How I Spent My Day Off

As coordinator our 1st big Safety Expo I have been a tad stressed the last month. We had six bikes, a huge box full of bags of candy, pumpkins, home made cup cakes & brownies and other little things donated to give away. I had volunteers all lined up to do face painting, man four buses and other various displays. Some of these volunteers were from a neighboring district that work with us on the Training Team and that bus was coming too. The local boy scouts were coming to help and we were expecting two fire departments, an ambulance and a snowplow. At the end of the day yesterday a small monkey wrench was thrown into our plans. Waking up to pouring rain was incredibly depressing.

This is how things looked as we were setting up.
Would anybody come on such a dreary day?

Turn out exceeded my expectations for a sunny day!
The rain let up and eventually stopped altogether.

The wheel chair bus was a huge hit. The kids
learned what it would be like to be in a wheelchair
and they got to see what a little bus looks like inside.

The smoke bus was also hugely popular. They use
a machine that generates a non-toxic white "smoke".

The kids learned how little they'd be able to see
if their bus was involved in a fire and why they
need to know where the exits are ahead of time.

Here's Mike evacuating out the back.
Doesn't he look tiny on the bumper?
We also taught the kids that they need to sit
and slide rather than jump.

The monkey wrench I mentioned?
The band was having their big show and the visiting
bands needed to warm up and practice at our location.
Things worked out and we ended up with extra
entertainment as a bonus!

The kids loved see the big plow and and all of the
firetrucks. They brought one more truck than I
expected which was great. They talked to the kids
about safety and let them climb all over their trucks.They
also let them play with the air horns so things were
a bit loud for awhile between the bands and the horns!

I was very excited to see the Training Team bus.
This was the first time I'd seen it since it was repainted.

It turned more than a few heads,
especially those from the visiting bands
that didn't know about it.

Here are Mike and Alex looking out the roof
hatch with Sparky the Fire Dog.

Nikki and Liz were there too.
Weren't their costumes great!
I didn't recognize Nikki when she 1st came up to me.

Of course there some glitches. We had to send out for more candy because turn-out was so much higher than expected. There were some things we will do differently next year. Many things went perfectly. We have lots of ideas and I'm certain that this will become an annual event!