Girl Scouts Tour the Fire Station

The Daisy petal Miss E's group is working on this month is "respect for authority" so for the meeting, they all came to tour Peter's fire station. This was a big deal to Miss E. It's the first time any of her Kindergarten friends got to come to the station and she helped Peter lead them around. Most of these girls had never been to a fire station before and Peter gave an excellent tour.

Miss E helped him get dressed and put on his pack. They do this every tour to help kids learn what a firefighter in full gear looks and sounds like. Kids have hidden in fires before because they are scared of the firefighters coming to look for them. And it does look kind of scary. When he has all his gear on, his mask on, the air going and all the beeping and hissing noises that come with it, you almost wouldn't recognize him as a human in a dark smokey environment. After he gets dressed he always has the kids come up to touch him, give him a high five or something just so they see that it's still him under there. This doesn't seem like it would be a big deal but up until about the age of 4 or 5, one or two kids always cries during this part of the tour, and even in this group there was one girl who would not go anywhere near him.

Miss E was also his medical model, showing how the pulse oximeter worked and getting hooked up to the heart rate monitor. Then they got to spray the hose and knock down some cones. It was a really fun tour. The kids are old enough to ask questions and really want to learn a bit about the fire station and what life is like there. When Peter explained his 24 hour schedule one of the girls raised her hand and very worriedly asked "do you ever get to go home? To see your family?". He assured her that yes, of course, he did get to go home (sometimes!) and see us.
Afterward Mr. T got to choose a treat since he (once again) was getting dragged around on one of Miss E's things and he picked doughnuts. So doughnuts it was and then we all laid around the rest of the day with the exception of a bought of street hockey because, as Peter put it, we really need more games where the kids play in the street.

This was Peter's one day off in 4 - he just worked a 48 and tomorrow he goes back for his regular shift and it ended up being a lovely low key family day.