Dark days behind us - lots to be grateful for


Little did I know that within days of writing my last post, and describing the bush fire burning near Braidwood, I would be in the midst of my own bush fire crisis here at home.*

The 31st of December 2019 will forever be a nightmare for me.  And so will the following days.  We got the bush fire alert to evacuate at 6.30am.  I had family from Canberra staying and they immediately hit the road and left for home.  The Kings Highway was closed so they had to get home via the Princes Highway.  This closed from Batemans Bay northward shortly after they left.  They were lucky to get through to Kangaroo Valley just ahead of the bush fires.

If not for my husband, and a few local men in our area, we would have lost our house.  They stayed and put out spot fires all over our area.  One escape route (of three) closed completely, and the other two were barely passable.  My husband says that after this experience he will never again stay to fight a fire.

 North Rosedale on fire 

North Rosedale (opposite our property) was almost completely decimated  More than 90 houses burnt to the ground.  If it wasn’t for the southerly wind which howled through at about 11.00am, we would have been engulfed on the opposite side of George Bass Drive.

 South (towards Tomakin) and Moruya on fire

I spent that morning on the beach with my friend and five dogs between us.  We were ready to just get into the water when the southerly hit. 

It was hell.

 Behind our house (West)

Eventually we were evacuated to a local cabin site where we stayed for 3 days.  We came back home every morning to soak the house and surrounding garden with water in case of ember attack.

 
 Hard to believe that this was the morning of 31st December 2019

Each morning I was grateful to see the house still standing.

So - not much sewing done - but guess what I packed when evacuated?  

My sewing machine and current projects, in addition to important documents, photos and items that have a lot of sentimental value and which have been given to me by my sons, my mother and sisters.

I am only now setting the sewing room to rights as it was also stuffed with outdoor furniture and any soft furnishings from outside that were subject to ember attack.

After lots of rain and stormy weather which finally put out the bush fires surrounding us, I’m finally over the fear and can unpack!

But I wasn’t idle.

I managed to ‘get lost in’ a couple of projects during those dark weeks.
And the baby quilt is almost finished.

So grateful to be here and to have the house still standing.  We have a lot to be thankful for.

Hubblebird

*I wrote this weeks ago intending to include photos. But I found the photos too traumatic, and put off publishing.  Since then, of course, we've been overtaken by Coronavirus.

But I thought it was worthwhile publishing my thoughts of the bushfires at that time, minus photos.

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