Exhausting Relaxation

So my daughter and I spent a few hours in the pool with the kids the other afternoon.  We have quite an assortment of items for use in the pool; your plain old noodles, some air mattresses, a chair, some wave boards, and some aqua riders.  All pretty cool and all designed to allow you hours of relaxation and fun. 

Well, I don't know about the relaxation.  Let's start with the noodles.  Those aren't to bad at all.  Sit on one like a chair, put one behind your neck and one under your knees and float.  Simple and relaxing; I can spend hours just floating in the pool. 

Now the aqua riders.  These are pretty cool.  They are over sized noodles with a head and tail attached to them and a seat.  We have a sea horse and an alligator one.  Pretty cool and something we absolutely had to have considering that we used our small regular noodles as sea horses and gave them names and had sea horse races.  Now we have an actual sea horse to ride.  Her name is Pumpkin Pie (I think - it might be Precious Pie).  We also have an alligator named Gator Boy.  This alligator lurks under the water and sneaks up on you and starts to attack much as a regular alligator does.  You have to fight him off. 

Then the air mattresses.  We have these because of Remington.  He thought it would be a good idea to have so he bought a couple.  What he told me was that now when we have company at Thanksgiving or Christmas and people have to give up their beds, Chris and Amanda will always have a place to sleep - they can use the air mattresses and sleep in the pool.  His thinking was that he would not have to give up the sofa that he claims as his bed when he spends the night. 

Now air mattresses are pretty relaxing - once you get on them.  That's the key - getting on them.  Not much of an issue for most people but if you are short that's another story.  You try to pull yourself up but quite frankly - the mattresses are already at my armpits when I try to pull myself up. Most people are taller and they can actually reach all the way across the air mattress thus giving them more leverage when they go to pull themselves up.

Then the wave boards.  These are Styrofoam boards.  Sounds pretty cool but believe me, they are almost impossible to get on.  Trying to get them under water is hard enough - they are designed to float.  Once you finally manage to get them under water and try to sit on them be careful.  One little tip or lean the wrong way and zoom!  They are flying out from underneath you.  If you do manage to actually get these boards all the way underneath your feet all you can do is stand on them - they won't float with you.  And again, don't get off-balance or again zoom!  They are flying out from underneath you. 

Now factor in some Marco Polo with the kids.  Are you getting the idea?  OK - now add in this, too.  My grand kids like to use me for a surfboard.  They stand on my back and I go under water and they 'surf'. 

So, with all the fun floating toys we have - my daughter and I found our relaxing afternoon in the pool to be kinda exhausting.  But we would still do it again -- in fact I did all weekend long with the kids - Friday- Saturday and Sunday!