It sounds like water was not only already on the earth, but it was also in the atmosphere. “Waters which were above…” 

Once the sun broke through, the Bible says that on the third day, in verse 9, God said, “Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and Let the dry land appear…”  Dirt.  Soil. Dry land.  The medium for growing things.  You now have waters below the heavens gathered into organized oceans, lakes, rivers and ponds. You have waters above the earth organized as water clouds that can mist the plants. (There was no rain until after the flood?  When we got a rainbow.)  Everything is ready for the plants to appear again so that the food chain can restored.

God was ready to Let plant life appear on earth once again.  He says, “Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth…” (!) The seed was already there upon the earth.  Seed left from previous plants?  That’s how that passage reads.  It certainly doesn’t say he created plants in this passage.  It says the seed was already there...waiting on the sun to clear.

I love the way God took His steps.  First the sun, water, land.  Then plants…you can’t have plants without those three elements being restored into a working climate.  First things first.  You have to have plants, because new animals are about to appear next in the order of the steps God took.