Princess Fluffy and Wild Fires Near My House

 

My relaxed kitty, the first photo is after I took the second photo where she is closer to being asleep. In the first photo she is half awake and looking at me.

Wild Fires Near My House. Smoke and white ashes in the air. 

Added note on Sept. 4. As of September 4, there are 925 homes destroyed in the county I live in, most of them were country homes nestled in lovely spots among trees. 

I posted the two photos of Fluffy automatically yesterday, that post was set ahead of time. I did not get Internet restored to my house until late yesterday. 120 people already read this post before I was able to add this note about the wild fires. In my area of California almost 400 homes are destroyed, and several of my best friends are evacuated from their homes, and I am safe at home and not evacuated. My sons are in their homes too. The air quality sometimes is rated as hazardous so I stay inside with windows closed. Lots of white ash from the fires has fallen all over outside. I have two apps on my cell phone AirNow and AirVisual which tell the air quality for where I live. No walks these past few days for me and Bounce. 

When I drove my car I had to wash off all the ash first so I could see through the windshield. From zero percent containment of the fires they are now 29 percent contained (50 percent contained as of Sept. 4), a great direction to be going in. The fires were caused by lightning strikes all over California, in a storm with no rain, just lightning and dry tinder. It is very nerve wracking to be stuck at home, and on alert for potential evacuation. I have a suitcase packed with essentials. I am optimistic that the fires are being contained and am praying for rain, for our city to stay safe and for my friends' homes to be safe so they can return to them. Anyway, just wanted to say hi to you all, friends both near and far, and let you know what is going on here.

Painting rocks and a frog

I've been feeling a bit blah with my routines, so chose an artistic outlet. I am painting rocks and it is so fun. I don't think about anything else when I am painting, which is a good thing.

The rocks are not completed so I will post photos when I have completed painting some. The main one you can see in this photo has a butterfly I painted on it. I am holding some Acrylic Paint pens which worked very nicely. I don't know much about paints so scouted around on blogs, etc. for info. I also ordered some matte finish acrylic paints and paint brushes; the paints are designed for outdoor projects. I used the paints on this project below. The frog welcome sign was completely faded after 20 years of being in my garden.

He used to be a bright happy green. So I painted him with my new paint set. See how he turned out below. My next step is to paint on Duraclear Gloss Varnish, which is meant for outdoor use and is soap and water cleanup. This varnish is applied by brush which probably wastes less and is kinder to our planet and the air than a spray. The paint set I bought is FolkArt Gloss Acrylic Paint Outdoor and the acrylic paint pens are Flyset Graffiti. All the paints are soap and water cleanup.

Have you taken on a new hobby? In these times of many of us staying home for long hours, a new activity is very absorbing and diverts my attention from worry to enjoyment.