Helpful Mom

I’m always searching out new and different places to take the kids.  In doing so I found Wickham Farms in Penfield, NY.  It’s a mix of entertainment, with their jumping pillow and mini golf, and garden center selling flowers and mulch.  It’s a nice slow paced place to visit for a couple hours.  It’s inexpensively priced at $4 a kid to either jump or mini golf all day. Plus you can find coupons for buy one get one admissions in the Penfield Community Rec brochure, which you can pick up on your way at the library/rec building on Baird Rd.  They also offer special discounts on certain days of the week or special days like Father’s day.  Click here for a coupon you can print out to bring with you.

• Parents can jump on the jumping pillow FREE with the paid admission of a child five or under.
• Parents can jump on the jumping pillow for just $2 with the paid admission of a child six to 18.
• Sunset special: Every day after 6 p.m., play mini golf AND go on the jumping pillow for $6!
• Tuesdays are TWOs days - mini golf is just $2 per person.
• Ask for our punch cards for mini golf and jumping pillow.

Open Daily from 10am-9pm at 1821 Fairport Nine Mile Point Rd (rte 250) Penfield, NY 14526

They do offer specials for teams or school groups, and they do birthday parties.  Call for more info 585-377-FARM

A fun place for the whole family!

Year-Round Attractions

Our 18-hole miniature golf course has enough obstacles to make the game interesting — but is nice and flat for the little ones! Our jumping pillow is a blast for young kids and the young at heart! Rent tractors to play in the sand.

FREE Fun!

There are so many things to see and do at Wickham Farms with no charge! Say hi to our friendly chickens. Climb on our antique tractor. It’s perfect for pretending or pictures! Look for the three mouse houses in the barn! (They are pretend, of course.) Play on our playground. (They are built to last a lifetime and they are for sale!) A table on our porch is always set up for a friendly game of checkers.

Fall Fun!

Fall is even more fun at Wickham Farms! The little ones love our kiddie train ride. (weekends only) Make your way through our three-acre corn maze. Most folks can find their way through the maze in about 30-45 minutes. Take a tractor ride through the pumpkin patch. (weekends only) We even have some free attractions just for fall! Check out our carved pumpkin display hut, run through the sorghum maze, and take a picture to see how much you’ve grown since last year!

In the pursuit of finding new places to take the kids I found this one thru a friend who now lives in Buffalo.  It’s a small farm in Clarence, NY outside Buffalo about a 1 hour drive from Rochester, NY.    Kelkenberg Farm is open year round by reservation only.  You need to either call or email them before visiting because they do full guided tours of the barns and introducing their animals, hay rides, and pony rides all included in the price of admission, $7.

learning to milk a goat

I emailed to pick a date and they replied within 24hrs.  During the spring they are open most weekdays from 10am-1pm.  It is field trip season for schools so you can pretty much pick any day to go on your own and just join up with a school group and go along for the tour and activities.  An added bonus of that was we only got charged the group rate of $6.50.  In the fall they are open on weekends too and their prices are $7.50 a person which includes a pumpkin for each person.  Also note that in the spring they only accept cash or check, but in the fall they do also take credit cards.

Katrina's first pony ride

I say it’s small farm but that’s when I compare it to Springdale Farm in Spencerport, NY which is a full working dairy farm.  This is more of an educational farm for families.  They do an amazing job of teaching the children in an engaging way and they have made it very hands on.  You start out touring the horse barn where you get to measure a pony and pet him.  Then you get to check out the turkeys where the tom is showing off, did you know turkey eggs are speckled?  We got to pet a chicken too.  Afterwards we headed into the big barn where the goats, sheep, pig, calves, and baby chicks all stay.  There we got to pet a sheep and feel the wool that had recently been shaved off him.  Did I mention that spring is the best time to visit a farm?  Why you wonder, because all the animals have recently had their babies so they are scampering about everywhere.  The girls got to pet 5 day old chicks and ducklings and there were baby goats, sheep, and a 3        month old piglet.

After our tour of the barns and all the animals the kids got to ride ponies!  Does it get any better than that at that age?  They have a nice setup for that too so the kids can be distracted while waiting their turn for a ride.  They have a mill set up so they can crack corn for the chickens, as well as tractors to climb on and books to read.  Afterwards they take you on a hayride around the perimeter of the farm.  Everything all together takes about 2 hrs.  Then you are free to wander around and revisit the animals, have a picnic lunch in their covered pavilion, or let the kids play in their large sandbox.

Logistically there is no running water on site, but they do sell cold bottles of water for $1.  No food is available for sale although they are within a few miles of various fast food restaurants.  They do have portapotty’s on site too and handwashing stations set up around the farm.  They are located a t9300 Wolcott Road • Clarence Center • NY • 14032  You can call them at 716-741-4862 or email them at charlene@kelkenbergfarm.com for reservations.  And enjoy!  We sure did!

Today we went exploring.  I told the girls I’d heard about this splash park but the directions I had weren’t specific so we’d drive up and down the road it was on in hopes of finding it.  The adventure was on.  It ended up being relatively easy to find, less than 2 miles from our favorite farm to visit, Springdale Farm in Spencerport.

I have heard tell of the spraygrounds in Geneva, NY but have not yet taken the girls what with the mix of my kids having some fear of the water, which this summer they are finally getting over, and the hour long drive to and from that park.  But when I read about a few closer to home on the Kids out and about website I thought I’d look into those since they are free so if they don’t like it nothing lost.  So today being a beautiful day and having all day to do whatever thought we’d go explore and see what gem we might discover.

Since I wasn’t sure if the girls would like the water or not we started by going to Springdale Farm for the morning and then going in search of Pineway Ponds Park in Ogden(Spencerport), NY.  It’s a public town park so it’s completely free.  If you take 531W from Rochester to the Spencerport exit Rte 259, go north on 259 about a mile, it’s just past the town center on the left.  They have a spray ground that is awesome.  There are all kinds of fixtures that spray in different ways as well as jets of water that shoot straight out of the ground.  The park also has a very large playground right next to the water so if you have kids with different interests you can keep an eye of all of them.  My girls enjoyed it immensely and want to go back tomorrow.  Well we most likely won’t go there tomorrow, but we might go check out the one in Webster…

I was in Thrifty Shopper today and they told me all their stores are having a customer appreciation sale on Saturday, October 18 from 9am-8pm.  50% off EVERYTHING! except brand new merchandise.  Thrifty Shopper is a thrift store supporting local shelters in Syracuse, NY.

They have stores in Auburn, Baldwinsville, Binghamton, Cortland, E. Syracuse, Henrietta, Liverpool, N. Syracuse, Oswego, Syracuse, and Watertown.  Go to Thrifty Stores for store addresses.