Fire Hose Fun!

During your 3rd grade year at this school, the kids participate in a Fire Safety program where a group of firefighters come to school and teach various fire safety lessons to the kids. Early in the school year, Kayli and I had to complete (I had to draw it!) a detailed blueprint of our house, marking all the smoke detectors, doors, windows, and two potential exits from each room in the house. We had to identify the meeting spot, where we would meet if our house was on fire and we both made our way out of the house, and needed to find each other. I had to initial every marked smoke detector, indicating that we had checked it's batteries and made sure it was working. We read facts, and completed multiple choice answers about common starting points for fires, and common causes of fires, etc. Kayli ALWAYS unplugs the toaster after toasting her waffle in the morning! We don't want to be in the "club" of small appliance fire victims! Anyway, apparently it is traditional that the end of the school year culminates with a special visit from these firefighters, where they host a water bucket relay and fire hose spraying party for all the 3rd graders. I made sure to be outside when the fun began. It was a hot day, in the 80s, afternoon, around 2:30, and there were many little feet hopping around the hot blacktop while waiting for the firefighters to arrive...

They were late, (I was on a tight schedule today and was planning to take Kayli straight from this activity to another building where I had to attend a speech inservice starting at 3:30!) Well, they came, and immediately began the bucket relay, two long lines of kids, passing large cups of water down the line to see which line could get their large bucket filled up first...

 Kayli's group won!

Then, the firefighters told the few adults that were nearby to head for the "high road" as they were getting ready to turn on the fire hose on the kids on the playground. I hadn't seen Kayli's teacher out here yet, but how funny was it when I turned to see her walking around the corner of the building onto the playground right as the firefighters turned on the giant hose and aimed it at the playground! Mrs. M. went running, and all the kids ran in the same direction, screaming and squealing with glee!!!

Once Mrs. M was safely under the eaves of the school building, the kids were back out in the middle of the black top running amuck as the water from the hose went from mild to wild! I watched as one minute the water was a fine sprinkling over the kids' heads

 then suddenly it would become a force so strong that it literally knocked kids off their feet!!!

I was thinking, seriously, this is so typical of these "firefighter grown up boys" playing with a fire hose! They were getting a little carried away. I kept thinking of my feather weight child and a few of her tiny friends, and hoping they didn't get in the path of those maniac hose wielding firefighters! I saw a few children slink off the playground holding or "dragging" a limb. Well, Kayli was having a ball right up to the end...

then, right as the waterspray ended, I looked at my watch and realized that we needed to leave if I was going to make it to my meeting on time. I headed over to the spot that Kayli was standing on the playground to find that she was limping and crying and holding her arm, and one firefighter was checking her over, then her teacher began twisting and turning her arm and leg, and it didn't appear that there was any blood, and I think they were both relieved when I appeared to take her away, and what happened was that in the midst of the pandemonium, somebody pushed Kayli down (or maybe it was the hose) and she skidded across the blacktop (why didn't they do this in the grass???) and because she was wet, we couldn't see blood until I got her inside and realized she had basically cheese-sliced a layer of skin off one arm and now it was bleeding. I was rushing her through the building saying "I am so sorry you got hurt but we've got to keep going because I have a meeting to get to!" I brought her in my room and helped her get out of her wet suit and into a dress and wouldn't you know, it's the end of the school year and being so efficient as I am, I have already taken my first aid kit back to the school nurse for the year, so no bandaids in here!!! The clock is ticking, Kayli is still wimpering, and I am dragging all my bags, Kayli's backpack, and Kayli down the hall so we can get the heck out of here before the dismissal crowd shows up, and so we can get to this "blankety blank" meeting on time! On my way past the kindergarten, I pop my head in the door and ask Mrs. R if she has a few bandaids to spare. Yep, she hands them to me, I hand them to Kayli, who is holding a kleenex on her arm. We get in the car, Kayli gets the bandaids in place while I drive to the meeting, we arrive just 5 minutes late, we are greeted with a few familiar faces, a fruit and veggie "buffet", and less than half the speech staff shows up for this meeting! What the? Well, Kayli was happy with the strawberries and grapes, and an opportunity to play Minecraft on her IPAD while I completed my last inservice of the school year!