Saturday, February 2, 2008

Water - At Least More Water



This is our new water tank. I am not too happy that it sits right in front of the house but it is water. This tank holds 1500 gallons of the precious stuff. We have to have someone deliver it to the house in a truck and it is not as cheap as the water that comes thru the pipes (which are still frozen), but it is water and I can take a shower and wash my dishes without having to worry about driving half a mile to the neighboors to fill up the assortment of 5 and 7 gallon water jugs any more.

I will have to say that I have enjoyed camping all my life and know how to use very little water but have never been without water in the house for more than two days. I had always taken for granted that I can turn on the faucet and have water come out until I turned it off when I am in my own home. I think this has been a good lesson for me how spoiled we all are.

Water is scarce in much of the world. With our growing population and population centers spreading out to places where there is little fresh water it is a problem for many of us. Yet we continue to use it freely without a thought. I am posting a challenge here for each of you who reads this to have a look at your last water bill and see how much you used. Then for the next month think about water each time you turn on the tap. See how many ways you can cut back on your usage and tell me about it.

Here are a few things I have done this past week:

Flushed the toilet with water from doing dishes instead of sending it down the drain (this is refered to as grey water...............you can also water plants with it if it is filtered). Many people find this a disgusting subject but another saying for flushing, "If its yellow, let it mellow, if its brown flush it down." At the least you do not have to flush every time.

In the shower turn off the water exept to get wet and to rinse off. Ditto for handwashing and brushing teeth.

Only wash dishes when there are enough................if you have a dishwasher never wash less than a full load...............ditto for doing laundry.

I know that I will be thinking about my water usage much more from now on. I got by with less than 200 gallons in a week and a half for a family of four so I am sure I can cut back on my water usage from now on. These will be small changes but I am sure they will add up.

Ok now that the water crisis is over I promise my next blog entry will be more quilt or art related. I am still putting together the t-shirt quilt and now have lots of large sections together and a few single blocks to join. Hopefully by Monday I will have one humongous top ready for quilting. I have ordered the backing fabric online as I could not find any localy and that will be here end of next week so I will have to wait till then to get this quilt quilted. This is my first t-shirt quilt and it is gonna be amazing when it is all together. The customers son has collected all these shirts for running, and triathalon events and there is some amazing history in the quilt. I have been enjoying making this memory quilt and now want to do more. What a great idea to take all those t-shirts and make them into a quilt!

6 comments:

Deborah Levy said...

While I have tap water, we are in the midst of a terrible 2 year drought. We Have recently removed all our grass and planted with native, drought tolerent plants. I have also replaced all the appliances in my home with new energy efficient ones. All our lighting is CF and I have a newer fuel efficient car. I still look every day for more ways to be more eco- responsible and reduce my carbon footprint on the planet.

Desert Threads said...

Sorry to hear about your frozen pipes. I remember as a kid living in Ohio, our well would freeze and we would have to take the assorted 55 gallon drums and fill up at a spring which was over a mile away.

SandyQuilts said...

Ami hope you get it thawed out soon. T&P's winging their way to you.

You have been tagged, please see my blog for details.....

Unknown said...

DO you live in the mountains of NM? I never would have thought that you'd get frozen pipes in the SW. Goes to show what one can learn about living in the south! I'm in NE Ohio and we've had our share of weird weather too. Sat is going to be 41* and Sunday 18! with colder temps coming.

I do art quilts and traditional too. The art group I'm with has a show at the Canton Art Museum in May so I've been working a lot!

I'll be departing from that for a while after I finish these art pieces so I can do more traditional ones. Of course I usually add a personal spin on those too.

Curious what machine you're quilting with. I'm considering seriously in getting a LA and leaning to a Gammill.

Hope your pipes thaw soon. We just watched Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth". This should be required viewing for everyone. USA folks just aren't getting the fact that we are living and depleting faster than the world can sustain! Why do so many think they deserve to live lavishly when so many can barely exist?
Marty

Featheronawire Sally Bramald said...

I know how to manage with no water too. In the year I lived in Greece we had no water in the summer. We would buy in water for washing and cooking and bottled water for drinking.
One other trick was to have a big shallow bowl in the shower to collect the shower water, then we each soaked our own clothes in that water with biological washing powder, that did the 'work' and we could rinse it clean with fresh water the following day.
Occasionally for a big loo flush, we would walk down to the sea and use the sea water.
I love living in England where I can turn the tap on and KNOW water will come out of the tap.

Anonymous said...

We have lived three times without water for various lengths of time, the longest, 54 days. It was rough, although we had rain nearly every day to collect for flushing toilets. We have nearly 20 inches of frost this year, much more than normal. Spring cannot come early enough. Good luck and stay smiling.