Our vacation was very blessed and I wanted to give a review of the Focus on the Family Kid’s Korner and Discovery Emporium in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The Kid’s Korner is an adventure for children of all ages! and maybe even an adventure for adults also!

As you can tell we took our Flat Stanley with us, he will show you many special things about Kid’s Korner!

Fun For Kids

• An airplane to climb inside that has a secret passage that leads to another play area.
• An inside jungle gym for older children.
• If your family loves Adventures in Odyssey then they will enjoy seeing the familiar characters, Whit, Connie, Eugene, and eating in the Whit’s End Soda Shoppe.
• The A-Bend-A-Go Slide that is 3 stories high. This slide is for children 43.5 inches tall to 5’9″. Even my husband went on it but said it was very tight on the cork screws as he went down. There is a smaller slide in the area for children that are smaller than the height requirement for the large slide.
• A toddler foam equipment area just for children their age in a room that is separated from the other play areas from the big kids. There is a nursing room in the building, but not on the same floor as the children’s play area.
• A video area called the “Video Cave” where they were playing a Veggie Tales video. (Where the kids and I are together in the main photo above.)
• Whit’s Discovery Emporium Room was full of fun activities such as dressing up like the Adventures in Odyssey characters (our son below) and playing on a stage, a puppet show area, the photo prop stage where we placed our faces through the holes (some of our photos in the main picture above). Then, there was a small area where you could sit and read books, and rotating character blocks where you can swivel the blocks and change the person’s head, clothes, and feet.
• The Narnia Room had a neat wardrobe door to walk through that went into a room where you could see a large picture of Aslan the lion and a few trees that made it look like the first entry to the forest. This room was very small, and much less than we had expected. We were hoping to see a room filled with Narnia themed items where the children could play but it was more like a photo-op area.                                              
• 3 Scavenger Hunts were available for the children to go around the entire area and find hidden items. We saw several groups searching with smiles for the scavenger hunt items.

Great for Parents

• What we loved about the Kid’s Korner & Discovery Emporium at Focus on the Family was that it was FREE!
• We ate lunch early in the Soda Shoppe with most meals being between $3-$6 each with several options available such as a sandwich, a beef hotdog, and chicken nuggets with smiley face fries, apple slices or cookies. My husband enjoyed a large ice cream topped with a cherry and sprinkles. I had amazing flavored tea! We felt like we could eat in the Soda Shoppe because we did not pay for admission.
• Safety First! As you enter the area to go down to the children’s area you check in with an attendant and register on a computer your name and the number of adults and children with you. Then we were given a sticker to wear on your shirt through the entire visit.
• You can bring a picnic lunch and eat in the Soda Shoppe or outside at the picnic area.
• Clean restrooms. The restrooms were very nice and clean, which says a lot about a place.
• All play areas were easily accessible for adults. In other words, there were no small nooks and crannies where you could not fit if you had to chase or rescue your child. As you can see, my husband, is inside the tunnel that leads from the airplane into another area.  
• We saw 2 or 3 birthday party areas that looked as if you wanted to reserve them that it was free by the signs that were posted. One of the rooms was a fire house theme with Whit dressed up as a fireman inside.
• Hours of play time! We had not planned to spend as much time as we did there since we were still needing to travel on the day that we went. We all enjoyed it so much that we stayed longer than we had planned. There is enough to do at the Kid’s Korner to stay for several hours without getting bored.

Don’t Believe the Reviews Online

Before going for our visit I went online looking for reviews and tips about what to expect in visiting the Kid’s Korner and Discovery Emporium at Focus on the Family and found some okay reviews and lots of bad reviews from people who were opposed to Focus on the Family in general. Several people said that they felt as if they were snubbed because of their looks, that they heard music and Christian propaganda being played in the speakers, and I want to say, that we felt no such attitude and heard no music playing that day in the play area. Other reviewers seemed to be against the entire place without having ever visited, so if you read those reviews, look for other less opinionated reviews before making your choice to visit. This is a place where both Christians and non-Christians could come with no pressure whatsoever to be or do something you are not.

The Bookstore

We did also go to their bookstore and walked through some of the other hallways in the Focus on the Family building. The bookstore is very large and our kids actually listened to a story time that they were having before we went down to the kid’s area. The story time was great but the music they had the kids sing and dance to was very contemporary. They were given balloon animals and treated very kindly and respectfully, even when Tres, our 3-year-old spoke out about something that no one even understood.

The bookstore is like most Christian bookstores, you have to pick the right types of books that go with your Biblical standards.

A Personal Note and Opinion

In one of the hallways there is a history of James Dobson and his work in writing books and creating the Focus on the Family area and group. This display gave us the feeling that he was being more exalted for his work as a psychologist than his work being something that God allowed him to do for His glory.

We believe that Biblical Counseling honors God in the best way because it teaches people what God’s Word says about topics and then teaches them how to apply the Word to their lives and live for God. America’s families do need help with the attacks that Satan is placing upon the home, but they need Biblical advice, not popular psychology. These things were bothersome to our beliefs, but it did not separate that they have a great play area for children that is safe, clean, and affordable.

We would recommend that if you are in the Colorado Springs area to go by and visit the Kid’s Korner at Focus on the Family.

This would be a great stop for families on vacation and deputation. We hope that this review gives people an honest view of the children’s area at the center. We look forward to another chance to be able to visit again!