Downtown St. Cloud Children’s Museum Marks One Year With All-Day Party

(KNSI) – The Great River Children’s Museum in downtown St. Cloud is turning one, and it is throwing a party to mark the milestone.

The museum will celebrate its first birthday on Wednesday, June 10th, from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., exactly one year after it first opened to the public. The all-day celebration includes art projects, dancing, stories, sensory play and birthday surprises throughout the building.

Story times are scheduled with the Magic Book Machine at 11:00 a.m. and Jan and the Sunshine Singers at 3:30 p.m. Henna hand art and face painting run from 10:00 to 11:30 a.m., and duck races in the museum’s Great Big River water table take place at 10:30 a.m., 11:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. Birthday streamers, noise makers and buttons will be available all day.

The party caps a busy first year for the $17 million museum, which opened June 10th, 2025, after roughly 13 years of planning that began as a conversation among a group of soon-to-be-retired educators. The 31,000-square-foot space along 7th Avenue South is the second-largest children’s museum in Minnesota.

By the museum’s own count, its first 11 months drew more than 101,000 visitors. Organizers had projected about 130,000 guests a year when the doors opened. The museum sold 1,264 memberships covering 4,455 individuals and hosted about 160 birthday parties. More than 1,200 community members took part in events, tours and meetings, and 1,400 people visited on a free Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

The museum also welcomed more than 319 guests across two “Sip n’ Play” adult-night events.

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