WRITTEN BY CHERYL WELLS
I have been sharing about what it took for me to step into the coffee and bakery business some 14 years ago, and you can look back at my past blogs to get the beginning stories. What a faith journey it has been. If these walls could talk! So much has happened and over time I expanded by adding space and buying buildings around me. When I started I had just one building that was narrow and long with also a basement and a second story. I needed room for serving people and all the equipment that it would take, as well as I wanted a courtyard out back that would be beautiful. With our seating in the second story, I would need a fire escape that took room out back also, so the building couldn’t go all the way to the alley. In the basement I put the kitchen and the dishwasher, so we needed a dumb waiter – which we have always called a smart waiter. At my house we didn’t say the dumb word. On our wall above the waiter, it said smart waiter and was always referred to as that. It’s funny, no one called it anything other than that. Also, in the basement we had room for storage, which is super important. We used every space available for boxes of cups and straws and lids, and cases of things that the kitchen needed to prepare food.
As a result of all of that, our dining area on the main floor was really small. Because we had dining on the main floor, we didn’t have to have an elevator, but we could only seat about 24 people on the main floor. We had asked to buy the building to the south, but the owner wasn’t interested.
On the day of our 1st anniversary of the coffeehouse she came over and asked me if I wanted to buy her building. This would really help us to add seating on the main floor and also, we could move our kitchen upstairs and also our dishwasher. We were able to add a walk-in cooler and freezer. There was a huge basement also because this building is only a single story and there is no need for a fire escape, so the building was much more square feet and went all the way to the alley.
The building was in pretty good shape, and we just remodeled it, instead of tearing it down and building new, like we did for the store. We were so excited about the possibility of having a big kitchen on the main floor, and it turned out beautiful. We added seating in the front of the new building for about 40 more people and that was huge for us. The two buildings are side by side, so it meant that we had to cut big entryways into the walls in the dining area and the serving area into what would be the new kitchen. We also cut into the wall in the basement in one place. It turns out that in order to do that, it is a really big mess.
We had to close for a time, and it took so much work to close everything down and then clean up all the mess and put everything back together. We have lots of funny stories and pictures of our staff cleaning with toothbrushes trying to get things ready to open back up. Just thinking about it makes me anxious and tired. So many things that have happened over time and so many lessons. So much provision by God with all the transitions and the theme was always that “we have everything we need”.
That has been the constant thing that I have said and continue to say. Perspective and attitude make all the difference in life. I have learned to laugh at myself and really just laugh when things get tough. Laughter is a good medicine and that came from the Bible. Proverbs 17:22 says that a merry heart doeth good like a medicine. My car license plate says cheerfl. Another version of this verse is “a cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones”. It has been a proverb that I have talked about a lot with people.
We have to guard our heart and our spirit from the heaviness that can overcome us. We can laugh and we can remind ourselves that God promises us that we do have everything we need. And it has been proven over time in my life. Like I said, oh the stories that these walls could tell if they could talk. I’m so grateful that as I’m willing to take the hard steps and do the work, that God will lead me to the full life that He has for me in every way.