You can use the tabs (make sure to look at the ingredients, and make sure it's trichloro....long name, and that they don't contain copper. If they contain copper, take them back and try Lowe's, Home Depot, Academy, or your local pool store for trichlor tabs that do not contain copper. Copper stains pools, turns nails and blonde hair green, and adds major problems to your water chemistry. Use them in the floater, but don't let the kids play with the floater--I would take it out of the pool while the kids are there, because you don't want them swimming into concentrated 'pockets" of low pH-high chlorine water. The tabs are very acidic, so they will help bring your pH down some. They will also add stabilizer, which you'll need in the pool to keep the sun from consuming all of your chlorine.

What is the ingredient in the "balance"? Don't open it--I'm pretty sure you're gonna need to return it. What are the ingredients in the bottle of shock, and in the bottle of chlorine tabs in your AG kit? (Try not to open it--you probably will need to take it back, too). You can lower the pH with either Muriatic acid (but read the instructions for handling it, linked in my sig, before you get it) or dry acid (like pH down that is also sold at WalMart).

If you buy a salt system, it will cut down on a lot of the chemicals, but you'll still have to lower your pH with acid on a regular basis, and you'll still need to add the stabilizer that you need. The Intex SWCG also has a copper ionizer in it, and I've already covered the copper issue.....For the rest of this season, you should be able to get along with mainly the tabs and some bleach--and a good test kit, which is probably the most important thing you'll buy for your pool. We highly recommend the K-2006 (see the testkit link in my sig), or at the very least, check your WalMart and see if they have the hth 6-way drop kit. I would pick up the test kit, a few gallons of bleach, and return the other stuff--even the tabs, if they're the ones that contain copper.

Janet