**UPDATE 2/16/17** The Pikes Peak Children’s Museum no longer rents space from the Space Foundation Discovery Center.**

The Space Foundation Discovery Center is a museum on Colorado Springs’s west side that is dedicated to space, technology, and engineering. This museum also contains the Pikes Peak Children’s Museum which takes up a large corner of the Discovery Center.

The Space Foundation Discovery Center was on our Colorado Bucket List 2017. We went on a cold day in January when our outside options were limited.

We were the first ones there when they opened and the staff was very friendly and showed my older 2 boys how to do the scavenger hunt. There is a full size space suit right at the beginning of the museum which I thought was fascinating.

Almost immediately the  corner that contains the Pikes Peak Children’s Museum caught my boys’ eyes. They rotate their exhibits approximately every 2 months and we were there right at the end of their Little Builders Exhibit. The Pikes Peak Children’s Museum was opened in October 2015 and admission is included in price when you visit the Space Foundation Discovery Center.

The Discovery Center exhibits include a small model lunar module, interactive exhibits to include making a space station and putting space clothes on wooden people, has an exhibit on space food (my 4 yo was very fascinated with the video of the floating food in outer space), a mars robotic lab, Science on a Sphere, Mars Viking Lander, scale model rockets, Huygens probe, and different moon exploration exhibits. There were also various arts and crafts stations available.

Our overall impressions of the Space Discovery Center:

• The Pikes Peak Children’s Museum is what saved the morning for our 2 younger boys (ages 4 and 21 months). If it wasn’t for this super interactive exhibit they both would have been bored to tears.
• The Mars rover was a lot of fun for the 2 older boys- they had control over a remote control car that was exploring ‘Mars.’
• The giant sphere (Science on a Sphere) was pretty cool- even the baby was mesmerized by the different maps that were projected onto the screen.
• This is a great museum for young space enthusiasts. There’s a lot to read to help learn about the different items on display.
• If you homeschool, they offer a ton of resources and activities.

Boys’ ages at time of visit: 5, 4, and 21 months.

Location: 4425 Arrowswest Drive, Colorado Springs, CO 80907
Website and Price: discoverspace.org