Pool Progress: Filling and Swimming!

After running all night this is what the pool looked like on Friday morning at about 8:30am. Not quite half full. It hadn't reached the steps yet.

 As you can see that didn't keep the boys from tossing in a bunch of toys!

As soon as Annabeth went down for her nap we went for a swim. It was like a zero entry type pool. JD and Hayden enjoyed it, once it's full they won't be able to touch except on the steps. When we got in Wesley could even touch in the deep end.

It was slow going. Here it was at 11:30am. We kept track of how it was filling by watching the light.

By 3:30pm or so we finally had water on the lowest step and the light was under water! We got in again. This time one of the neighbor boys joined us! When Jerry got home from work he got in too.

Annabeth enjoyed sitting on the step under the table. She won't be able to do this once it's full!

I told the boys we would wait for Dad to try the slide. So Jerry had the honors of first slide. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture.

It was quite a drop from the slide to the water, but the boys didn't mind! I should say most of the boys didn't mind. Hayden wasn't ready to try it just yet.

We were right back out there Saturday morning. I didn't take any pictures since the camera was charging but the pool still wasn't full. We swam all Saturday morning. Two of the neighbor kids and their mom joined us too.

We weren't very smart about sunscreen so we all got a little sunburned. Thankfully, the boys have swim shirts so it was mostly just faces that got red. We were more careful the rest of the weekend.

I took the photo above around 12:30pm on Saturday. The pool was almost full, the water was just reaching the tile.

Since the equipment is not running yet we used one of the hoses to keep the slide wet. After awhile we moved it to the waterfall just so we could see what it looked like. The plumbing to the waterfall and slide uses bigger pipes than our hose so it will be a bit more water than this once it's going for real.

It ended up taking a little more than 48 hours with two hoses running to fill it up. Tomorrow someone will be here to start up the equipment. Then later this week we'll have pool orientation. It will be a salt water pool once it's up and running, but for the first month while the finish cures it will just use regular chlorine. I don't know anything at all about maintaining a pool. We couldn't even figure out how to turn on the light so I expect we'll be taking lots of notes!

Pool Progress: Acid Wash and Filling

We kept an eye on the backyard all morning, but didn't see any activity. Around lunch time, Jerry finally called to make sure we were on the list for acid washing. We were. The guy was here not too long after that. I wasn't exactly sure what was going to be done during this step.

It was just one guy. He unloaded his equipment and got to work.

First he scrubbed (or polished?) the pool with this contraption. The boys thought it looked like a weed/grass trimmer.

Then came the acid wash. Wesley and I stepped outside and watched him pour it out in the deep end. It turned the water a greenish blue color as it removed a layer off the pool finish. He used a pump to reuse the chemical as he walked around with the hose.

Then he got out the pressure washer wand and started to spray.

He rinsed down the whole pool and then pumped the dirty water out. He also removed all the pop-up cleaner caps and installed the drains in the deep end.

Then it was the moment we've all been waiting for... he turned on the hose!!

One last shot of the empty pool...

This is what the floor/walls looked like after he finished. You can really see all the little colored pebbles now! You can also see one of the decorative tiles on the step. The acid wash really removed the film that was coating everything.

They couldn't wait to get in!

JD stands in the deep end. Tomorrow it will be over his head in this same spot.

Justus, Wesley, and Hayden got in their swim suits to splash around. Even Sam got in on the action. Silly dog!

Poor JD and Eli had appointments at the eye doctor so they had to stay on dry land. They got in for a bit after dinner, but it was too dark to take pictures.

The first hose was turned on about 2:45 pm. Around 3:30pm I turned on the second hose. At 7pm the water was still only in the deep end. Any guesses on what time it will be completely full??

I'm not wrapping up the Pool Progress posts just yet. I'll have more pictures to share when it's full. And, of course, I'll have to share some slide and waterfall photos. Plus we still have to have the official start up of the equipment and our pool "how-to" orientation sometime next week.

Pool Progress: Interior Finish

Woke up this morning at 6:40am to a bunch of guys already hard at work in my backyard. It freaks me out a bit to know they were out there working for quite awhile and I never even heard them!

By the time I took the first photo of the day they had already prepped the pool by covering the tile and deck with plastic. Basically the opposite areas the deck guys covered!

They strung up a bunch of ropes to hook their tools and hoses on so they didn't drag across their work area. It kind of looked like a spider web.

Once the prep work was done. The guy in the truck started to mix the finish. It was then pumped through a hose and sprayed onto the pool walls.

One guy sprayed while the others smoothed everything out. This is the final finish so they made it all even and worked carefully around the various holes for pool equipment and the tile.

Then they did it all over again with a second coat.

As it dried the color lightened up. It was a darker grey-blue color when it was still wet.

During the second layer they imbedded several small tiles along the step and bench edges. Just a little added touch to make the steps easier to see. The tile we chose is a plain, deep blue. One of the guys had to come knock on the door and ask me where the tiles were. Thankfully, I knew the tile guys hid them in the skimmer!

They used what looked like paint rollers for the final pass and then cleaned up.

Tomorrow they will be back to acid wash the interior and... START FILLING!! Unlike a plaster pool, with this type of finish we can get in right away, even as the pool is filling.

I'm curious to see how long it will take to fill up. It's 24,687 gallons and we have two hoses. It should definitely be full for swimming this weekend. Good thing, because we're supposed to have highs back up in the 100's. Maybe even 105º on Monday. I won't be complaining!

Once they acid wash it should look a little less splotchy. You will also be able to see the tile better. Even the perimeter tile has a blue haze over it right now.

The hole in the middle of the oversized (baja) step is for an umbrella. Hopefully we can find one. We actually need a couple since there is an umbrella hole in the table too. The couple stores we've checked have already been out of them for the season.

You can just barely see the orange circles where the pop-up cleaners will be. The cleaning heads will be installed when they officially start up all the equipment. We're not sure how they'll do that... scuba gear? :)

 

Here is a close up of the finish we chose. It is called "Pebble Radiance" and the color is "Kona Blue". As I mentioned before, it is not a plaster finish. It has little tiny pebbles in it that will sparkle in the water. It is a bit rougher than plaster so we'll see how our feet adjust to that. Once the water is in it should be a very pretty blue.

Next up: Acid Wash and FILLING!!!

Pool Progress: Inspection and Table Install

Tuesday, September 25th

The inspector was here today... better (a day) late than never, I guess. He was a bit more thorough this time. Mike, our superintendent, was here to talk with him while he was here. It took so much longer than the first time I was starting to get nervous. But, in the end, it was good news... we passed our final inspection!

Unfortunately, it was too late in the day to start the pool finish so that will have to wait until tomorrow. I don't know if he didn't want any further delays or what, so Mike installed our table top himself. [Interesting side note: Mike is from Milwaukee and we spent a few minutes discussing Monday night's messed up Packer game. He was so mad about it he broke his cell phone throwing it out his back door! Just want all you GB friends to know the out-of-state fans suffered too!]

The table installation was pretty straight forward. They just had to cut off the rebar that was sticking out of the post.

And then drill holes for the bolts that were pre-attached to the table. The only tricky part was the special (super strong) adhesive they use to glue it to the post only gives you a couple minutes to get the table top in place.

 They did a dry run first, then put down the adhesive and put it in place.

Except for one little chip around the umbrella hole it looks great. We'll be mentioning that. I don't think they can do anything about it at this point but maybe they can give us a credit or something.

 Here's a closer shot of the top. It's white with blue, brown, and grey speckles.

Next up: Interior Pool Finish

Pool Progress: Fence

Finally! The fence! I thought it would never get here. Actually, it got here a little bit faster than they told us originally. Just under 2 weeks. I guess it could have been longer because our pool builder uses two fencing companies and it seems one has been having issues lately. Thankfully, our fence came from the "better" company.

Before they got started, one of the guys knocked on the door to ask me if I knew where the fence should go. I refrained from saying, "Around the pool." :) The guest house porch was confusing him a bit. He got it figured out and got to work.

They spent a LONG time measuring and marking where the fence would go. Our fence has all kinds of weird angles and elevation changes so it was probably a bit more challenging than their average fence installation.

Then it was time to start digging the post holes. I was a bit surprised to see they used a manual post hold digger. It's hot and that's hard work!

In a few areas they loosened the dirt with a rotary hammer first, but all the actual posts were dug by hand.

Then they unloaded the fence and set it up for a "dry" fitting. At this point, Wesley went out back to check things out and came back in saying the fence looked terrible leaning all over the place. I reassured him that it wouldn't stay that way.

They slowly worked their way around screwing the fence pieces together and putting up supports to hold it while the cement was poured.

Once everything was level and in place, they mixed up buckets of cement and poured them into the post holes.

The gate and latch were installed. The gate is self-closing and self-latching. For safety purposes, unless it is propped open, it will shut and latch itself.

Below is a close up of the fence color. It's a speckled light brown. We wanted the fence to be a color that would blend in and not stand out.

I think we chose wisely. A darker colored fence wouldn't have looked nearly as nice.

We were a bit concerned the fence would make the pool area feel too enclosed, but the deck is big enough that it doesn't feel that way at all.

Once you're inside, the fence just blends into the landscape and the pool is the main attraction.

One last inspection and then it's time to fill 'er up!

Next up: Inspection

Update 9/24/12: Over the weekend I noticed that a couple of the posts by the guest house felt a bit loose and the gate wasn't latching correctly. The fence guys must have known about the loose posts before they left because before we could even call on Monday morning one of them was back working on them. He ended up having to anchor the posts to the cement patio. He didn't know about the latch issue, so I showed him. The post to the right of the gate had slipped down into the cement a bit too far. He was able to fix it by adding some additional cement. It seems to be working now, but I am going to keep an eye on it.