Fall in the Woods!

It was drizzling, those are raindrops on the lens. But I really love where I live.

No More Fro for Beau

I had very specific instructions from Beau’s Daddy, “Please take him to your sister and have her make him look like a boy”. According to Dad the curls on the back of my precious baby's head were out of control and teetering on the verge of Fro. whatever.
Here is the “Fro”

Ok I may have been able to make pigtails…

Here’s my handsome little boy. Is he seriously this big? Someone pinch me.

Brown Beans and Ham that wasn't meant to be...

I came home to the worst smell in the Universe. The smoke had completely cleared, but we have a problem. Yesterday Mike was making brown beans and ham. He turned the heat up yesterday morning while we were all getting ready. He remembered he turned the heat up at 11:15 while he was at school. He got home at 11:23 to a house full of thick gray smoke. The bean pot was not on fire, but close. He took it outside, opened the windows, turned on the attic fan and had to fly back to work.
The closest thing our house smells like is someone’s car where they’ve chain smoked cigarettes since 1982 with the windows rolled up and parked it in the dessert to cook all summer. It is that stale nasty, never wash a coat smoke smell. It makes me queasy.
I immediately started cleaning. I thought, well as soon as I get the gunk off the stove and wash the fabrics/take them outside, this will be better! Nope. I went over all the cabinets 3x’s with Murphy’s Oil soap, I bleached all the counters, and started putting all the dishes, one load at a time in the dishwasher. I sprinkled baking soda and carpet freshener on all the carpet, got out my Zep OdorElminator, I started washing clothes, and then quickly realized I had nowhere to put them after the dryer. For the last load, I left work clothes in the dryer so we’d have something to wear today. None of that worked. I stink. Around 10pm I kind of lost hope. All of the White Barn wallflowers were plugged in, every candle I own was burning and the house still reeked. Mike had a ballgame in Fordland (they won) and when he got home, he said he could tell a difference. So that’s good.
I called State Farm this morning for some help, advice, maybe a cleaning solution… and got bad news. We have what’s called Protein Smoke Damage. Apparently, it’s one of the worst things that can happen, besides a fire. The proteins make the smoke very thick, potent and you cannot clean it with readily available cleaning products. They said I need to get a quote from ServiceMaster. ServiceMaster will be at my house tomorrow morning at no charge. After briefly speaking with them about what happened, the fact there is no black smoke stains on the walls, it just smells bad, they let me know Protein Smoke is one of the hardest to clean (I’m now aware of this fact) and it could cost up to $9000 to restore our home. Yes I just said $9000. Our insurance deductable is only $1000, so that would be the only amount we’d be paying. Thank the Lord!!
Obviously Mike feels horrible, has apologized over and over, but no one’s mad, you know why? Because we still have a kitchen to clean, a home to sleep in and the Wright Country Rural Fire District did not call us yesterday to let us know the house is a total loss. I can totally deal with this. I’m mostly thankful Mike wasn’t burnt when he went back to the house, or when he carried the beans outside. I’m thankful Beau’s room isn’t really that bad and we have $1000 in the bank. There is a lot to be thankful for as I sit here and sniff my chain smoker pink fleece hoodie.