"I'm OK!" he shouted to no one in particular, then picked himself up to try another activity at My Gym, just opened a few months before in Enchanted Lake on the Windward side.

Move over, Gymboree. When it comes to interactive play centers, there are some new kids in town.

While Gymboree has been around the Islands for a while, interactive play centers like My Gym and WeePlay & Learn have taken their time cracking the market here, even though the concept has been spreading like crazy at malls and neighborhood centers across the Mainland.

"Hawai'i is slow catching up," admits Mary Melzack, who founded WeePlay & Learn back in 2004 in Hawai'i Kai, but reopened in September in Ward Warehouse.

Emily Tam worked at a My Gym in Virginia when her now-husband was stationed there. When they learned he was transferring to Pearl Harbor, Tam, who was born and raised in Hawai'i, figured it was time to bring the franchise to the Islands.

"I think the Windward side needed something like this for families," she said. While Tam hasn't started a family yet, the classes with the Little Bundles (keiki age 6 weeks to 6 months) are definitely giving the former performing-artist ideas.

My Gym, like other outlets, has parent-participation classes for the tiniest participants, and free-play hours and classes that keep parents on the other side of the kiddie gate for the bigger tykes.

There's even a drop-off Parents' Night Out, which Tam says fills up quickly with 25 kids. A weekend night out gives parents three hours of free time while kids nosh on pizza and play with the friends they've made at the center.

"Parents love (the nights out)," she said, because allows them time to take in a movie, dinner — or quality time: "Some just go back home and snuggle."

GETTING REFRESHED

WeePlay has another component to its offerings: It allows moms to get in a workout while their children are occupied.

"When they come out, they're refreshed," said Melzack.

Moms at the My Gym Mighty Mites' class in Enchanted Lake seem refreshed by a few precious minutes of free time to run errands or sit and watch in amusement as their children are run through exercise drills.

They may take a few minutes to pop over and grab a coffee at the nearby Starbucks or pick up something at Safeway, but it's obvious they're riveted by the fun their children were having as teacher Kimberly Williams rang the Mighty Mites through their drills.

"We watch," admitted Lisa Kreitzer, mother of Colin, who's putting on his "listening ears" with a firm "Click!" as the teacher instructs. "They entertain us."

Lynda Nugent said she appreciated not only how social the class is, but also how well-structured. Her son, Dash, has only come a few times, but is growing more confident with each visit.

Mothers also remarked how great it was to have someone besides them giving their children directions.

INTERACTION IS KEY

While the classes allow children to interact, perhaps the most interesting fringe benefit is how much interaction it's allowing parents.

Two women quietly discussed what came out of a recent doctor's visit, and another had a free hand to play with a younger offspring while the older one bounced like Tigger around the play area.

Across the room, Miles Wilcox was spending the free time inching across a padded bridge toward a box filled with colorful balls.

As he edged closer to the box of balls, he was psyching himself up for what was about to happen:

"Jump! Jump!" he ordered himself before hurling his 3 1/2-year-old self into the balls with a banzai-style yell.

Then he shrieked in giggles.

As he and his friends wrapped up the hour with "goodbyes," "thank yous" and even hugs, they seemed quiet and subdued — not plum tuckered out, but on the way to a nap, at least.