My name is Jenny Oklejewski. I am the owner and founder of Poppins Playhouse. When I was 17 years old and a senior in high school, I took a humanities elective where the yearlong project was to design your dream. My dream was to open a hands-on children's museum with interactive educational experiences. Over the last 30 years I have worked on parts of that dream. I have degrees in philosophy and speech pathology. I have been a licensed teacher, an advocate for special education, a liaison, a mentor and a parent. When my own kids were growing up it was so difficult to find a place for them to be out of the house and in an environment that was fun, sensory friendly, supported their educational and developmental milestones, flexible that one child could interact with others and another child could engage in solitary play and where I could meet other parents navigating the same milestones. Over the years I have visited a multitude of kid dedicated spaces from children's museums in different countries to local pop-up zoo exhibits to children's festivals. In all that time I have tweaked and edited what my 17-year-old dream was. I am now able to make the playhouse realistic and practical and developmentally appropriate while engaging the imagination and natural curiosity of childhood. After all, and according to my own mentor Mr. Rogers, “Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.” I hope to have created a space where not only children can use their imagination and explore their creativity but where parents and caregivers are encouraged to interact and play right alongside. Please feel open to bond together over story times, sing in the Theater District, tinker in the Big Idea Lab, create memories and masterpieces in the Art Gallery and so much more.

“We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” -George Bernard Shaw.