A Busy Week

A Rainy Week

Spring is the time that the ponds get spruced up, cleaned up, new plants and new filter material for the filters and that is what I have been doing..or rather, having others help me to do in between the bouts of rain and cold we've had.
The pond is nearly crystal clear  after just 4 days with the filter on. I have to replace the big bucket I
use but, the old one, rigged up a bit, is working in the meantime.
Making your own filter is the only way to go for clean, clear water and saves you hundreds of dollars on a big pond.

Here are photos for this week's Friday Foto Friends and Skywatch Friday .

In the photo below you can see the mint that spills over into the pond.

While they don't eat the mint itself, they do suck the algae off the roots. 

You can hear the sucking noises as they do it! It's so cute.

These fish are not tiny as they seem. They are big!Some are over 20 years old.

The big pond is not all that big really. It is 10 feet long by 8 feet wide by 4 feet deep.

The little pond is 5 feet long and a bit over 3 feet wide and 2 feet deep.

I am in the process of planting around the little pond right now and finally got the fountain hooked up.

Here is a view of the little pond from my front window.

Plants like this below, a perennial, will go around the pond. Most are in now,  but more fillers are   needed to fill in the gaps. Most are perennial plants.

I like it jammed packed if possible.

One of the Rugosa, beach rose, is huge now and about 14 feet tall and very wide.

  The other grows on the side of the house and climbs up the chimney. They are native and grew of their own accord.

It blooms only once a year unlike other roses, and leaves behind rose hips.

      In the foreground is one of the Wisteria which grow like wild fire in this sandy soil.

 Just some weekly happenings... Batting practice for the Little, who hit a home run with bases full  and lunch with friends.

The little has a mean swing. That ball went flying. 

Did you play baseball? I played as a kid. I was always the short stop.

Cedar trees make good places to hang planters

And to hang hammocks

By the sea, machines get filled up and scratched by the blowing, drifting sand.

Sand drifts into the back of the Pepsi machine and little birds and animals leave their footprints.

A stray autumn leaf that hid there all winter is safe and secure in its Pepsi home.

And then there is the sky which sometimes seems endless.

Or even when I monkey around with it. The clouds are all real but  I couldn't resist adding the face with Photoshop because that little cloud was peeking out in just the right way.

I've shown this one before, but it makes me chuckle.

I like this photo below because of the sun reflection on the road.
You can click on it to see it full sized.

Even blurry from a moving car it can be pretty.

And another  blurry photo taken by me at the shopping mall of a watercolor sky.

Thank you for visiting and please come again.
Tomorrow's post will be  Literary Pearls which I've not done in a while.

PS... Click here to learn how to make a cute little spring in your garden.
I will also help with plans for your pond and explain to you how to make a powerful homemade filter.