A Note From Aunt Chris

Here is the note that we got from our California family, Thank Goodnes they are home safe.
Dear Friends,
Thank you for all your calls and emails! We are all fine as is our house. We evacuated on Monday morning, when our neighbors got an advisory evacuation call at 6:15 am and after I turned around from going to work. I saw that northbound I-5 was a parking lot at 6:00 am, and figured things were bad and going to worse. The neighborhood just south of us had a mandatory evacuation by Monday night and the fires reached a few miles from our house. Luckily they stopped it on Tuesday and the winds subsided (this is the real reason the whole county did not go up in smoke). We came home Tuesday night after staying with our friends, the Brakases, with another family about 6 miles west of here. At one point on Monday night they issued an advisory evacuation for our friends' neighborhood also and we were all trying to figure out where we might go next in the middle of the night. I have lived here for 22 years and have never experienced the howling all-night-long hot winds that were going on Sunday and Monday. Today's temps reached into the mid 90s, but no wind. The kids were very upset when we were packing up our valuables, but I let> them watch cartoons most of the day so that they wouldn't see the news reports and that helped. I told the kids to pack anything they couldn't live without, so Sonya's suitcase was bulging with stuffed animals and I ended up taking out the rocks from Nicholas' suitcase. No clothes. Nicholas was concerned how Disneyland was faring but felt better when we assured him it was clear of any danger. My parents are here with us now because the town where they live, Fallbrook, is still shut tight and is still burning. They don't know when they can go home. Latest I heard was that the fires won't be out until Nov. 4 at the earliest. No one has been working in the county since Monday; I'm not really sure when I'm going back. Schools have been canceled for the week, but our kids are in the first week of their October break anyway. The grocery stores and most restaurants are opening up now. Thanks again for your thoughts. It is nice to know so many of you are thinking of us during times like these. --Chris