WHEATON, IL — Doodlebug Workshop started with a dream to help provide opportunities for adults with special needs. That dream, which blossomed into a nonprofit operated out of owner Sarah Starke's one-bedroom apartment, recently hit a new stride with a permanent storefront in downtown Wheaton.

The workshop and job training center had hoped to host its grand opening in 2020, but that goal was delayed due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, Starke told Patch.

"It felt like every other week there were new rules," she said. After two years of waiting, Starke hosted a ribbon-cutting event in early May, with Wheaton Mayor Phil Suess and about 65 people in attendance.

The visitors enjoyed tacos and margaritas while learning about Doodlebug Workshop's mission and checking out the shop's handmade birdhouses and decorative yard signs, plants and other offerings.

Starke told Patch it was "nice to finally be able to do that."

Starke got the idea for Doodlebug Workshop in 2017, as her son, Alex, who has Fragile X Syndrome, started to age out of his school's transition program. Fragile X Syndrome is a can lead to cognitive impairment and learning challenges.

"A lot of special needs get plugged into food service, hospitality and janitorial work," Starke told Patch. "I wanted something more for him."

Her first idea was to work with Alex and other special needs adults to create growth charts for measuring children's heights. Starke said she posted in a mom's group on Facebook and was overwhelmed by the support she received, getting 42 orders in 36 hours, along with uplifting messages that included "what an awesome idea" and "we love this."

"We just went from that to where we're at now," Starke told Patch of Doodlebug Workshop, which got its name from a childhood nickname she gave Alex.

Starke worked with a "core group" of friends and family members to source tools and come up with more do-it-yourself projects, eventually expanding into a nonprofit workshop in 2018 that occupied a two-car garage in Wheaton.

Members of the local VFW added heaters to the garage space, allowing Doodlebug Workshop to craft its creations year-round. Starke ultimately added 22 grow boxes outside the garage, so the team at Doodlebug could start a horticultural program, planting vegetables that they donated to People's Resource Center to provide food for community members.

In February 2020, Starke signed a lease for a storefront at 314 Main St., hoping to offer more day programs and job training for special needs adults. That March, coronavirus hit, forcing Starke to temporarily shift gears as her program participants were stuck at home amid the lockdown.

It was "kind of frustrating because we had just gotten the space," Starke told Patch.

To keep her homebound participants engaged and active, in April, Starke began "dropping crates of wood at participants' houses, so families had projects that they could work on while they were at home."

Now, the day programs have returned to the new space Doodlebug Workshop occupies, giving more and more special needs adults opportunities to learn skills they need to find a wider array of options in the job market. She said those training sessions, along with the work participants do in the workshop's retail space, helps fill them with a sense of pride and purpose.

"They find a lot of joy in bragging about their work to people," Starke said. "They like to talk about how they do it" and "they love giving tours" of the shop.

The expanded space is something Starke herself appreciates too.

"It's amazing to have that presence and not be in my garage trying to sell things on Facebook marketplace," she told Patch.

In the future, she's hoping to add a computer lab to Doodlebug Workshop to give special needs adults a place to hone their computer skills as well.

Doodlebug Workshop's spirit of giving extends throughout Wheaton and surrounding suburbs as well. Since the workshop's inception, Starke and her team has partnered with the Wheaton Park District and Warrenville VFW Post 8081 to create and place thousands of flags for the Field of Honor at Seven Gables Park each Independence Day.

Doodlebug Workshop has also made care packages for Support Over Stigma, which provides coats, candy, pet food and other items to aid local veterans.

Starke said it has been rewarding to see Doodlebug Workshop's participants "out in the community so much working with other organizations."

She hopes this presence, along with the Main Street storefront, will help people better appreciate the many things adults with special needs have to offer their communities.

"I call them ambassadors to the special needs community," Starke said of her participants. "I see them changing people's perspectives."

"People assume that they can't do things, but coming here, they show people that they can," Starke said.

"The stigma of special needs diminishes with them learning their abilities, skills and self-confidence, being out there in the community and showing people what they can do."

Click the link to learn more about Doodlebug Workshop.

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