Water We Gonna Do About It?

Well folks, it’s that time of the year again, when our water gets so bad it’s truly hard to handle it sometimes. It’s a time when our toenails turn orange, we get out of the shower dirtier than when we went in, we gag when we brush our teeth, and the old adage “don’t throw the baby out with the bath water” has become more true to life than I would like.



Echo taking a bath. This is freshly drawn water.

We don’t drink the water straight from our faucet. After a period of not being used, when I turn the sink water on, it sprays out a rusty stream for a few seconds before it starts to clear up. Last year, we bought a filter for the sink, and a Brita pitcher to filter it again, and even then we only use the water for cooking, and buy bottled water to drink. That’s three times filtered and I still don’t drink it. Even the native Russians don't drink the water on our farm.

(This video doesn't do it justice, but you can see when you first turn it on, it is reddish and then clears up a bit).

Our water in the winter was not so bad, and I’m not sure what the difference was. Maybe our water source is different in the winter time than in the spring and summer, but I had thought I was getting used to the water, until a couple weeks ago when the bad water came springing back.

When we first arrived here last year, I was pretty disgusted by the water. You could ruin a pot of uncooked ramen noodles just by adding the water. Day after day, it wasn't getting better, so I had to get creative. While Shane was working here alone last year, he ate at a restaurant that had no running water. It operated on what it collected as rainwater. It didn't sound too appetizing to me, but it did give me an idea. I may not want to drink the rain water, or even cook with it, but I figured I could probably wash with it. So, on one of the trips to town I bought a large bucket. Since it was raining just about every other day or so, I just put it under my rain spout outside and started collecting rainwater. Then I would boil a large pot of rainwater every day in which to wash my dishes. This went on for quite awhile until we found an individual filter for our kitchen sink. It helped immensely with the fumes as well as some of the dirt in the water. It also was nice to not have to boil my dish water every time I had to do dishes.


My solution to the water last year



My rainwater is cleaner than my house water supply.

 
On one of our trips back from the States, we brought a Brita pitcher. Now I filter my water from my sink filter a second time. I mainly use this water for cooking. Even twice filtered is not very clean.



The bottom of our Brita pitcher. You can see my fingerswipe across the bottom. The residue in the water is very hard to escape.

 
I know I don’t drink enough water because we buy every bit of our drinking water in a bottle. I guess subconsiously it just happens. Shopping trips get that much more crowded when you are hauling 5-6 huge bottles of water out to the truck along with the other groceries every week. On a side note, Shane is becoming quite the connessieur of bottled water. We have tried probably 10 different varieties so far.



I get over run with these water bottles. I've been very creative with them and use them for just about everything, but even then they kinda haunt me.

The girls and I long for the days when you can walk up to the fridge, and fill up a glass with water. Such a novelty. For me, I can’t wait until the day when it doesn’t matter whether I’m washing dishes, cooking, or drinking, I can go to one source for water instead of choosing which of the 3 I should use: Sink, filtered pitcher, or bottled water.
 


Getting ready to boil some water for dinner. This is what it looks like out of our sink filter before we had the Brita.



After it boiled for awhile, I decided I couldn't stand it and I dumped the water out. This is what was left in the pot.



When the residue dries, it's almost chalky. I brushed the inside of the pot and then dumped out that pile of "dirt". If I remember right, I used bottled water to cook dinner that night. Don't tell Shane--sometimes he growls about using up the bottled water too quickly. =)

 
Washing dishes is always fun. I turn it as scalding as I can get it because it leaves a greasy, grimy residue if I don’t wash and rinse in VERY hot water. It’s often so hot that my Russian rubber gloves disintegrate as I wash. The other day I even melted the sacrament cups in the water when I rinsed them. (Yes, we wash and reuse).



I lifted this pot out of the soapy water to wash it, and that's what my dishwater looked like.




My rinse water is not much better. That is a "white" bowl.


The bathroom water is even worse than the kitchen water because it is only filtered once from the house filter. It's pretty much horrible. When using the shower, the fumes from the water gag me. I often use the kitchen filtered water to brush my teeth with because the bathroom sink water makes me want to vomit when I rinse my toothbrush and mouth. Sometimes I find myself holding my breath when I shower. 
 
Laundry is always a treat, too. My whites are a nice dull orange cream color and smell horrible when they are drying on the line in our laundry room.


Inserts for Echo's cloth diapers. The one on top is brand new. The two underneath just had their first wash. I'd say they came out pretty clean, don't you?



I sent Rain in to shower the other day and she came out with orange rust streaks stained onto her legs where the water ran down in rivulets. Same thing happened to me. I would count my blessings and say it’s a good way to get a tan, but it looks like a wipe-on tanning lotion that has gone horribly wrong.

The girls love to use the soap at the bathroom sink to "wash" their hands and then run to me for me to smell how “clean” their hands smell. Mostly I smile and hold my breath as I “smell” their hands, and then nod about what a great job they did washing their hands.
 
The shower never stays sparkly because within a day or so, the rust stain has crept back over every surface the water touches. But I must say the shower is quite clean from about the neck height and up.


Our lovely shower. I'm embarrassed to say it has been even rustier than this picture.



Sometimes I can't stand it anymore and give it a good bleaching. It lasts about 3 showers before it is stained again. But it's beautiful while it lasts.

 
The water also has other lasting effects. When I was home for Christmas my mother commented on how dark my hair had gotten, and not even just dark, but it had almost a rust tint to it. So there you have it, a cheap way to color your hair. If anyone is ready for a new color, I can bring a bottle back on our next trip.
 
Soooo, "water" we gonna do about it? Be thankful we have water plumbed to our house, of course. After all, we could be dependent upon a community well...Counting my blessings!


Community pump in a small village we drove through looking for cows.