RE: Regarding pH levels and liming (for plots)....
Here's a few thoughts. I am not familar with the pool test pH strips, but I assume they are similar to regular pH strips.
Yes you can use them, as long as you know that the accuracy may not be the greatest. They will get you in some general area of your pH. The full test pH strips covers the entire range of pH. Your soil if anything like what I have may be in the range of 5.0 to 7. So your pool test strips may not be adequate to measure the lower pH. If the lower limits only measure to 6.2 you may get a false high reading. More likely, the test paper will have some odd color that is not on the chart that the company provides.
Go ahead and follow their procedure or let me know and I will give you a general soil pH procedure that I use in the lab where I work. You may want to test the pH of the distilled water. Not all distilled water has similar pH. Use a one to one ratio of distilled water to soil if possible.
One more thing. Yes you are cheap, but so am I.