Family Fun Day

Do you live in the Capital Region? Do you have young kids?

If you answered “yes” to both of those questions then you must have been WMHT’s Family Fun Day last Saturday—because I think every kid in the Albany area was there!

WMHT recently cut the ribbon on its new $20 million studio at the Rensselaer Technology Park in North Greenbush. The Family Fun Day was one of the ways they were marking the occasion. There were activities and chances to meet a few characters from some of the PBS Kids shows.

So we made the 30 minute drive to the other side of the Hudson River only to be greeted with a line of Disney World proportions! Basically, we wound up standing in line for 90 minutes so the kids could get their picture taken with Clifford the Big Red Dog.

Ord from “Dragon Tales” was there too. But there was a separate line for him, and we weren’t about to get back in line.

But there were some other activities. There were some arts & crafts tables and the kids got to jump around in front of a green chroma key wall and see themselves on TV. They also got some temporary “Jakers!” tattoos slapped on the back of their hands.

They also got to see the Noo-noo from “Teletubbies.” Thomas was excited to see him (he’s some kind of robot vacuum cleaner thing—I don’t know, I’ve somehow managed to avoid seeing a lot of that show) from a distance, but not so much up close. Kids are funny that way.

The place was an absolute mob scene. I couldn’t believe how many people were there. The woman dishing out the tattoos (in the parking lot to keep the kids occupied while waiting on line) admitted they were getting more people than anticipated.

But as crazy as it was, the kids say they had a good time. And as always, that’s what matters.