Kids can build a fun day at the Iowa City Home Show

Although the Iowa City Home Show is designed for adults to find new products and ideas for their homes, kids are certainly welcome, too.

Tumbling

The Home Show will host a KidZone in the lobby just outside the exhibit hall at the Coralville Marriott. Show hours are Friday, March 7, 5 to 9 p.m., Saturday, March 8, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sunday, March 9, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Kids, accompanied by their parents and grandparents, can learn some new gymnastic moves from the staff at the Iowa Gym-Nest. “They'll have their mobile tumbling center there,” says Lucy Hershberger from Forever Green Landscaping and Garden Center in North Liberty and one of the KidZone organizers.

Planting

Thinking of spring, the staff from Frog Hollow Kids Campus, a daycare, preschool and before/after school program in North Liberty, will help kids do a planting project in the KidZone. “We'll provide the soil, the cups and the plants. Then they'll have a plant in a clear plastic cup to take home and watch the roots develop, which is fun for kids and parents,” Hershberger says.

The KidZone will be open during the entire Home Show, Friday through Sunday, but kids do need to be supervised.

Watch the ducklings

Another fun activity, for both kids and adults, will be at the Forever Green booth in the exhibit hall. “We're going to have ducklings in a little pond,” Hershberger says. “We did this last year and it was such a hit we decided to do it again. They were just a ball, cute as can be. It's fun to watch them swim around.”

See a playhouse being built (and maybe win it)

Students from Clear Creek Amana High School who are part of Kirkwood's Architecture, Construction and Engineering (ACE) Academy will build a playhouse at the Home Show that will be given away later this spring after the Parade of Homes. Materials for the playhouse are being donated by BCI Lumber Company and McCreedy-Ruth Construction. Families can watch the construction in progress and dream about having the playhouse in their own backyard. Come and learn more about the ACE Academy and different career fields available to high school students.