As Susan and her husband, Bill, were coming to terms with their son’s diagnosis of Asperger’s, they made the decision to go to an autism convention that had come to Louisville. Susan went to a breakout session that was about students with autism learning the necessary job skills for employment while working on a farm!
Because she grew up on a farm, she knew the amazing benefits of working in the dirt, lifting bales of hay, planting and harvesting and the myriad of other chores to be done! She was sure that a program like this is what would be the next step in her journey of life. She connected with the “director of the program” who turned out to be a dad whose son was working on a farm and doing very well and who was convinced that this could be a great program.
She called me, Suellen, from the conference and told me all about this farming program and was almost in tears because she was so excited! Together we talked about how good this could be and that my husband had talked about wanting to be a farmer and how neat that would be to spend the rest of our working days on the farm.
Fast forward a year or so, Susan kept researching how to make a program like this successful. Together we contacted a few farms who were training those with special needs. We heard stories that were really encouraging, but we still weren’t sure how this was going to work here. Greg and I had the God given opportunity to work on a hobby farm and were given full reign over the massive garden with training from the farmers.
In December of 2017, we had our first board meeting! We were following leads to using farm land and building a house and living on the farm where the program would happen.
That next spring, we had the unique privilege of selling our harvest at the local farmer’s market and although some veggies were sold, it was a slow and frustrating time. Our harvest was pitiful and because we were trying to farm organically, bugs were a huge problem! We had a lot of head knowledge because we read a lot of books and watched a lot of videos on how to successfully farm organically, we just didn’t have green thumbs. Mine is actually a shade of black!
Toward the end of the market season in 2018, Susan and I had a long conversation about the direction of the program because I was very discouraged about our lack of farming prowess and the bleak outlook on actually making enough money by selling fruits and vegetables to sustain a program. It was during that conversation that God revealed to us that Greg and I were not meant to be farmers, we were meant to cook and run a restaurant! What had happened at the market was that I got my sampling license which meant that Greg could make a recipe that included an ingredient that we grew and we could sample it to our customers. What we discovered was that people wanted to buy the cooked food and not the raw ingredients.
We decided that we could probably incorporate both the farming (because the students would still learning so much through it) and the restaurant (because this is what we know and the students would learn a lot through it)!
In the summer of 2019, Greg and I and the other board members all participated in the farmer’s market again, only this time, we sold cooked food (yes, we got a temporary food license) and it was a hit! We developed a customer base that loved our food and that was aware of our ultimate goal of using a restaurant and a farm to help young adults gain the skills necessary to secure gainful employment.
In essence, we are still on the first steps of our journey, but the plan is more focused by focusing on young adults with mild to moderate autism, and more integrated by including cognitive skills training, vestibular therapy, parent training and vocational training. We are on the cusp of putting our preliminary program into play and although it feels like a long time coming, God has been behind the timing the entire time! He knew what we needed to learn and what needed to happen in order to be successful in helping these very special young adults.