A Welcome Storm

Today, I was delightfully surprised by a pop-up thunderstorm.  I was out deadheading in my swimsuit top and shorts...so when it started raining...Ijust stayed put.  However, as the minutes passed, thunder and lightning started, so I decided I'd better go inside.  I'm glad I did, because the skies opened up and it started pouring.   I watched excitedly from the doorway...I could feel the temperature drop as the storm went through.  It was even hailing for a few minutes. 

I went out afterwards to see how much rain we got. Like so much of the midwest, we have been in a drought.  It has hardly rained all summer.  I have been so tired lately, it was difficult for me to get out and water, so I am lucky my garden was doing anything at all.  My mini water feature that I never got started this year has quite a bit of water in the bottom now. 

Right before the rain started, I was tying up my sunflowers.  We had some brief thunderstorms the other day that didn't produce much rain, but they made a bunch of these tall flowers bend over.  It was very convenient to tie them up to this white fence.  I didn't plant any sunflowers this year...these are all volunteers from last years' seeds dropping to the ground. 

You can see this pretty flower, it might be lemon queen, is drooping, heavy with rain.  I love it!

The rain gauge said 2.5 inches, but I haven't emptied it out since the other storm we had this week.  I know, though, that we got less than .25 to .5 inches, so most of this had to be from today.  Right now, the clouds are already gone and the sun is shining again, so I'm headed back out to resume my gardening.  I hope you get some rain coming your way as well.