was "cooking" which I can only assume means that it was worse, faster.  Ours and the adjoining neighborhood were the only ones evacuated this time around, but I think the fact that it kind of started in the subdivision made things worse than before.  At least before there were a few hours to evacuate.  This time people were told to just get out of there.

So with all of that it is odd to think that we were really fortunate on so many more levels this time.

• There is the obvious thing; that our home is okay and really, the smoke isn't bad at all.  And our home was on the opposite end of the subdivision this time, so it really wasn't in any immediate danger.
• Given the weather conditions lately, and where it started, this could have been bad (again Colorado Springs was playing in the back of my mind all evening) but only (and I say that as sensitively as possible) 4 homes were lost.  
•  S was fighting the fire again, but this time he was among the first dispatched so I felt like there was almost an extra level of protection on our home.  At least to the level that if something really tragic happened I would know about it really quickly.
• It occurred on a day that Bean was with her Gma H.  S and I were both working and the Bean and I already had plans to spend the night, so we were prepared with clothes and, most importantly, Bean's entourage of stuffed animals.

Someone in testimony meeting yesterday said that these things happen to remind us of all of our blessings.  It's true.  Not only with all the things mentioned above, but I was dumbfounded at all of the texts/phone calls I received in a short amount of time making sure we were okay.  Thank you.  It is definately humbling.

While I was watching some live scenes of the fire on the news, I had no idea that I was actually, in one case, watching S fight a fire.  It's probably better not to know.  Sometimes I forget that he kind of has a dangerous job.  He told me later that night that he had never worked so hard in his life.  (He crawled into bed the next morning barely saying a word before he crashed.)  S hates it when he/firefighters are elevated to hero status, but I don't know how you could describe saving that many structures in only a few hours anything but heroic.

Finally (and I apologize to those of you reading this who are also my friends on facebook, but I have to share this again) I was trying to decide how to break the news to Bean that we were not going to be able to go home right away that morning--such was the plan and I think I've mentioned how she is when plans change.  I told her in as optimistic a voice as I dared that there had been a really, really big fire by Bean's house but that it was okay because daddy was able to help put it out.  Her eyes literally lit up and she said, "Yeah, go get marshmallows at the store for the big fire by {Bean's} house!! But not the big ones, just the little ones. {Bean} doesn't like the big ones."  What a sweetheart.  Thankfully she forgot about our plans for an enormous marshmallow roast by the time she returned home with her daddy that night.  I'm pretty sure the city would have frowned on the idea.