My goal this summer is to give you a view into the lives of our precious baristas. We are going to be at Valleydale Farmer's Market this summer - July 18th as well as August 1st. We will be selling our Cafe' Three21 t-shirts as well as canned drinks to cool you down as you look at the produce and local artisans!
Let me tell you about my heart for special needs students. It began a long time ago when I worked at a church in Mobile, AL. I have always had a heart for middle and high school kiddos, and that is where I started. My own church youth group. But while working at the church, I made friends with a man who had an intellectual disability. He was precious. But he was hard to understand and he made the people around him uncomfortable because he would walk up to you and just stand there. He might say, "hi" and then he would just stand there. It did not bother me at all. Ever. I found that he was sweet and helpful and just wanted some company. He would find me wherever I was. That was just the beginning. When I started subbing after quitting a job as a Provider Relations Coordinator at a local insurance company, I got many jobs in the Special Needs department at the local high school. I took to it immediately.
What I found was that people that work with Special Needs individuals are amazing people. They have a huge capacity to love others. And their patience is endless. They have awesome problem solving skills and they know how to laugh - even when things are extremely difficult. So - at the age of 45 - I finally found my niche. The next year, I applied as a para educator at the high school and have been there ever since. That is 8 years now. And I love it. I really can't imagine doing anything else. I get to work with high school students as well as the special needs population and it is amazing.
If you read the opening story, then you know that Cafe' Three21 was created out of a desire to find ways to give our students work experience and with a goal of eventually starting a company that hires these students so they have something waiting for them when they age out of the school system. Letting them work with the public and get used to having to be scheduled and work at specific times as well as job skills such as cleaning and serving drinks, folding t-shirts and packing into envelopes and applying mailing labels in invaluable to our students. This is our way of seeing it happen.
We would love to hear of similar programs started in your area.
Visit us on FB and Instagram @cafethree21
Also - if you would like to help fund our summer Cafe' here is our GoFundMe link: gf.me/u/ycutn4
God bless and keep you all!
