What a busy day Seamus and I had yesterday! John’s at Boy Scout camp this week, so it was just the two of us, and we packed a whole weekend’s worth of stuff into one day.

First there was an early morning ball game, in which Seamus got a piece of it, and was batted in. That boy’s turning into a base-stealing fool, I tell you what!

After a quick trip home to change out of cleats, we went back out that way to work on the trailer for a while. Seamus is old enough to be a help now, so I set him to painting molding and he did a fine job of it. He also was my lovely assistant when it came to woodcutting, holding up the back end of the plywood just fine.

It was after lunch by the time we finally knocked off, and something had been kicking around in my head for a while, so I proposed it (after checking with Marv that he didn’t care if I destroyed a chunk of the lawn at my house.)

“How would you like a pool, son?”

Would he ever! I’d seen those big frame above-ground pools at Costco earlier in the week for a really good price, and why not? He’s finally old enough to trust around water without hovering right at the edge, and it’ll give the kids something to do which is not lazing around the house all summer.

So we went and got it. It was so heavy that I had to open the box in the bed of the truck and wheelbarrow some of the components back into the yard individually. He wanted to swim right now but was good about understanding that there’d be some work to do.

First, we had to pick the spot. We outlined it with the hose and spent some time dragging over buckets of dirt to fill in holes that various dogs have dug over the years. The site didn’t have to be perfectly flat, but a deep hole in the bottom would be a problem with the liner. He was a very good sport about that.

Then it was on to laying out the tarp and the pool liner. That was the heaviest piece; I could barely lift it, and once it was unfolded, it was extremely awkward. The gods of summer smiled down upon us though, and when we opened it up, the holes for the pump were exactly where they needed to be.

All of that was hot work, on a 95-degree afternoon. We took lots of breaks.

Then on to the assembly line work of installing the frame. Around and around we went, doing each step in its turn, except that one step which we forgot and had to go back to this morning. No biggie.

By then, I was pooped, and stinky and sweaty. We’d done physical hard work outside for eight straight hours, which is a lot to ask of a nine-year-old. We came in and showered, and ran off to see Pirates, mostly because I’d already bought the tickets online. It was a long day!

The next morning though, he was raring to go again. We got out there early and put the ladder and pump together, and started with the water. Hooray!

Of course, the water’s not running fast enough to satisfy the kid, but he’s out there playing in it right now anyway. I won’t worry about chlorinating it until I get it full. Surely I’m capable of chlorinating a pool, right? I do, after all, disinfect drinking water on a regular basis, and the parameters are much stricter for that.

The best part came at the end of the hard work yesterday. Seamus turned to me and said, “This was way funner than watching TV, Mom!”

I have to agree. It was, and will continue to be for the rest of the summer. Won’t his brother be surprised!