SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (WAND) - It hasn't been the easiest few months for restaurants and small businesses across the country, but Emily Lewis said she isn't letting the pandemic get in the way of following her dreams.

"When my husband and I met, we actually started baking together, so we started at the Farmers Market back in 2015," Lewis said. "We were 18 and 19 years old, and it just kind of blew up from there."

Lewis said it all started with a childhood dream.

"I've known since I was a little girl that some day, I wanted to own businesses ... bakeries ... ice cream shops," Lewis said.

That dream became a reality for Emily and her husband, Tim, because now, the pair owns not one, not two, but three businesses in Springfield!

The first that opened was Three Twigs Bakery.

"We moved out to Toronto Road with the bakery in the beginning of 2018," Lewis said.

Next was an all-day brunch spot.

"We had the opportunity where we saw another business close down," Lewis said. "We thought Springfield really needed an all-the-time, all-menu, all-day brunch spot, so we opened Biscuits and Brunch."

On the week of Sept. 14, the duo opened their third business, the Salted Lemon Company. According to Lewis, the ice cream shop uses only locally-sourced ingredients.

"Every product used in here is from Kilgus Farms, which is a small family dairy farm," Lewis said.

Those ingredients are the foundation to some of the ice cream shop's most unique flavors.

"Ube - I have a lot of people saying what's Ub or what's Ube," Lewis said. "I love when people ask that, because it's an opportunity to show them something they've never heard of before. It's actually a purple sweet potato. It's really popular in the Philippines."

Marketing Manager Kelsey Atkinson said the Salted Lemon puts a twist on anyone's ice cream shop experience.

"I think the chocolate coffee ice cream is one of my favorites, especially in the pancake cones," Atkinson said. "The salt, pepper and caramel, whenever we were making that; I was like pepper ... in ice cream? [Emily] really she knows what she's doing."

The Lewis family not only opened the Salted Lemon, but Biscuits and Brunch during the pandemic, and Lewis said the risk was worth the reward.

"A lot of people think I'm insane for that, but honestly, I told myself I have this vision for myself and the community, and I'm not going to let anything get in the way," Lewis said. "When you're searching for joy in such a dark space right now, this is what I think we needed."

While the city of Springfield has seen several businesses moving out of the downtown area, the family decided to move Three Twigs Bakery into the heart of the city, bringing their business full circle and right back where it started. 

"I have a really special place in my heart for downtown," Lewis said. "That's where my husband and I started at the Farmers Market on Adams Street. We always knew one day, we'd go home."

Lewis said the goal is the have the bakery officially moved downtown by the end of October.