The Pool is Finished!

...ok, well, it was finished 2 weeks ago, but I haven't had a chance to update this thing. We've been having a blast swimming though! It's really a great family activity - many nights all 6 of us are out there swimming and chatting. Weekends usually find us with a few extra kids around, but it's so nice having them here instead of my boys at someone else's house swimming - after all, that was the point of building it! So here's what you see when you walk out our door: the basketball hoop has already gotten a ton of use! This is definitely a pool for big kids though - our shallow end is neither very shallow or very big. It starts sloping into the deep end fairly quickly. We do have a large Baja step though that you can sit or lie on. Here's a few more pics - it's not as small as it looks though. ;)

And a couple of the boys in it: As you can see, we still have work to do in the yard. We pretty much tore out the whole backyard when we started this project. The next step is installing a sport court and getting the grass and rocks installed because right now, it's gets kind of muddy out there! More pics of the process will be put in the photo album soon...

Back in School!

Yes, school has already started here! August 6 was the first day for all 4 boys. Summer went by so fast! I was very happy with the teacher Kent and Kurt (3rd grade) got, plus the "pod" Wyatt (7th grade) got into was the one I requested - very happy about that! Grant (sophomore/10th) has a huge workload this year - all honors classes with Advanced PE. I still haven't figured out just what makes the PE class advanced, but it's taught by the head football coach and that's all that matters - the class is full of football players!

Now, if I can just figure out how to slow things down so that this year doesn't whooosh by like last year.

They just couldn't wait!!

FINALLY!! The interior Pebble Tec was done on Monday. On Tuesday we got to start filling our pool. When the boys got home from school, the deep end only had about 3 feet of water in it. Next thing I knew, they had put their suits on and jumped in. I told them it was the only time they'd be able to stand in the deep end with their heads above water. Yesterday (Wed.) it was full about noon so we all got to swim. Today they are installing the diving board, getting the waterfall going, and doing a formal start-up of the pool. More photos of the finished product will be posted soon!