When visiting the Las Vegas Strip, family friendly doesn’t come readily to mind. And there are a lot of adult distractions on the Las Vegas Strip. We lived in Las Vegas or its surrounding cities for more than four years. Over the years, we learned were to go with our young family that was fun, family friendly, and affordable. This is the insider’s guide to the family friendly attractions of Las Vegas: stop 1 — M&M’s World.
Our day began by parking at the MGM Grand Resort. All the resorts offer free parking, but the MGM Grand was the resort closest to our destination. When parking the family vehicle at a resort, don’t worry about looking for spaces on the lower levels. Go up to the upper levels — they are less crowded and, because of elevators, basically the same walking distance to the entrance of the resorts. Also, be sure to secure all valuables out of sight and lock the vehicle before leaving. And finally, take a picture of where you parked the vehicle — the row number and level. This will help because after a long day of fun remembering where the car was left is very difficult to do.
M&M’s World starts on ground level as a fantastic souvenir shop that sells all things M&M’s — even personalized M&M’s by the pound. Aside for the souvenir’s and great chocolate for sale, there are other attractions that make this a great place to take the family. There are also some fun places to take photos along the way. So, be sure to bring the camera.
One of my favorite photo opportunities is the wall of M&M’s. I love the colors. It’s just amazingly beautiful and chocolaty. We did have to tell our Kindergartner to “Not touch anything.” The temptation to dispense a few of those colorful M&M’s is very strong — even for me. There are levers under all those tubes of M&M’s. You can fill bags full of all sorts of flavors of M&M’s, but it’s on the pricey side at about $13 a pound.
As visitors progress up the levels, they’ll find a fantastic historical mural about M&M’s. It shows how the M&M candies have developed over the years. I particularly liked how the peanut M&M was depicted in the 50s.
M&M’s World also offers a free 3D movie periodically throughout the day. It’s a 10 minute movie with good visual and physical special effects. The title is “I lost my M in Vegas”. The kids all enjoyed the movie, especially trying to grab …. That would spoil the plot of the movie, so never mind. My fourth grader said “That was the best movie, ever!” as she bounced out of the movie theater. Be sure to clap for the live actor who facilitates the movie.
On the next floor, is a NASCAR souvenir shop with one of the M&M NASCAR cars. Photo opportunities abound. I’m not a huge NASCAR fan, but the car is pretty cool. My boys really liked the car. We had to keep them from trying to get in it.
All this touring makes little ones tired, so after spending the majority of the day at M&M’s, we decided to go to In-And-Out Burger for a fast meal and headed home. There are still plenty of attractions to visit, but there are other days. As a side note, M&M’s World is a crowded place to visit, precisely because it is family friendly. So, keep the little ones nearby. We employ the buddy system and it seemed to work well. My two older children are each assigned a younger child to hold hands with. Then Dad walks in front and Mom walks behind. Also, the bathroom on the fourth floor isn’t used as much, and has a great diaper station. So, when little ones need the potty — I’d head upstairs.
Our next stop was the Coca Cola Factory — come back to see what we did there.
