KidsFest San Diego

We got $ 11 per person tickets through a Groupon. I would say it was more of a $ 5 value, tops. Also, believe it should be advertised for 4 – 8 year olds. Our 8-​year old was entertained well enough, but the 11-​year old was not. Although there was some free stuff, the activities were not that interesting and, yes, seemed like an advertising venue for the vendors. «Food court» was very small and the food was not that great. I wouldn’t go back. Sorry!

Not worth it even with 50% off tickets! Just a bunch of vendors trying to promote their business. Although, some have good crafts for the kids, many don’t. The way I see it, it should be free! Also, venue is the worse ever for this event cuz. when you have a family event, you are going to have babies and it’s right in the path of airplanes. Just annoying when you have a tired/​sleepy baby who gets woken up all the time. Never going back.

This venue was wonderful. It was a wonderfully organized event that was truly child centered. The activities that were offered at each table were thoughtful and creative; allowing the kids to do something while the adults could absorb/​buy/​gain information. We all had a ball, kids and adults. I look forward to going next year — more importantly I loved that the proceeds went to charity.
Two points of suggestions for next year –1 while the location was great, space wise — plenty of square footage to do, be, areas to stretch, shade for eating, and plenty of openness for the activities; to me the constant noise of planes was bothersome.
2 MORE FOOD TRUCKS! :)
Come on people, come join the fun next year!

Entertaining for toddlers and preschoolers. Crafts are mostly provided by vendors, quality varies dramatically and parents will be hit up for the sale while your child is coloring. They really need to supervise or set standards for the quality of crafts — $ 80 for a family of four is too much to charge when activities are simplistic and unimaginative (play dough, Legos, blocks, painting). Get on Pinterest and get inspired, you can do this at home for much cheaper!

Thought this may be an interesting thing to do today. Then I looked more closely. $ 20 per ticket for folks over 2 years old. Plus a $ 2 fee to purchase online. So, a family of four pays $ 88 to go. Well, I’m not going because frankly that’s way too expensive for a collection of small activities in a public space. Plus, the photos I see online from prior years here on Unilocal shows activities using Ikea toys. Really?
Not sure who’s running the math for this event but they should check out comparable kids activities in San Diego before setting prices. Case in point, one year unlimited admission to the New Children’s Museum downtown costs less, has similar activities, is open all year long, and is great for kids.

This was our first year going and we will definitely go again. We got a 50% off coupon through spotted fox. The location is really nice. Once you are in the front gate everything is free. (well ok, not the food or souvenirs, but all activities, stations and jumpers.) we spent about 4hours here and made our way through the entire place. Our daughter is 7 and she loves pretty much everything she did. Even the crafts that she got to take home were free. They had nice tables set up where we ate the lunch we brought with us, but they did have food you could buy too.

3 stars/​4 stars, not sure which!
We bought $ 9 vouchers from a discount site before we went. I was very hesitant to spend nearly $ 30 for this but thought I’d take a chance.
Parking and traffic were no problem. We had no trouble parking close by at all.
This place is great for kids. I have no idea why they charge adults to get in because the adults are only there to watch the kids – there aren’t really any activities for adults. They should charge the $ 20 or whatever but only for the kids.
There are TONS of things for kids to do. There was the gumball area (a bunch of brightly colored, different sized balls). There was a «messy» area where they had all kinds of different sensory things for the kids to play with from green-​dyed spaghetti to corn starch with water (which makes a solid/​liquid which is very interesting). There were lots of vendors and nearly all of them had either a small giveaway (by spinning a wheel) or something for the kids to do (like make a foam bracelet, string macaroni beads to make a necklace, bounce on a small trampoline, make sidewalk chalk). Don’t get excited about the «swag» box because it isn’t anything great.
Bring along hand wipes and sanitizer because there aren’t any sinks except near the potty area. Most places did have hand wipes on-​hand which was nice. We went early on Saturday so I don’t know if they’d have any left by late Sunday or not.
There were a few food trucks on-​hand for food. There was also seating but only in the sun (we moved some chairs into the shade so that was nice).
My son is 3 ½ and I was concerned he wouldn’t be able to do everything but he definitely could. I think the upper age on this for fun would be around 5 or 6. I think expecting a 10 year old (stated as max in the target age range) to like this would be pushing it.
Haven’t decided if I’d spend another $ 30 to do this again (I’ll figure it out next year when the time comes). It was fun but I’m not sure it was worth the money. There is no way I’d spend the «tickets at the door» price of $ 19/​each which would be nearly $ 60 for our family (we only have the 1 kid). That is way too expensive for the value in my opinion. Your kids would probably have more fun at the fair for much less money.

We decided to attend KidsFest after taking advantage of a recent Groupon for the event. The website advertises «over 100,000 square feet of activities designed to stimulate and celebrate the imagination.»
There were dozens of stations where kids could do all sorts of projects and crafts, or just play around and have fun. My son is only one year old and therefore was not able to participate in a lot of the crafts, but he was able to «paint» a picture in the Messy Zone using some paint-​covered marbles (and get pretty messy in the process!). He also goofed off for hours with some musical instruments and the «gumballs» in Gumball Alley.
Overall a really fun experience. It would have been nicer if more of the craft stations had projects that were geared towards toddlers, but my son was still thoroughly entertained and had a lot of creative, wholesome fun.

I just checked out this event with my 3 kids. yes it sounded expensive BUT IT WAS SO WORTH IT!!! really a great way to spend the weekend and not have to worry about the kids.

The only reason we went was because I scored Groupon tickets that saved us 75% off the entry fee. BUT IT WAS SO GREAT, I would have paid the full price!!! Seriously. They had sooo many stations set up doing so many cool things for the kids… drum circles, painting, messy crafts, potting plants, face painting, bubble blowing, dancing, dressing up, construction zones… it just went on and on.
At each of these stations, the kids would get to make something AND KEEP IT TO TAKE HOME. FOR FREE. We came home with balloons, stuffed animals, a potted plant that the kids painted and planted, flags, frisbees, and we did pay $ 6.50 for a couple of really cool watering cans for the girls to play with.
PLUS, they had a big stage in front of a beautiful pond they filled with plastic duckies, and they had live bands, ballerinas, the kids loved it.
They had food stations, and while those weren’t free, they were reasonable ($ 3 hotdogs, $ 1 water bottles, etc.).
The bulk of the event was set up in the grassy areas, so it was like a giant picnic area. Really nice for our short legged family members, since the festival is for them!
I think they have the right idea, charging $ 15 a head at the door, then making all the stuff inside free. It makes it a MUCH MUCH more pleasant experience inside the festival, to not have to stand in line for five-​ten minutes, just to have to pull out your wallet. Also, I am sure that it cuts down on the unmanageable crowd aspect. If it were free at the door and each booth charged, then the place would be mobbed by window shoppers and it would kill the experience.
I plan to go to this event every time they have it! We’ve only been to the first of the two-​day event. We’re going back tomorrow and plan to bring a picnic with us. Weeeee!!!