As a dad of 4 children, Joel Wegener of Loveland, Ohio, is always looking out for his kids. That includes Mary Kate, who is 18. She has Down syndrome （唐氏综合征）, which, unfortunately, has made it difficult for her to find employment.

Mary Kate finished up at Pathways, a program designed for people of all abilities, not long ago. While she was there, she was often asked questions about what she would like to do. Her answer---“I wanna work with Papa. ” That's when Joel decided to take action to make her dreams come true.

One of his first steps was buying an ice cream truck. Fittingly, he was able to purchase one from another family with special needs in Indiana. Soon after, his wife came up with a perfect name for their new business: Special Neat Treats.

Although their business is still relatively new, they're already a massive hit! In fact, according to Joel, they're “exceeding expectations” with thousands of desserts sold. They're even planning on expanding outside of the Cincinnati area with more trucks next summer.

All the while Joel is spending precious time with his child and teaching her valuable financial and social skills, such as how to manage money and how to interact with customers. One thing the teen loves best is smiling and waving to customers who, according to Mary, go crazy for their ice cream!

Joel created this business for his kid, but their mission goes beyond their family. It's about the special needs community as a whole and raising awareness about the difficulties they face. Joel shows other parents that there is something creative out of the box hat we can come up with for our family and for our kids to do.

“Almost every time I find a family with special needs, it's just been an unbelievable journey, ”Joel said. “No matter what your abilities are, there's something that you can do and you can spread joy and interact with other people. ”

Another Reason

It was a quiet village in which there was a military camp. It was far from the towns and cities and there were some high mountains around. Of course it was a good place for training the new soldiers. But it was difficult for the young men to go outside. Mr. White, an officer of forty, was strict with them and he hardly let them leave the camp.

Once Mr. White was ill in bed. He couldn’t work and a young officer, Mr. Hunt, began to train the new soldiers instead of him. He knew the young men well and let nine soldiers go to the nearest town to have a holiday. But night fell and none came back to the camp. He was worried about it and stood at the gate. It was five to twelve when Mr. Hunt decided to go to the town and see what was happening with the young men. He started the car quickly and set off. At that moment the nine soldiers came back. It seemed they were all drunk. Of course they found the officer was angry.

“I’m sorry, sir,” said the first soldier. “I left the town on time. But something was wrong with my bus on my way here. I had to buy a horse and made it run fast. Bad luck! It died and I had to run back.”

And the other seven soldiers said they were late for the same reasons. It was the last soldier’s turn. He said, “I’m sorry, sir. I got on a bus on time, but…”

Having heard this, the officer became even angrier and stopped him at once. He called out, “If you say something was wrong with your bus, I’ll punish you at once!”

“No, no, sir,” said the young man. “My bus was all right, but the dead horses were in its way!”