We recently received the following question and I thought some of you might be curious about the answer. I have edited it here to hide personal details:

Hello-
my daughter  has attended several of your mom’s morning outs.  She (and I) have really enjoyed them.   I booked them through Pearachute and noticed that the most recent ones have changed the age to 2.5 years.   I wondered if this was an error or if you had really changed the accepting age? I also noticed that you had decreased the number allowed and was curious if this was an error? 
Thank you
Mom

Dear Mom:
Thanks for reaching out with your questions. Pearachute is a great resource for us to fill in our class vacancies and reach new customers and I'm glad you found MoBu Kids that way.  However, we only receive 50% of the price of the class. Our contract with them specifies that they will pay us half of what we charge for a walk in customer.  As a small business,  we cannot afford to offer more than a couple spots via Pearachute and other similar services. It's unfortunate,  but we are a business and there are expenses. 

As to the age change, we have many younger children enrolled that need a higher staff to child ratio. As we are filling in empty spots, we are looking for older children to balance the numbers. 

You are always welcome to register your child directly through us. You can use our parent portal at https://app.iclasspro.com/parentportal/mobukids/camps?camptype=2 and use the code "save10" for 10% off the regular price. Our MDO list for the entire summer is there and many are nearing capacity. Additionally,  in the fall we plan to offer MDO weekly as a class of 8 sessions. It will allow the children to bond as a playgroup and for parents to make plans weeks ahead of time. 

I'm sorry I'm not able to accommodate you through pearachute at this time, but you are welcome to keep checking back as we see how many slots we have remaining as we get closer to the event. 

Best wishes,

Jill
Owner, MoBu Kids 

Summer hasn't even begun and we have so many things going on at MoBu Kids!

First off, the camps that you know and love are back but you may notice that we have a slimmed down schedule this year. We have had many requests for Moms Day Out to continue through the summer months. It has become one of our most popular classes. In response to that, we say LET'S DO IT! Our summer schedule will alternate between weeks of camp and weeks with a Moms Day Out and lots of Open Play. You will also notice that we have weekend Moms Day Out scheduled! We are trying it on two Sundays and one Saturday this summer. If you like it, we will keep it on the schedule this coming fall and winter.

One more change coming to our summer schedule is our Saturday  Parent's Night Outs starting at an earlier time. You asked for a 5:30 pm start time, so we have it on the schedule in June, July, and August. 

​Our summer mini-sessions are back this year. Four weeks of classes with unlimited Open Play during the month. 
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We are excited to see you back at MoBu Kids!

Jill

Hi friends,
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We have adjusted our hours this spring and will be closing at 5:00 PM on weeknights. As a working mom, it was hard to make the decision as I fear it makes MoBu less accessible to families. However, with the onset of warmer weather and more daylight, there was considerably less demand for evenings at MoBu. We will revisit the issue as the year progresses. As always, let us know what we can do to improve your experience at MoBu Kids!

Jill

Hi friends - 

I am happy and sad to report that Miss Morgan is leaving MoBu Kids to go back to school to finish her degree. I'm happy, because I want wonderful things for her. She has been such an asset to me, to MoBu, and to the families that come to play. But I'm so very sad because Miss Morgan is THE BEST and cannot possibly be replaced. I want to crawl in bed for a few days, preferably with an electric blanket and my dogs. 

Alas, the show must go on, so we are seeking a phenomenal person to lead our team. The position can be full or part time for the right person. We are seeking someone mature yet fun loving, responsible yet playful, a leader who listens to listens to the team and a bunch of other stuff I'll share in the description below.

Miss Morgan's last day is Friday, March 8th, so please stop in and wish her the best of luck before she goes.​

​MoBu Kids Manager Description:

MoBu Kids is seeking a hardworking, organized, and self-motivated Manager for its busy indoor playground. 

The position combines client services, scheduling and staff management, administrative tasks, marketing and sales (traditional and social media), and general cleaning/maintenance. Having a positive and upbeat attitude is a must! Applicants should be detail oriented, dependable, outgoing, have excellent phone and customer service skills, and be able to pass a criminal background check. 

MoBu Kids is an independently owned children’s facility in Falls Church, Virginia, offering classes, camps, birthday parties, and parent’s nights out. The ideal candidate will be able to craft thoughtfully created plans for art projects, music classes, and camps to ensure children are learning and having fun. If you are a self-starter full of creativity and ideas you will fit in perfectly! 

The full or part time position will be hourly with monthly evening meetings and occasional weekends. Compensation begins at $17/hour, with monthly bonuses based on revenue targets. This position is for the individual who takes their job seriously and is willing and able to work collaboratively with the owner. 

Applicants need not be education majors or experts. Summer camp, retail, waiting tables, babysitting, drama club, sorority/fraternity recruitment, cruise ship experience, etc., will all go a long way in preparing you for this job.

Please send resume and cover letter detailing experience with children, customer service, and staff management to info @ mobukids.com.
** Please NO PHONE CALLS OR VISITS! **
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Have you seen our party room lately? Or, more to the point, have you seen what others have done to our party room lately? I am blown away by the creativity that parents bring to what is essentially - and intentionally - a blank canvas. We enjoy seeing the originality of ideas most of which are in response to your child's special interests. My son had a school bus themed birthday when he turned 2. The kid was obsessed with all kinds of buses and would rattle off, "city bus. Tour bus. Double decker bus. School bus," from his car seat. Now, as a teenager, he is embarrassed when his dad and I remind him of his love affair with buses, but every now and then he will humor me by pointing out, "decker bus, mommy!" I swoon.

Here are a few photos of recent parties that were awesome! 

Thanks to all who came out for our Santa event yesterday! It was wonderful to get to spend time with your families and we look forward to making this an annual event for kids of all ages. MoBu Kids primarily serves the littles, but the older siblings had as much or MORE fun than their younger brothers and sisters. The cookie decoration station was a hit! 

Brandee D. Photography will be emailing you your photos by Tuesday afternoon. Here are my candid outtakes of the afternoon:

The past six weeks have flown by! I can't believe Thanksgiving is already over and December is upon us. As much as I love the holiday season, I have a bone to pick with it. There are too many demands packed into one month. Parties, events, school pageants, shopping, cooking, being nice to relatives, finding the perfect pics for cards - then having them made - THEN having to mail them! Sheesh. I need a nap just thinking about it.

In an effort to make things a little bit easier for you, we have scheduled Parent's Day Out (formerly Mom's Day out, but dads need a break, too) one day a week in the weeks leading up to Christmas. Kids ages 2.5 and older can spend three hours being entertained by our amazing staff while you run errands, meet a friend for coffee, or have the aforementioned nap. We also have drop off opportunities during Parents' Night Out and our winter camps. 

Finally, go easy on yourself. A few years ago, I started asking my family at the start of the season what was their ONE thing that they wanted to do during the holiday season. For the MoBu Dad, it's easy: he wants his mother's bourbon balls. As long as I whip up a batch, he doesn't care what else we do/don't do over the season. For my kids, it varies. Some years, they to make 5 different kinds of Christmas cookies, other years they want to go all out with decorating the house. What floors me is that their requests are almost always doing an activity at home with the family. For me, my one thing is Christmas cards. The rest of the family doesn't care, but I like the tradition of sending and receiving cards. What's your one thing?

We wish you the best of this holiday season, whatever or however you celebrate!

Great news! We had some beta testers come in and tell us what they liked (pirate ship!) and what we needed to fix (shocking lack of unicorns), and now we are ready to tip toe into the world of daily openings. For the next week, we will be open daily for Open Play. Bring in your old play passes and punch cards, otherwise it is $13 per child for a day of play. Socks are required, but if you forget we have socks in all sizes for $2 per pair.

Hours are as follows:

Friday, 9/14 - 11:00 am - 5:00 pm
Saturday, 9/15 - 9:30 am - 3:00 pm
Sunday, 9/16 - 11:00 am - 3:00  pm
Monday, 9/17 - 9:30 am - 5:00 pm
Tuesday, 9/18 - 9:30 am - 5:00 pm
Wednesday, 9/19 - 9:30 am - 5:00 pm
Thursday, 9/20 - 9:30 am - 5:00 pm
Friday, 9/21 - 9:30 am - 5:00 pm
Saturday, 9/22 -Our Grand Opening! 10:00 am - 2:00 pm. 
Sunday, 9/23 - 9:30 am - 5:00 pm

These times are subject to change, based on deliveries, staff training, and other factors outside of our control. We will update our Open Play calendar and Facebook page as things change. Please be patient with us as we train new staff, learn a new software system, and deal with glitches involved with moving in general.

See you soon!
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MoBu Kids is starting to look like MoBu Kids! Things are getting put together and organized. Ms. Roxana was in organizing art supplies and getting things ship shape. 
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We cannot get our internet installed! Ack! We need our phones and computers to work and our building apparently needs either an upgrade or someone who remembers how to install the old pre-fios system into our building. It's always something.

​We can't wait to host your party at MoBu Kids and plan to start in October! In response to your requests, we are moving to an online reservation system and hope to have it up and running next week (dependent on internet service, of course.) We are not yet taking reservations, but will once this new system is in place. Check Facebook and our blog for word.

We still don't have a date for our official opening, but are hoping for soft openings beginning next week.