Putter Bert said she never dreamed of the success KidsQuest has had when it opened in Factoria a decade ago, but Wednesday, she and roughly 50 community members, leaders, and officials stood at the doorway of the new home for the children’s museum and reveled in how far they’ve come in 10 years.

“Can you believe it? We own this building,” Bert told the crowd outside the former Rosalie Whyel Museum of Doll Art.

The celebration was many years in the making, KidsQuest’s president and CEO said. In 2012, the building was selected as KidsQuest’s expansion site, and nearly three years of work and $6.35 million worth of fundraising later, she held the key to the museum’s future.

Bert said she hopes the new site to be up and running in the first half of 2016, but to do so, an additional $6.35 million needs to be raised by the end of the year, a task she said the staff is up for.

“I never thought we’d be as successful as we are,” she told the Reporter. “Last year we offered 24 new programs in addition to the roughly 600 other we’ve been providing. We want to be the institutional resource for parents and children in the region.”

And they’re certainly getting there, more than tripling their proposed annual visitors from 60,000 to 180,000. Once the new facility is renovated, Bert said that number could skyrocket even further. The location has a lot to do with that, she said.

“We’re creating a real family complex here with the library and Ashwood Park so close,” Bert said. “We focus on early learning and interactive play, but at the current site there’s no real outdoor space. We have some of the best educators and they’re so good at reaching children’s minds and imaginations at their level, whether they like to blow stuff up or get messy.”

The new facility, which will have twice the exhibit space, is designed to better incorporate multi-sensory learning and hands-on exhibits including an interactive water feature and climbable tree fort.