KaBOOM! Play Together Tour

How many city people play around outdoors these days?

How many city families play in a group, especially outdoors?

Enter KaBOOM! Play Together Tour “powered by Disney Parks”. Despite the name, there are no explosions involved, and nothing scary, unless seeing your spouse hopscotch would be a little frightening.

This past weekend, Anaheim’s Center Street Promenade was filled with this KaBOOM! Tour. The experience will be making its way to other locations soon (see below).

If you don’t know what KaBOOM! is, and I didn’t, here’s some official info: KaBOOM! is the national non-profit dedicated to the bold new goal of ensuring that all children, particularly the 16 million American children living in poverty, get the balanced and active play they need to thrive. KaBOOM! has been a powerful champion for play since its founding in 1996, working with partners to build, improve and open more than 15,000 playgrounds, engage more than 1,000,000 volunteers and serve more than 6,600,000 children. KaBOOM! creates and catalyzes great places to play, inspires, empowers and leads play advocates, and educates and elevates the societal conversation about the importance of play in children’s lives. For more information, visit kaboom.org/act or follow the conversation on why #playmatters at twitter.com/kaboom or facebook.com/kaboom.

We parked for free and arrived on the scene:

a middle-aged father who sits in an office much of the time
a beautiful, slim mother whose body has been toned by dystonia (involuntary contractions of voluntary muscles) but was using a walker
a strong-willed 7-year-old daughter
a strong-willed almost-5-year-old son

The place was well-staffed with lots of friendly people wearing Disney VoluntEARS shirts. Radio Disney provided music, sponsorship info, and commentary.

Commentary? Why yes, commentary. KaBOOM! in general and this experience are designed to “encourage meaningful connections between children and the influential adults in their lives” and it “underscores value of quality family time in child’s success”.

So if you do make it to this traveling experience, you are encouraged, if you’re so inclined, to dress as a team, but dress to be active.

We arrived with the free tickets we printed out at home (you can also carry them in digital form), signed in, and signed wavers (there is photography involved). We each got a free Disneyfied water bottle. We got wristbands. Somewhere along the way we even got a card with what amounts to parenting advice for dummies (“Be warm by smiling and laughing with your child.” – Uh, OK. Maybe it sounds better in a fortune cookie).

Next was a stop under a canopy to make our team flag.

The flag receives ink stamps at the completion of each activity.

First up was building a tunnel from soft foam building pieces, with the goal of each member of the team being able to make it through the tunnel.

Then it was off to hopscotch, where each member of the team was to make the noise of the animal depicted as they reached that spot.

Next was putting together a puzzle together.

After that came rolling a giant beach ball through a course without knocking over the cones.

Finally, there we helped to raise our flag up a flagpole, and posed for a complimentary team picture.

We did these things without racing another team, and at a low-pressure pace.

My kids, like many others, weren’t ready to leave yet. Fortunately, there was a “free play” area where they could construct things out of the big, soft, foamy building blocks for as long as their parents were willing to be there.

There wasn’t a hard or soft sell of anything. The local businesses were offering specials, however. In addition to publicity, it seems the only benefit Disney or KaBOOM! is getting from this is contact information.

I appreciated the generally relaxed atmosphere. Someone might hear “Disney Parks” and “Imagineering” and might think of something more sophisticated or slick, but considering it was free, it was a nice family outing. It isn’t something I’d tell people to travel an hour out of their way to see, but it was nice enough that I would encourage families with school-aged kids who live within a short drive to reserve a time online and try it out.

Here is the rest of the tour:

Sacramento - location TBC - Wednesday, August 20 San Francisco - Marina Middle School - Saturday/Sunday, August 23-24 Chicago, Lincoln Park, Grove 2 - Saturday/Sunday, August 30-31 Atlanta, Old 4th Ward Skate Park - Saturday/Sunday, September 6-7 Kissimmee, Mill Run Park - Saturday/Sunday, September 13-14