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This little painting is from the road up to Buck Mountain Lookout. As you can see up on the mountain around the tower all the trees have been burned. The Beaver Lake fire came through in 2015 wiping out all up the forest up there on top. This was my lookout for two summers a long time ago when I worked for the Department of Natural Resources. In the next few days I will tell you more stories from my days on Buck.

Today marks the beginning of Project Wildfire. This is a 40 day project to paint a watercolor study each day. I am calling it Project Wildfire because 75% of each sale will be donated to a wildfire relief organization. More details on that in the coming days.

Most people are aware that this summer was a terrible wildfire season. 4th of July brought the first, the Chelan Hills fire near Chelan, Washington in which one man perished and many homes were destroyed. On Aug. 1 we got word my cousin in Tonasket was being evacuated. The Sinlahekin fire which started on 7/26 was rapidly approaching the town of Tonasket, and it had come over the mountain across the river right behind her home. On that same day my sister and brother-in-law were evacuated from their home on Five Mile in Spokane. Our families were very fortunate in both situations and their homes were not lost, but so many people were not as lucky. The Sinlahekin Fire in Tonasket burned over 166,000 acres, and the fires in Spokane destroyed over 800 homes and structures and damaged well over 1,000 more.

As I watched these fires unfolding, my heart was absolutely breaking. Facebook became my place to find the latest updates, and there were so many videos of the brave men and women running into the flames, instead of away from them. I watched as fire crews were dispatched from other states to come help. Big Bark from Sweet Home, Oregon ran a video of their team pulling out of their compound. 18 trucks in all rolling north, having no idea what the next two to four weeks would bring. This brought me to tears, and I am still crying as I write this. The bravery of the firefighters, all of them, from the local volunteers, DNR, Forest Service, all the organizations that came in from around Washington as well as other states and countries, and all the neighbors and town folk doing whatever they could to help save homes, pets, farms, orchards, and friends. 

The needs in the affected communities, don't stop when the fire is finally contained. As I watched, I kept asking myself "what can I do to help?" Finally, I decided that I could sit down and paint. Maybe I can earn enough to make a donation to a couple different wildfire relief organizations. I decided any donation helps. So, for every painting you purchase from this little project of mine I will donate 75% to wildfire relief. That leaves enough money for me to purchase mats and mailing materials and to ship each one to you.

Here are the important details about the Project Wildfire :
• I will be creating a painting every day for 40 days. Each of those 40 days I will post the "painting of the day."
• This year I'm mixing it up by painting in a couple different sizes. At this time I plan to try painting in the following sizes: 7"x10", 8"x10" and 8"x8".

• The price of the "painting of the day" will be a very reduced rate for the first 24 hours after it is posted on my website. Each day the price will be shown here in the blog post for the day.
• After 24 hours it will revert to its retail price.
• All purchases can be made on my website using PayPal or by credit card using Stripe. Instructions on how to purchase can be found here.
• These paintings will be matted and attached to a backer board, but will be unframed.
• I will ship all purchases within 3 business days. They will be pressed between foam core boards and sent in a waterproof bubble wrap padded envelope.

Here is how you can stay up to date and see each painting in this project: 
• Subscribe to my email newsletter to have the first look each day. You can subscribe here.
• Go to my blog page. If you want to subscribe to the blog you can click on the FOLLOW THIS BLOG button on the right. This will give you the RSS feed, but you will need an RSS reader. I think it's better to just sign up for the newsletter and follow the links I provide there. 

• You can also follow me on Facebook here, or Instagram here.

Thank you so much for your encouragement. Sending love and joy to each of you!
Kristi