Rescue Heroes -5yr- Fire Station Visit

My son just turned 5 and he was desperate for a Rescue Heroes themed party.  Here is what we did for him:    Rescue Heroes invitations can be downloaded as a pdf file for free at the Fisher-Price website.  We printed these out at home.  They are very cute and they got the kids thinking like the party was a rescue mission!  

We had everyone meet at our local fire station.  We called about a month ahead of time to the fire station and arranged for a tour.  The tour was free.  Two firefighters showed the kids all around the fire station and let them sit in the trucks.  At the end of the tour, they gave each kid a plastic hat, a badge, a sticker and a coloring book.   

From the fire station, we went back to our house.  It was a hot, sunny day (end of August in Kansas usually is).  We greeted everyone at the front yard and led them into the backyard.  We had already set up the backyard with an inflatable kiddie pool shaped like a fireboat, so the kids could cool off.  They had fun splashing around and playing pretend with the boat.  We also let them spray the garden hose (not on full strength).   

We played two games.  First, I had cut and painted a large piece of red cardboard (found at a teachers supply shop) to look like flames.  We nailed it to a tree.  We had water balloons available and we started yelling, "the tree is on fire!" and so on.  The kids spent about 45 minutes hurling water balloons at the tree.  Eventually the cardboard got soggy and the paint ran so the fire was out. 

Then everyone got a "hero" medal we found at a party store with military-themed stuff.  Second, we painted a large police car on another piece of cardboard and painted a separate piece to look like the car's roof lights.  We played "pin the lights on the police car."  Not as much fun as the water balloons, but good for about 10 or 15 minutes.   

We did a craft where the kids made Rescue Communicators.  I found foam blocks at Hobby Lobby and covered them in aluminum foil.  The kids stuck pipecleaners in for the antennas, and we had a variety of stickers for them to decorate their communicators.  These turned out to be easy to make and the kids really got into the project. 

They also played rescue heroes with them, pretending to radio each other about emergenices.    Finally, we had cupcakes.  We found small plastic firefighters and policemen at a party store for about 50 cents each, and these guys went on top of the cupcakes. 

Additional party favors were a real grownup flashlight for each kid (about $2 apiece, including the batteries) and Rescue Heroes fruit snacks.    The kids and parents all had a great time.  My son was thrilled!  This party was very easy to do, very simple, and very inexpensive.  Supplies for everything, including the craft, the games, the cupcakes, and the party favors cost about $50 to $60 for 10 kids.