We're having water troubles here in Bellingham. It's not that we don't have enough water, in fact, we have plenty to go around. The problem is that the recent heat wave has caused (we think) a big bloom of algae in the lake. This prolific algae is now clogging the filters in the city's water treatment plant which means that it is taking longer to produce the amount of clean water the city needs.
Apparently the problem became so dire last week that the city of Bellingham enacted new and hopefully temporary water restrictions which prohibit us from watering established lawns and flower beds and really restrict the use of any water for plant maintenance purposes. They do allow you to water newly plantings, but only with a watering can. Since all of my plants that I've been watering are new plantings I think that means I can continue to water them.
However, just to be safe, I decided to switch to watering using cans and lake water. I figure since there isn't any problem with the amount of water and only with the amount of clean water this shouldn't be a problem. So this morning I spent about an hour trudging back and forth from our little beach watering all of my new little flower beds. I certainly felt old fashioned. :)
The most exciting moment though was when I heard a big splash, just as I was walking through the trees by the boat house, on my way to the beach to fill up my watering cans. I was surprised because it sounded like the splash came from very close to the shore and I didn't think there was anyone down at our beach. I hurried on and arrived at the beach just in time to see the eagle that lives in one of our big trees grab something out of the lake and slowly fly away with it. I think he must have dove down from the tree to pick up a fish out of the lake. It is so nice to have an eagle around the house!
Here's a photo of one of my new beds. I've planted a variety of flowers but the ones I am most hopeful about are the sweet peas. They are growing just on the opposite side of the iron fence and I hope I can train them to grow up it. Right now they are almost big enough to reach the bottom of the fence.
And here's the dahlia bed. They dahlias seem to be growing well so far. I think I may have to start staking the big one soon though.
Down at the beach I'm developing quite a collection of glass pieces. It seems that they wash up on our beach almost constantly. Most of them seem to be quite worn and don't have any really sharp edges. I think they must have been tossed into the lake quite a long time ago. Our neighbor who grew up in the house next door told us he has been picking glass up off the beach for over 30 years!
My plan is to get a big glass jar to keep the glass pieces in. I'll set it down by our little beach, then I can just drop the new pieces of glass that I find into it and someday I'll have a fun collection of old glass pieces.
And finally, here's a stack of new fabric I picked up at Jo-Ann's the other day. All of them were on sale so I just picked out a few that I thought might work nicely for a quilt or other sewing project.
And now... back to cleaning the house!
~ElizabethRose
