The Williamsburg Fire Station

A few weeks ago I made an appointment for our mom group to visit the Williamsburg fire station. This past Friday was the day of our tour. We had a smaller group that I had anticipated because I arranged for the tour over William and Mary's spring break thinking that it would be fun for the dads to join us. I didn't realize how many people would be out of town. (Hope everyone who went on a trip had a blast.) Jared was pretty sure he'd be the only guy who showed up, but there were 4 dads who came. And who spent a big chunk of the time gabbing about March Madness.

This is Luke waiting for everyone to arrive. The kitchen, where we met and watched the presentation, was adjacent to a mini showroom with an old fashioned fire truck. Luke tried every way he could think of to break in and get to the "siren."

We had a pretty good turnout, and I was glad some of our friends that we haven't hung out with much before were able to come.

Our tour started with a short presentation on house safety. Firefighter Nicole talked about toys vs. tools. We can play with toys, but we don't play with tools.

This was the funniest one. Firefighter Nicole was explaining that scissors are a tool and are only for Mommy and Daddy. My friend Stacy was sitting next to me and sheepishly whispered to me that she had let her son Tucker play with scissors just that morning.

Then the firefighters talked very briefly about fire safety. They showed a smoke alarm and explained that it beeps if there is smoke in the house. They said that we get down and crawl on the floor if we see smoke or hear the smoke alarm. The kids practiced crawling under the smoke. (The blanket was the smoke.)

Luke was too scared to crawl under it.

One of the firefighters dressed up in all of his gear to show the kids. He said they could come touch the gloves and give him a high five. Ila wanted a hug.

And then we got to go into the garage to see the fire trucks, ambulance, and EMT trucks.

You might be wondering, "Where did all the kids go? Why is Luke alone?"

Well, the point of going to the fire station was to see the FIRE TRUCK. So that's where all the other kids are.

Luke had different plans. I need to provide a little background for it all to make sense. You all know about his obsessions with garbage cans, fans, air conditioners, and stereos. His newest addition to the list is Fords. When we drive down the road he always asks, "Where's the oval SUV?" (Ford Explorers and Expeditions are his FAVORITE vehicles, especially if they are blue.) If he sees a Ford in a parking lot he will try to run over to it which is NOT a good thing. He wants to get right up to it and stare at the Ford logo and then look at every single wheel.

Well, it turns out that the EMT trucks are Fords. So that was the ONLY thing Luke was interested in. He really, REALLY wanted to get inside one of those trucks.

Luckily for him one of the Firefighters let him climb in and "drive." He was in heaven!

Even though I should have expected Luke would do his own thing, I was a little bit annoyed that he wouldn't go in the fire truck. The whole reason I put the day together was so Luke could see inside a "siren!" So I made Jared wrestle him into the truck.

He really didn't want to go!

But once Jared got him inside Luke decided it was pretty cool, and he climbed in and out a few times.

But then

back to the Ford!

Micah slept the entire time we were at the station, so he never even made it out of his car seat to make an appearance. It wasn't surprising that he slept the whole morning because he didn't sleep at all Thursday night. I don't know what was wrong, but about 7 pm Thurs. night he got very fussy, and it escalated to screaming if he wasn't being held and rocked. Jared and I took turns staying up with him. By 6 am I was ready to take Micah to the ER, but then around 7:30 he just stopped screaming, started smiling, and became his normal joyful self. He slept a lot Friday, but other than that you'd never know anything had been wrong. We still don't know what caused it. We're sure glad he's feeling better!

It was a great little outing, and all the firefighters did a good job with the kids. They let us take our time looking at all the trucks and were so caring with the kids. When we were leaving each kid got a plastic firefighter hat and a fire safety coloring book with crayons.

I'm so glad we went!