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Welcome to Springs and Things, the podcast where two close friends spill the tea on all things Colorado Springs! From culture and community to hidden gems and neighborhood lore, we’ve got it covered. Join us as we sip our coffee (or maybe something stronger) and dive into the stories and secrets that make this city so unique. Whether you're a local or just passing through, our fun, light-hearted, and always entertaining take on the quirks, hot topics, and insider tips will keep you coming back for more. Discover what’s really happening in the Springs—beyond the mountains and parks!
Ninety years ago, a farmer named Nick Venetucci started tossing free pumpkins to kids off the back of his vegetable cart, and nearly every kid who grew up in Colorado Springs has a memory of that farm. Then in 2016, the water turned up contaminated. Forever chemicals in the aquifer, the soil, the plants, no more food, no more pumpkins, and this incredible place was staring down the end of its story. But it wasn't the end of this story. This week, we're recording at Venetucci Farm with Sam Clark of the Pikes Peak Real Estate Foundation and Nikki McCumsey of Gather Mountain Blooms, one of the women who turned contaminated ground into a flower farm, a wedding venue, and a gathering place for countless fun community events.
Carly Ries:So grab your headphones, you guys. This one is fascinating and inspiring. Before we get into it, this episode is brought to you by Vanguard Aesthetics. When you're out enjoying the events at this incredible place, do not forget that sunscreen. Hey, everyone.
Carly Ries:I'm Carly.
Lauren Ferrara:And I'm Lauren.
Carly Ries:We're two Colorado Springs locals who love uncovering everything that makes the city special.
Lauren Ferrara:If you're the kind of person who wants to know where to go, what's happening, and the stories behind it all, then you're in the right place. Welcome to Springs of Things, your insider's path to hidden gems, local flavor, and unexpected moments that make The Springs one of its kind. From secret spots and campus events to arts, eats, and those you've gotta hear about at local stories.
Carly Ries:We've got you covered.
Lauren Ferrara:So grab your coffee, settle in, and get ready to fall
Carly Ries:a little more in
Lauren Ferrara:love with Colorado Springs.
Carly Ries:Let's dive in to Springs and Things. Okay. You know me. I'm the sensitive one between the two of us. You think so?
Carly Ries:Yeah. I mean, I think I'm the only one that's cried in interviews.
Lauren Ferrara:You cry a lot in interviews. I will be really impressed if you cry today because I can't figure out a reason that you So
Carly Ries:can we taper a lot down to infrequently, but happens? Sure. Sure. Okay. Are you
Lauren Ferrara:gonna get okay. Now I can see a world in which
Carly Ries:you would cry. Nostalgia. Nostalgia. Thank you. And let me be clear.
Carly Ries:I didn't like pull into Venetucci Farm weeping by But any we were just telling Nikki when we were walking in right before we started the show. It was October. We brought our dogs to what was it called again? Pumpkin Fest. Pumpkin Fest, where you can bring your dogs.
Carly Ries:It's one the one day a year you can bring your dogs to Venetucci Farm, and we did, all these promo shots of the podcast, and we're like, oh my gosh. This is gonna be so fun.
Lauren Ferrara:Our kids taking actually did a pretty decent job, but yeah, our kids were
Carly Ries:taking the pictures. Yeah. They actually she did a really good job. Oh. We looked so good in those.
Carly Ries:He's a photographer, and Huckleberry looked especially cute next to next to pumpkins. Yes. Your pup. Well, on that day, I remember remember us specifically saying, gosh, we cannot wait to do an interview with these guys. We talked about it, and it worked.
Carly Ries:And now we're here.
Lauren Ferrara:We manifested it, Carly. We manifested
Carly Ries:it and emailed about it.
Lauren Ferrara:But I wanna hear before we bring in Sam and Nikki, I wanna hear, like, your memories as a kid from, like, Venetucci.
Carly Ries:Oh my gosh.
Lauren Ferrara:Know it was, a big big thing for like families and kids.
Carly Ries:Every local kid comes here. It was such a joy when I was a kid. I I have such good memories coming out here. Keep looking at Lauren. I guess we could look at you guys to our guests.
Carly Ries:Friends with us. We have guests with us. It was so fun and I was even telling I emailed Nikki because Thea actually brought her boys here for music and blooms two Tuesdays ago or whatever it was and the looks on their faces. They were so excited. They ran over to our house in the morning and they were like we get to go to the place to listen music where we get
Lauren Ferrara:the pumpkins in the fall
Carly Ries:and they were so excited. There's just such a connotation and again nostalgia with it here. So yes, I'm sorry you didn't get to experience that as a kid.
Lauren Ferrara:I got to experience like so I moved here almost fourteen years ago, and those first couple years working in local news, like everybody fought over the Venetucci Pumpkin Ale story. Like, with the day that was released, it was like, you know, everybody's fighting for that story. So, drank a lot of beer on the news. Oh, memories. Well, those were my nostalgic memories, but I'm you're not crying.
Lauren Ferrara:I'm not crying. So we're off to a good time.
Carly Ries:I did not drink beer here in elementary school. I'm just gonna throw that out as a as a PSA, but we're here with Sam and Nikki. I talked about you guys a little bit in intro, so I just want to get into the questions. It was kind of hard to whittle it down. I have so many, so we're just going to get right into it.
Lauren Ferrara:And I cut her off. Yeah, like you're done, Carly. You only get 10 questions.
Carly Ries:I was like and more and more. Okay. So the well, one, you guys, welcome to the show. We're so happy to have you.
Sam Clark:Yeah. Thank you for having us. It's it's a delight, and sharing the farm with anybody is always great, but when it's with great enthusiasm and appreciation for the history behind it, it just makes it that much better.
Nikki McComsey:Yeah, I love being here, and what's really fun for me as Gather Mountain Blooms is hearing the stories from people when they came as a child, and getting to re experience the farm in a different way. So it is very nostalgic for a
Carly Ries:lot of people. Well, let's talk about the history a little bit. The Venetucci Farm, which is where we are, has been a fixture in this community for nearly a century, and 2026 this year marks its ninetieth anniversary. That is insane. For listeners who grew up here like myself, what did the farm mean to families before 2016, which we'll get into that why 2016 is a thing?
Carly Ries:And how do you think Nick and Bambi would react to what it's become today?
Sam Clark:So the property for, I think, seven decades has been this pumpkin farm that really speaks to the generosity of Nick and Bam, really the whole Venetucci family. What it meant to families was it was the last kind of working farm in this community, and there was just this full heart and grace from the Venetucci's that said, we want kids to be on this farm to experience kind of a piece of their legacy and history. And so it evolved from Nick Venetucci just driving vegetable cart up North Tejon and tossing pumpkins to kids for free to starting a pumpkin patch to the pumpkin patch expanding. And, you know, it's it's shifted in those years. I I was told a story, I guess, last year by Bambi Venetucci's niece that Nick was always proud that there were a lot of cockerbrels in the fields, because he wanted kids to go into the fields and get stuck with thorns, those types of things to understand how hard farming was.
Sam Clark:Yeah, like a build character, I don't, yeah, think he was a very kind man. I don't think he was a soft man, by any means. And it's really, I think it's a property that does kinda two things. One, it speaks to who we are as a community, and who we've been for a really long time. And it also speaks to how a community reimagines itself, revitalizes itself, and sort of meets the needs of the moment.
Sam Clark:And when I look at Nikki here, I'm like, holy cow, it's been ten years since you and I first started talking about Venetucci Farm, really seven years since you've been working on it. I no belief, or it was beyond my belief that it would be what it is today, considering where it started.
Nikki McComsey:Yeah. And I mean, being the one to hear a lot of the stories from people who had been out to the farm and experienced it through the eyes of children or as parents, and hearing from people who have met Nick and Bambi, I think what's really neat for me as kind of the new generation of caretaker of the legacy of Venetucci Farm, is that people are just in awe that they get to re experience it in a new way. So there's the memories that they've created here, but then knowing that the legacy continues in a whole new way through flowers, it's just really special. It's really cool to be part of it. And I think Nick and Bambi would be pretty happy with the way that Pikes Peak Real Estate Foundation has handled the whole stewarding of the land and making sure that it's open to community for the current generation as well.
Carly Ries:Okay. So I wanna circle back because I said we'll we'll get to 2016. I want why I threw out that date specifically. So in 2016, water contamination ended the farm's ability to grow edible food, and its its future was genuinely uncertain. Right?
Carly Ries:So walk us through that moment. How close did the farm come to actually disappearing entirely?
Sam Clark:You know, it's a lot easier to think in retrospect about what the challenge was of PFAS and finding out that, you know, this property and really every property in the Fountain Valley is subject to contamination from, know, the Air Force's use of this aqueous firefighting foam that leached into the aquifer. And that that firefighting foam is called has something called PFAS, which is a forever chemical, and it is it is a really sticky substance. So it is in the water. It's in the aquifer. It's in the soil.
Sam Clark:It's in the plants that are growing in the soil. And in 2016, you know, you just find out that you're subject to this contamination. You don't know how bad it is. The first question is, well, how do we get rid of it? And it took not a long time to find out that you don't get rid of it, but a hard time to believe that.
Sam Clark:And really looked at I remember one winter day being on the property, Nikki could tell you that the property can just feel empty in the winter, and looking at it and thinking, I don't think this is gonna work. How are we gonna do this? We can't grow food. We can't lease the water. We can't use the water.
Sam Clark:Farms typically need water and revenue to work. And so, I would say that it was a lot of community belief, a lot of support from the Pikes Peak Real Estate Foundation, the Community Foundation, and later coming in from Nikki to say, let's stick with this. This is something that's happened for a long time. I mean, you made the comment, it's been ninety years. We're celebrating two fifty years of our republic.
Sam Clark:'90 is a pretty good run for a farm, right? The fact that to let that go just seemed like it would be harder to do that than it would be to keep it going, and so we committed to keeping it going, and that's where we are today. It's been ten years since Agate Damage. I think the farm might be in the best state it's been in the last thirty years, in part because of that.
Carly Ries:Do you
Lauren Ferrara:think that the nostalgia, the story of this farm played a role? Like, if Nick and Bambi hadn't been who they were, and this farm hadn't been really accessible to every single family that lived in Colorado Springs, do you think it would have survived?
Sam Clark:No, farm wouldn't have survived without the Venetucci legacy. I mean, it compelling is space, but I really think that the Venetucci's embody the best of us. Mean, they were generous, they were hardworking, they were resilient. I mean, they took on floods and drought. They took on pestilence.
Sam Clark:Bambi was a blind woman who learned how to work a farm. She learned how to drive.
Nikki McComsey:I did not
Sam Clark:know before. She was Colorado's Teacher of the Year. She was a teacher at the Deaf and Blind School, and she wanted to learn how to drive. Nick used to take her out on the empty dirt roads and just tell her a little bit left, a little bit right. But I think the farm survives, to answer your question, because this is a really of Cardinal Springs, El Paso County story, which is a place that's giving, resilient, that sort of sticks to its identity and its history.
Sam Clark:I think that's why it's still here.
Nikki McComsey:Yeah, and I think on top of that is just the fact that they chose to donate the property and put it in a conservation easement upon their passing because that's really what preserved the farm in the first place. So if they hadn't done that, most likely the farm would have been developed into apartments or shopping center or something different entirely. So even just the foresight they had to protect this land and this property from the very beginning is pretty spectacular. And I do think that their legacy keeps people coming back because they're curious about, well, what is it now? What's happening now?
Nikki McComsey:So we get, I think one of the reasons we have been so successful at Gather Mountain Blooms is that it already has such a name in the community and people just want to come and experience it all over again. They definitely live on today because of what they did.
Lauren Ferrara:Now, the famous Venetucci Pumpkin Giveaways, part of local lore, the farm can't obviously grow those pumpkins anymore, so where do they come from now? How do you keep that tradition alive when the ground itself couldn't do that?
Nikki McComsey:So, there's two parts to the pumpkins at this point in time. Gather Mountain Blooms hosts a pumpkin fest which is open to the public and people come and just enjoy pumpkin patch area. We get the pumpkins from a farmer down in Pueblo which is Millburger Farms. So they're locally grown pumpkins and we knew we wanted to be able to support local agriculture. So there's a big festival that happens around Pumpkin Fest, but then there's also to continue the Venetucci Legacy, a kids giveaway program, and I'll let Sam tell you more about that.
Sam Clark:Yeah, so Venetucci's gave pumpkins away to kids for years. They'd also host something kinda like what Nikki still does, which was, you you could come and you buy your pumpkins, you know, there's all these stories about how they charged and who they charged and, you know, kinda hefting a pumpkin to figure out its price. What we do now is we work with the school districts and make it available to every kindergarten student in El Paso County that wants to book a field trip here. We kinda thought we could honor two legacies that way. One is Nick and his brother's legacy of giving the pumpkins away, but like I mentioned, Dambi was the Colorado Teacher of the Year, and so we thought, well, if we're pulling kids out of school, let's make sure there's an education component to this.
Sam Clark:So they get a free pumpkin, but they also get a kind of curriculum based program on really an outdoor education experience around science, how pumpkins are grown, that type of thing. And we work with the school district to make sure that it's meeting their curriculum standards so that the joke is, you don't get a pumpkin for free, you gotta learn something when you come here. But we really feel like it's our way of kind of making sure that that legacy kicks off. And what's cool about it is it's the first field trip experience for these kids. You know, they've been in school for maybe six to ten weeks as kindergartners, so it's, some of them, it's their first time on the Big Yellow Bus.
Sam Clark:It's the first time kind of unloading from the, you know, onto a field trip, and it just there's, like, a lot of joy and excitement that comes with that. We don't have jaded middle schoolers coming here for those things. We get them early. So we're really excited that, you know, we've kinda been able to figure out a a way that honors the dual legacy of both Nick and Bambi.
Carly Ries:Well, yeah, Nikki, like I was saying, I knew exactly where our neighbor kids were going when they were like, we're going to listen to music where we got our pumpkins in kindergarten, and they were losing their minds. And I was like, I I know about that place. And speaking of that place alright. Let's take a quick break to talk about our wonderful sponsors, starting with Vanguard Aesthetics because, honestly, they are a game changer. If you've been on the fence about getting a little skin refresh, this is the team you want.
Carly Ries:They're not pushy. They actually listen to your goals, and the whole vibe is just warm and welcoming, not intimidating like some med spas can be. And, also, we wanna give some love to Core Collective. They have been with us since the beginning. They are a former Pilates studio in Downtown Colorado Springs, and my body has not been the same since I started going.
Carly Ries:And I mean that in the absolute best way. It's challenging, and the instructors are so good. Like, they actually cue you through every movement, so you're feeling it all in the right places instead of just guessing. And the community there is just awesome too. It's one of those places where you walk in as a stranger and leave feeling like you found your people and you just wanna keep going back.
Carly Ries:And the greatest thing is if you get to check out when you are booking a class, type in the code Springs and Things, all caps, no spaces, because that'll unlock three classes for just $30. That's $10 a class, which is crazy and awesome. So be sure to visit their website. That link is in our show notes as well. So Gather Mountain Bloom started leasing the land here five years ago, and you guys have been saying you can't even believe what the farm has turned into since.
Carly Ries:So one, like how does that feel knowing that the expectations you had, they've just exceeded those? But also, why flowers? I mean, if anything you guys could have done with this land, why did you go that direction?
Nikki McComsey:Well, that's two big questions, but I'll start with why flowers because it kind of feeds into how we ended up at Venetucci Farm. But I had a concussion about nine years ago now, I guess. And it took me out of work. And it was debilitating. I had really bad migraines and some nerve damage and just some really hard times in my life.
Nikki McComsey:And I spent a lot of time in my garden just trying to heal and trying to figure out what is life and what does this mean for me. And my husband started bringing me flowers home. And it was like one of the only things at that time that was showing me joy and love. I really just needed something at that point in my life. And as I was starting to heal, it just sparked something that I wanted to share flowers with more people.
Nikki McComsey:Flowers are there for so many times in your life from the joy and love of weddings to the death of a loved one and sympathy flowers. So they're really there for every emotion that there is. So for me, flowers just became a very emotional connection and I didn't think that it was a career path though. I ended up finding a flower farmer out in Washington State called Florrette. She does a training program to teach people how to start their own farms.
Nikki McComsey:So, I took the course and completely fell in love with everything about it. I started growing in my backyard, which was maybe under a quarter of an acre. It was a big yard, but still small compared to what you can grow flowers on. Started selling at Eclectic in Downtown Colorado Springs. Just popped up outside their shop and sold flowers at this little boutique.
Nikki McComsey:And knew that if I really wanted to make a career out of it, I needed more space. And the really hard thing about living in Colorado is that land is expensive. So anywhere you look, it's going to be really expensive. And then finding water is also really challenging. So, the combination of those two things made it hard to find any land that would work for a flower farm.
Nikki McComsey:And that's where the Venetucci Farm came into my part of the story and reached out to Sam and the Pikes Peak Real Estate Foundation to see, you know, knowing that the farm, Venetucci Farm, had shut down because of the water contamination but that flowers could be a really good fit. It was a non edible crop so it didn't matter if there were contaminants in the soil and in the water. So, it ended up being of a perfect fit for us and I think also for the community, the real estate foundation did I answer all of the questions? There's another question, I think.
Carly Ries:No, you did. I just kind of threw everything at you at once, but just I mean that. You're not. I mean, just where is it today versus where you thought it was going
Nikki McComsey:to be? So when we first moved in to the farm, I remember that we were still thinking really small. So we thought that we were going to have like a small, maybe half acre of flowers and eventually we'd get the property renovated and the barn ready for weddings and we would just slowly start adding in things. But we just kind of jumped in all the way from the very beginning. The farm had been sitting without anybody farming it for a couple of years, maybe two years at that point.
Nikki McComsey:So weeds had really taken over pretty much every inch of space and it just needed a lot of work. When we moved in, it was hard to kind of see the full vision, but we just, every day, kind of kept working and working and working. And we opened with half an acre of flowers, and it felt like the biggest thing we had ever done in our whole lives because it was so much work. And we started hosting weddings the first year. So we started renting the barn out for weddings the very first year.
Nikki McComsey:And just the combination of those two things led to enough success that we could keep growing every single year and adding more events and we re now up to two acres of growing space and we re open for events almost three days every week and run events from Mother's Day through Halloween, and workshops through the winter. So it's really become a year round, much bigger vision than I think what we even thought possible. And you do this with your sister, right? What is that like? So, I love working with it started as three sisters, so myself and two sisters.
Nikki McComsey:And then one of my sisters moved on hairstylist, so she kind of went back to that trade. Now I work with my sister Abby. And even from day one, all three of us have very different traits that we bring, and it works perfectly, and it wouldn't have worked without one of us. So I think farming is really hard and it gets really overwhelming some days and sometimes we just want to quit. If it were just me, I think it would be really hard to keep going.
Nikki McComsey:But doing it with my sister brings so much joy to me, but also encouragement when one of us is feeling down, the other is, Nope, we can do this. We're going to keep working through this. We get through it, and then we get to see people come out and enjoy the space and enjoy the flowers, it all feels worth it all over again. But having my sister is definitely what makes it work.
Carly Ries:Oh, I love
Lauren Ferrara:that. What and this is a question for both of you. Favorite moment on the farm?
Nikki McComsey:Oh, Favorite moment? I have so many. I think my I'll say my favorite event because it's always my favorite day with the most magical moments, which is Rocky Mountain Flower Fest. Yeah, it's a festival that we dreamed up five years ago. It's a music festival.
Nikki McComsey:A lot of people think that it's all about the flowers, but for us, it's really about the music. So we have bands that come out and perform for the day, and we have a flower crown making station, and you pick flowers, and vendor market, and line dancing in the barn, But it's just a magical day. I mean, to see so many people out here for different reasons, whether they love music or they love flowers, it just feels like such a magical day.
Carly Ries:Nikki, you can't tease our listeners like that. We're on the one month countdown. You have to give the dates and everything.
Nikki McComsey:You're right. Okay. So it's August 8. So it is coming up so soon. And we have Patchwork Jack, which is amazing Manitou Springs band, and then Grass It Up, which is just a staple in the community.
Nikki McComsey:So, August 8, mark your calendars.
Lauren Ferrara:It's so fun. I came, I've come for two years, and it's just an amazing event, so well done.
Carly Ries:All right, Sam, you're on the hot seat. Favorite moment?
Sam Clark:I mean, it's cheesy and a little bit obvious, but the big break in my work day is when you have kind of I get to see that first group of kindergartners come in, and you just get there's no more enthusiastic person in the world than a five year old who's just gotten out of school. And so that is a fun you kinda see the property through somebody else's eyes. And with a good a really good outdoor educator kinda teaches you about how you can sort of observe the world differently, and, you know, they've got magnifying glasses, they're looking at bugs, they're kinda crawling around, and, you know, to me, the Venetucci Farm, as much as I love it, you know, I'm usually here when there's a problem, and so it's nice to be here when there's just something great happening. And it makes me It's kind of the, Oh, right. This is what tickled the Venetucci's in a way that made them I kind of want to give everything they owned over to this, this experience of giving kids this kind of magical moment to be outside and doing something out of their normal world, and to take something with them, that's pretty cool.
Sam Clark:It's a whole lot more fun than an Excel spreadsheet. So I do love that quite a bit.
Lauren Ferrara:And speaking of all the fun things, let's go ahead and talk about all the different events that you have and love on
Nikki McComsey:the farm. Music in blooms, dahlia nights in the fall. Tell everything that's going on. We do have so many things going on. And the really neat thing that I love about the way we set up the schedule this year is that every month we celebrate a different flower that's in bloom.
Nikki McComsey:It's one thing that I think a lot of people forget about is that flowers have a season, and we're so used to being able to go to the grocery store, the florist, and get any flower any time of the year. Usually, they all look the same, and you don't really know when they're blooming or where they came from. Here, we started realizing that people want to feel a little bit more connected to the flowers and the seasons, so every month we have a different flower festival that we celebrate what's in bloom for that month. So May it was monunculus, June it was sweet peas, July it's zinnias, which is coming up real soon, and then August is sunflowers and September is dahlias. So we have different events and festivals and ways to kind of celebrate flowers that way.
Sam Clark:I'd also add in, Gather Mountain Blooms is kind of our anchor tenant, but we also have another, call it 160 acres of the farm that we lease to alfalfa, and we've also been working with a new group, Cabo de Youth Outdoors, that runs a core program, which is this, really their opportunity to use traditional recreation as a way to kinda build the parent and kid bond. So these are really after school and weekend classes where you can do archery, fly tying, that type of thing, and I would go to their website, Color Youth Outdoors, to look at, hey, if I've got a kid that is really interested in understanding traditional recreation a little bit better, this is a really great way for you to go do that with them in a way that walks you through it and helps you develop appreciation and communication that comes from having a good outdoor recreation partner. So that's something new, really, this year, but we're really excited in terms of offering that programming through the summer and fall.
Carly Ries:Sam, how did you know that was literally our next question?
Lauren Ferrara:You didn't see our questions,
Carly Ries:and we're literally just gonna ask about the Colorado Youth Outdoors. Okay. So you're basically just alluding. This is a big piece of property. The land is conserved, which kinda shapes what can and can't happen on it.
Carly Ries:So for people who don't know what a conservation easement is, what does it mean for the farm's long term future and the promise you're keeping?
Sam Clark:So a conservation easement is really a it's a binding agreement that says you're gonna only use this property for certain uses. So before Bambi Venetucci deeded the property over, she made an agreement with the state that said that this property wouldn't be used for development of a golf course, or single family housing. And when she did that, the property loses quite a bit of value. But it was, really, the idea was, how do you sort of preserve this property for agricultural and education uses down the road? And so we've got this little building imprint where we get to build a barn and other things that sort of accommodate Nikki's uses, but the rest of the property, it backs up onto Fountain Creek.
Sam Clark:We've got incredible birding. We have these fields that have been in cultivation for a hundred plus years, preceding even the Venetucci's. And so we are sort of the land stewards of that. And also really think about, Nikki does this incredible job of activating a little over 14 acres of the property. The question we've been asking ourselves is like, all right, well, now that we feel like this is in a really good spot, how do we add more programming and experiences?
Sam Clark:Particularly, we thought that traditional recreation really speaks to this community in the Fountain Valley, and at the same time, we been put in touch with Cottage Outdoors, which has a big campus in Fort Collins, and they want to expand their program offering, and we're looking around Colorado Springs, and so we said, Well, why don't you sort of give it a shot, see how this works at Venetucci? We're really piloting this to figure out if this is the right space, if it works for them, but really our goal is, hey, we have this property. Can we use it as a way to kind of give them a launch pad to figure out, can they make the programming work here? Can they establish a foothold in El Paso County, and is Venetucci the right space for them? But what we like about it is, one, is that education component.
Sam Clark:Two, it's serving kids and families. And three, I think it's creating some appreciation for the natural elements of the property beyond the cultivated spaces that Nikki manages.
Carly Ries:Okay. So, as you know, I'm a native. I've I got to do the kindergarten pumpkins, and it was just the best. But if a long time local hasn't been out to the farm since those good old days and is a little unsure what they'll find, what would you want them to know, and what's the one thing you tell them to come see in 2026?
Nikki McComsey:Well, if they haven't been out to the farm, I think that it's definitely worth a visit because it's such a different experience. I think a lot of people when they came out for the pumpkins, a lot of it was out in the big open field. And now, you get to experience the farm in a little bit of a more intimate way where we have a farm store and we have concessions and we have a little ice cream shack and the fields, the two acres are cultivated into flowers and it just feels a little bit more like a gathering space. So I think it's worth coming out just for that to experience it in a whole new way than it was when people were coming out for pumpkins. And I think the one thing for 2026, I would say, come for Rocky Mountain Flower Fest.
Nikki McComsey:It really is just the best day ever.
Lauren Ferrara:It really is the best day, but I do love the intimacy of Music in Bloom's, and I have one more flower question before we get to your picks of the week, but I feel like you it's more of a math question. I'm in awe of, like, the many events that you host, and there's always a flower component. Make a flower crown or take home a bouquet. How do you make sure you still have flowers for everybody? That's a great question,
Nikki McComsey:and it takes a lot of planning over the winter. So I have a bunch of spreadsheets and I literally just map out how many days a flower is going to bloom and how many days it takes for it to go from seed to bloom and when are we trying to host our events and how much space do we have available to plant. And every square foot of the farm is mapped out in the winter time so that we know exactly when to plant different seeds so that they bloom at the exact right time. And I'll tell you, we are always so anxious leading up to the two weeks prior to an event because you never really know if the sunflowers are going to bloom at the exact time you need them to for sunflower days or that our sweet peas are going to bloom at the exact window we need them to bloom. And the weather is such a big factor in that, that it always creates a little bit of anxiety.
Nikki McComsey:But we always find a way to make it work. And we do sell out a lot of our events for that reason, is that we can't just go buy more flowers. What we grow here is what we have and sometimes we have to cut off our events and just have sold out dates because we've reached maximum capacity for the flowers. Not necessarily for the space, but
Carly Ries:for the flowers. Can I do a Corny transition?
Lauren Ferrara:Go for it.
Carly Ries:I know you want to. I really want to because we're talking a lot about flower picking. Thank you. We have to ask you guys your pick of the week. What are you loving in The Springs right now?
Carly Ries:Whether it be a restaurant, a hike, a clothing store, whatever. What is the one thing that you're loving?
Nikki McComsey:So I am loving right now that my son is really into fishing, which is new for our family. So, we have a little pond in our neighborhood and he just loves to take a scooter to the pond and go fishing. And as a family, we've started to go around to different reservoirs and different streams and we're learning a lot. But the way that we're learning is by going to Anglers Covey. And every time we go in there, they tell us so much information about what fish are biting and what reservoirs or lakes have certain fish in it and what bait or lures you need.
Nikki McComsey:And for our family, that's been so helpful. And I also know that they do on Saturday mornings a fly fishing intro, like intro to fly fishing, and it is $10 but they give you a $15 gift card in exchange. So it's, you know, they basically pay you to come to their fly fishing thing. So that's my pick.
Sam Clark:I think Inglis Covey's a great pick. I'm gonna stick in Old Colorado City, and not paid for this one, but Pizzeria Leopold, Making a Run, I think is best pizza in Colorado Springs, which is on West Colorado, maybe like a block from Bancroft Park, but it's got a great rooftop, it's kid friendly, and I think it's just great to see a new restaurant come in and just crush it, especially for the tourist season that hits there, but it's one of those places that I'm glad, as a local, is gonna stick around.
Carly Ries:So we're gonna go to Intro to Fly Fishing and then go get pizza.
Lauren Ferrara:Yeah. We'll get paid $5 to go to because
Carly Ries:you guys are coming with us. Let's go. Whole crew. Well, this was such a pleasure.
Lauren Ferrara:Thank you guys for all you've done stewarding this land. It is just really cool that this is still here going on ninety years. Are you doing anything special for the hundredth?
Sam Clark:I've got a little story here. So, you know, I was, I think, maybe 30, I was math, 31 when the whole issue happened with the water, and the kindergartners come, I was single, there's a bunch of five year olds running around the property, and the woman who ran the outdoor education piece kinda came up to me and was like, hey, I just wanna let you know there's a special place in hell for the guy that makes me take a bunch of kindergartners into a porta potty, and I had no appreciation for this. Again, I was and now I have a four year old, and I am very aware that that special place in hell is, in fact, the porta potty. And so, this year, kind of in celebration of where we've come over the last ten years, it's been ninety years, we have embarked on a big transformation for the property, which is to make the barn air conditioned, accessible to install bathrooms, and then, just outside the barn, to create an additional bathroom facility, because really what we want is this to be a welcoming space that everyone feels like they can enjoy comfortably, and also realizing that our super user is a kindergarten student, and so it's been kind of fun designing the bathrooms that we've found a lot.
Sam Clark:My personal experience of being like, hey, we need to make sure that you can communicate over the wall, that these sinks are the right height, that these are like trough sinks, not just single hand washing stations, because the person that is managing this is usually one teacher with kids of both genders, in out, that type of thing. And so it's a big endeavor. We're raising quite a bit of money in. If you go to the Venetucci webpage, there's a donate button, but it's a big part of helping us keep this legacy going. It's how do you make it possible so that when people come here, they feel like they're welcomed and that it's community forward, as opposed to just a thing that you have to accommodate.
Lauren Ferrara:Amazing. Yeah, my kids at that age would have shat their pants before they were willing to go in a porta potty, like, would not happen. So gosh. Imagine having 25 of them. Good lord.
Lauren Ferrara:Yeah. That's a smart move.
Carly Ries:Well, you guys, this has been so fun. Like Lauren said, thank you so much for coming on the show.
Sam Clark:Thank you for having us. It's a real treat.
Nikki McComsey:Yeah. Thank you so much.
Carly Ries:And listeners, as always, thank you so much for tuning in. Please leave that five star review. It helps us spread the word to other locals wanting to hear about this awesome information. Share this episode with a friend that you want to bring to all the amazing events happening here in 2026 and beyond. And be sure to subscribe on Apple or Spotify, and we'll see you next week on Springs and Things.