"I want the swimming poo"

I made a big mistake. For weeks, now, Bethany has been very sadly mentioning that we don't have a swimming pool. I think playing in water is one of her favorite summer pastimes, and I've been wanting her to play outside more anyway, so I decided to indulge her. I was out running errands by myself one night and picked up a swimming pool. Nothing fancy, just a three-ring inflatable pool. But I bought it before it was really warm enough outside to set it up, so I kept it where they couldn't see it, and didn't tell them. And then came my mistake. A few days ago, Bethany looked so sad when she said once again that she didn't have a swimming pool that I caved in and showed it to her. I knew it would happen, but it was worse than I was expecting. I was hounded for days, all the time by the kids wanting to go outside and swim. Meagan kept calling it the "swimming poo" (I hope we don't get any of that). She even got the box somehow, and ripped it open and dragged the pool around the house. I had to hide it in my closet so it didn't get punctured before they even used it.

Today it got into the lower 80's. My mom's rule growing up was that it had to be at least 80 degrees before we could swim. Quick side story--one day I really wanted to go swimming, but it wasn't hot enough yet. So I lit a match and held it up next to the thermometer outside our kitchen window to make it seem hotter outside than it really was, and then called my mom to come look at it, so we could swim. Somehow she didn't really believe that it was 120 degrees outside. Go figure. Anyway, I decided to set up the pool. I even had the perfect time to do it--while Bethany was at school and Meagan was napping. I got it all inflated and partially filled with no one whining at me, or running around crying because the water's not on yet, blah, blah, blah. It was great. All I had to do was pick up Bethany, get them in their swimming suits and sunscreen on, and let them go.

I only partly filled the swimming pool because Bethany likes playing with the hose, so I turned that back on and watched them play. They both have a hard time keeping water in the bathtub at bathtime, so I told them that outside it was okay to splash as much as they wanted. That prompted Bethany to start stomping up and down in the pool, and then jumping in and splashing. They also ran back and forth from the sandbox and added lots of toys to the pool.

In past years, Meagan's never really liked the swimming pools. She's preferred to sit in my lap and just watch--I'm not really sure why. So it was good today to watch her get in and play with Bethany. Her favorite part was getting buckets of water and dumping the outside of the pool, who knows why. She also insisted I come take a picture of her foot in a puddle of water outside of the pool, because "there's water in my shoe".