Kid's Place

We decided to check out Kid's Place a few days ago with this crazy heat we have been having. It is located in the same building as The Lexington Athletic Center, located behind the Wal-Mart on Nicholasville Road near the Fayette Mall. Admission is $7.99 per child. Infant and Toddler are FREE with paying adult (Ages 1-23 months). Adult Admission is $3.00 (Ages 18 years and older). One supervising adult is free with every paying child.Adults who are not supervising a paying child must pay adult admission. But, when we went with two adults and one toddler, it cost $7.99. So, they didn't charge for the second adult. They do have specials on their website (including buy one get one free admission on Tuesdays). So, I think it is a bit pricey, but not too bad for a something special to do. NOTE: Don't forget socks for your kiddos, they need them to play here.

Inside, they have an arcade area, a large area of tables for eating (you cannot bring in your own food, but I didn't have a problem bringing a small snack for my son), and a large climbing area. They also have lockers that cost $0.25 or a token. The climbing area is broken down into a toddler area and an older area. The toddler area consisted of a climber, some plastic blocks they could build with, a smaller climbing area with a slide into a ball pit and a smaller jump area.

My son had a hard time with the climbing area this time, but I think he was just a bit scared of it. Most of the climbing areas seem to be net-like and I just don't think he has climbed much on that. But, he loved the ball pit and the jumping area. And, there weren't any other small kids in that area, so he had it to himself. This is the only ball area that I saw, so some bigger kids did get into it a few times, but it is pretty small so they moved on.

The larger area for climbing is pretty huge and looks like it would be super fun. There are a ton of climbing areas, slides, tubes, a rock wall to climb and a large jumping area. It is also many levels, which looked like a lot of fun. We used a bit of the bigger kid area and found it to be really fun. There are a lot of places to climb and things to walk across. But, there are some areas that are falling apart a bit and held together with zip ties. So, it looks like some areas could use some maintenance. There are a ton of seating areas around the kids area so you can sit and watch them play. But, the toddler area is a bit tucked away, so it might be tough to keep an eye on both a younger kid and older kid.

Overall, things seemed fairly well kept. Yes, some of the balls in the pit were broken. And, some of the netting was broken or fraying. And, yes, every mom worries a bit about all the crazy germs that your kid just got all over his entire body in the ball pit. But, I think that is just what comes with the turf when you go to a place like this.

The arcade is next to the climbing area. It had a decent amount of games, with most of them being the older games (Skee-ball!) and a few newer video-type games. Most of them were $0.25 per game, which I thought was really affordable. The video type games were upwards of $1.50 per play though, so that could add up if you have a kid that prefers those games. My 2 year old had a good time playing with some of the more physical games and we ended up playing for a good amount of time and only spent $4.00. You do need to get a card to play the games, but there are kiosks around so it is pretty easy. They take credit card or cash. You get tickets on your card based on how you do on the game (so no hundreds of paper tickets in your pockets), which I thought was nice. And, the toys they sold for tickets were pretty standard. One thing I thought was nice is that you could buy 400 tickets for $4.00. So, your kiddo could get a nicer toy without you spending a fortune trying to win the tickets.

We didn't get any food there, but the food seemed fairly well priced. They had good snacks for younger kids too, like animal crackers, peanut butter crackers, or string cheese for $0.99.

We had a good time and would definitely keep this place in mind the next time we need somewhere to go inside. My son had a blast and we were able to kill a few hours without spending a ton of money. And, my husband and I were able to get a little Skee-ball and basketball shooting in too, so that is what I call a pretty good day.