Tuesday, December 13, 2011

A little Soggy...Behind on the Holidays

We've seen some rain lately...broke some records I believe with two feet of rain falling within ten days! That's a lot of rain. However, right now I see some blue sky and I'm hopeful that it will be enough sunlight to power the water pump.
First off I thought I'd share a picture of Stella in her new favorite shoes. She wears them everywhere.
We're all amazed at how well she can walk in them! She can actually run in them.
She has definitely worn them more times than I ever have. I'm glad they can be put to good use :)
Here are some rain pictures. We have 3 separate lakes forming in our yard. Duck Lake is the one one the driveway that the ducks absolutely love to swim in. Muddy Lake is the one where the duck enclosure used to be located, and Banana Lake is the lake that is forming around the Banana trees (as seen in the picture below).

With the move to the back cabin, school, start-up business woes, and a 2.5yr old I am dreadfully behind on all things Holiday. I managed to hang 3 Stockings...just about the only Holiday decorations I packed and moved to Hawaii. I have not even started a Holiday card, but I have started to receive them, which makes me feel loved and horrible all at the same time. Horrible because I don't think I'll be sending out Holiday cards this year.
Calvin, Alice, Mr. Drake, and Jemima swimming in Duck Lake.
Our new solar array...kicking out the power. We did see that the batteries went down to 80% of charge with the lack of sun.
Tommy is moving the old solar array that still runs the water pump. We can't run the water pump on the new array because it is the wrong voltage. We'll be upgrading the pump in the near future, but we needed a temporary boost to the system so that we could flush the toilet, have showers, etc... The old array was in the shade at noon...just laying flat on the roof...so Tommy set to work on setting them at the correct angle for maximum winter sun...soltice is soon approaching.
Here he is with his handy angle finder. Even though he got finished well past the afternoon hours the panels were still able to collect enough sun energy so that he could have a shower, we could flush the toilet, and I could do a sink full of dishes before we ran out of juice. I'm hopeful today we can gain some momentum...come on sun, break through those clouds!
Can you see Stella at the edge of Duck Lake? I took this picture from the roof.
There she is running.