Pool Time!

*I've been really bad about blogging lately. I started this right after Memorial Day, and a week and a half later, I'm just getting back to it. It's been a busy week ;-)

Memorial Day weekend our pool opened, and we spent most of the weekend there. We have not yet attempted taking the whole family to the pool. It seems like it would be more work than fun. Maybe by the end of the summer we'll be brave enough to try it as a family. For now, we take turns with the kids. Only the three bigger kids went this weekend, and they all had a blast the whole time.

Our pool is public, so anyone can pay to go in at any time. We bought a membership because with seven of us, it pays for itself in just a few visits. I definitely saw some crazy things at the pool, and I'm sure there will be many more pool stories before the summer ends. I had to spend a lot of time at the baby pool with Trouble. That's where he felt most comfortable, and the big pool was freezing, so I didn't mind sitting with him in the little pool. He learned baby pool etiquette pretty quickly - where any toys you bring into the pool automatically belong to everyone there. The baby pool is gated, and the huge sign on the gate states that children must be supervised inside the gate at all time. To me, this means that you need to be in the gated area with your child. Apparently that rule doesn't apply to everyone, because some kids were in there alone. All day. I guess the baby pool itself is a babysitter? I don't get it, but as long as they left my kids alone, I didn't care.

Another thing I learned is that not all women shave their armpits. To each his own, but I don't get that one either. I was very surprised when this lady raised her arms to catch her daughter, and her pits were as hairy as my husband's. Speaking of body hair, I also saw a few men with hair sweaters. You know, where their hair covers their chests, stomachs, and backs. I thought they'd just shake off like a dog, but to my surprise, they used towels to dry themselves. I'm not making fun of anyone, just observing. Trust me, someone somewhere is probably blogging about the lady trying to tan her enormous thighs while chasing her kids around the pool. (that would be me!)

I don't understand the use of those giant water squirter things at the pool. Kids in the baby pool (the ones with no parents watching them) were squirting the other kids in the baby pool. More than once, other kids' parents had to tell them to stop bothering their own kids. At the big pool, there were adults standing on the side of the pool squirting their kids, and getting other kids at the same time. If you want to get wet, just get in the pool. That being said, I understand we're at a pool, and the point is to get wet. But I need to get used to the water on my own. I don't need you or your kids to squirt me or splash me. While we're on the topic, adults should not do cannon balls in the 3 feet. You could hurt yourself or someone else, and your butt crack almost always ends up showing. No one wants to see that. And then your kids and their friends follow suit, and everyone is cannon-balling in water that is too shallow, splashing people who don't want to be splashed, and there are butt cracks showing all over the place.

I haven't been to the pool in 2 weeks because we've been really busy. I'm sure there were other stories I wanted to tell at the time I began this post. There's a long summer ahead of us, folks... plenty of pool stories to come!