We’re still a couple of weeks away from the official first day of fall, but with the school year in full swing, I think it’s safe to say summer has come to an end here. So last weekend, we ended our summer with a trip to Pumpkin Valley Farm for the Maine Sunflower Festival. I believe the festival was supposed to be back in July, but due to all the rain we got through the spring and early summer months, the festival date got pushed back to late August. Which still worked out really well for us because July was incredibly busy and the festival landed on my last weekend of summer. So it was pretty perfect timing.
Since Zack had to work (and didn’t care too much about sunflowers anyway), I invited my sister and brother-in-law along instead. They had a few errands to run that morning so Allie and I ran a few of our own before meeting up with them. We had to skip nap time because of it, but it thankfully worked out pretty well regardless (minus a few tears toward the end of our outing. #ToddlerLife).
The Maine Sunflower Festival was held at Pumpkin Valley Farm in Dayton, Maine which is only about 30 minutes from Portland, Maine. We came here last fall as well for pumpkin picking and will definitely be picking pumpkins, here again, this year! This farm is awesome!
The farm is pretty affordable to me at about $10 a person. Kids 2 and under are free so this will be the last year we can get Allie in for free which is super sad! Now $10 may seem steep for some families (especially larger ones) BUT there is so much to do here for kids and everyone else in the family. It’s a whole experience.
At Pumpkin Valley Farm, you have a corn pit for kids to play in, playground(s), a large slide, face painting, a small petting zoo, a rather large corn maze (usually with a scavenger hunt!), a jumping pillow, and more! During their pumpkin picking season, you also have access to the pumpkin patch, hayrides, 2 shots on the corn launcher, a ride on the cow train, etc. Parking is also free so you never have to worry about that added expense. So all in all, $10 a person really isn’t bad to us at all!
Pro Tip: Bring cash for food and drinks! You can use a card to pay the admission fee, but food requires cash!
In addition to all the fun activities, they also have a small bar, kettle corn, pizza, and other snacks and food items available for purchase. We forgot to bring cash for the Sunflower Festival, but we did end up eating lunch there last fall when we were picking pumpkins. The pricing was very reasonable and they had plenty of options for kids as well.
This year was a bit warmer than the last time we visited, but I was super happy (and lucky) that the sun stayed away at times. It makes for much better photos and a more comfortable outing when you’re not sweating everywhere. I think it was in the low 70’s this day as well so we lucked out as far as weather goes!
Pro Tip: When inputting the address for Pumpkin Valley Farm into your GPS, make sure you’re putting it in for Dayton, not Buxton. This is a super common issue some people have (myself included).
Allie and I actually ended up getting lost on the way there so by the time we arrived, Allie was a bit cranky (we were in the middle of nap time at that point) but still very excited to see her Auntie and all the pretty flowers. After paying our admission, we decided to visit the animals first before throwing her into the millions of sunflower pictures I wanted of her. She really loved the donkey, but for some reason, she was terrified of the cows every time they made any sort of noise. I thought this was super odd and kind of funny considering she loves making cow noises herself. Maybe by the fall, she won’t be so scared of them!
After visiting with the animals, we headed down the path to the sunflower field. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever seen a real sunflower field before. I’ve obviously seen them in the grocery store and at farmers markets and things like that, but I’ve never seen sunflowers that are taller than I am. Allie thought this was pretty cool and really wanted to pick them. We kept having to redirect her to something else to prevent her from completely destroying them!
We’re lucky to have gone at a time when it was much less crowded. The festival went from Friday to Monday so I had originally planned to go on Sunday, thinking it would be the least busy of all the days (Friday being the first day, Saturday being a naturally busy day for outings and Monday being a holiday where everyone was off). Due to work schedules, we ended up having to go on Saturday and thankfully, it wasn’t nearly as crowded as I had anticipated. Allie had plenty of freedom to run and explore as she wanted rather than someone having to constantly hold her hand or carry her (if you’re a toddler mom, you know how amazing this truly is! ha!). So this helped a lot considering we were skipping nap time to be there!
Once Allie was completely over the sunflowers, we began to make our way back toward the food and the parking lot. I had originally planned on eating lunch while we were there, but I failed to bring cash. Instead, Allie and I said goodbye to my sister and brother-in-law and hit up McDonald’s on the way home. Allie much-preferred chicken nuggets anyway so she wasn’t complaining about it one bit!
Between the gorgeous weather, small crowds, and great company, we had an amazing time at the Maine Sunflower Festival and yet another fantastic experience at Pumpkin Valley Farm. I’m already excited to go back for pumpkins soon!
