By Joseph L Campos Jr.
The Sugar Plum Festival returned to the Buena Park Mall last week, and it brought the spirit and excitement of the Halloween holiday early. There was great food, music and a lot of happy faces as the event-goers scampered about in search of Halloween decorations, pastries and autumn jewelry to purchase. Beautiful hues of orange, gold, red and yellow filled the venue, as the Buena Park Mall’s basement location became filled with spectators and festival aficionados.
There were a lot of wonderful floral arrangements and antique furniture for sale at this year’s event. A wide variety of patterns were available to choose from, which kept treasure hunters, artists and collectors very happy. There was also a much larger display of comic book memorabilia at this year’s Halloween event as well. Comic book collectors had a large assortment to choose from with stories geared toward DC heroes like Superman, Wonder Woman and Batman, along with the rest of the Justice League. The X-Men seemed like a hot item as well this time around. There were a lot of great reads from this Marvel iconic story line.
Much of the items for this fall’s Sugar Plum Festival consisted of a backdrop pertaining to helping people. It was all about sending a positive and inspiring message in a dark world to uphold a light, or beacon of hope for all of humanity to thrive on. One of this year’s top vendors that was leading this charge was Isabel Alvarez and her husband Albert, with their delicious scented candles boutique titled Albisa.
Each of her candles are hand-poured and are molded in a variety of scents. They also come with a large selection of positive messages and pearls of wisdom to promote self-confidence and to help people fight through trying times.
“Each of our candles help people to believe in themselves,” explains Alvarez. “I am a very confident person, but I have friends that do not feel good about themselves, and I have to constantly tell them that they are beautiful, because they don’t believe it. It is important to feel good about yourself. This is why my husband and I decided to make our product to help people, to inspire them and to help them get through all of life’s many struggles.”
One of the big messages that Isabel’s candles have are that “my faith is bigger than my problems.” There are a lot of beautiful messages about life on every single one of the candles. “We also have many formulated lotions that we also make ourselves too,” states Alvarez. “They are formed with holiday scents just like our candles are. We have some scents that are our main lines of products, but then we have some special editions that fit in with specific seasons or holidays.”
There are seven lotion scents—four holiday scents, and three regular. They are all TSA-approved and can be taken on a plane by travelers. The scented candles are also packaged in special travel tins that are TSA-approved. Overall, there are ten different scents for the candles, each one based on the elements of different seasons and weather.
“This is our fourth year attending the Sugar Plum Festival,” states Alvarez. “My husband and I have been running our business though since 2009. It is a wonderful team effort.”
Alvarez’s hottest selling item is the Mango Papaya meditation candle. It has a sweet and delicious tone to it that is really calming when breathed in deeply. A lot of various mixing and pouring procedures go into cultivating the delicious scented candles, and it takes about 24 hours to complete the pouring properly. Some of the different styles of scented candles that are offered by Albisa are Baked Apple, Christmas Tree, White Pumpkin and Pumpkin Spice.
“My personal favorite is a bright autumn flavored one titled Dusk,” explains Alvarez.
The Dusk candle has a smooth, creamy aura to it and is very refreshing. It serves as a fun choice for a dinner party or a Thanksgiving feast day.
Isabel and Albert Alvarez come all the way from Los Angeles to showcase their talent at the Sugar Plum Festival.
“The customers here in Buena Park are always so amazing,” exclaims Isabel. “They love our holiday scents and always come back to show us love. As an entrepreneur, it makes me feel good that people enjoy our work and our art. It makes me cry tears of joy when I see my old customers come back. It brings me so much happiness that they love my work and that I am able to help them. I take this relationship between our customers very personally.”
Isabel and Albert are planning on coming back for the big Sugar Plum Festival Christmas event in December.
A brilliant vendor that captured the hearts and taste buds of Sugar Plum Festival goers was Maureen De Long Staab with her food condiment company called Essenco.
Staab has been a professional chef for over 30 years and is a graduate of The Culinary Institute of America in New York. She has also served as a professor in Culinary Arts for man years and has had her personal products reach supermarket level.
She has been to the Sugar Plum Festival in the past and has showcased her meat pie business. Sadly, she had to end that business after a severe car accident left her injured. Yet she has healed up fairly well and is back at the Sugar Plum Festival showcasing a brand new item. This time Staab is one of the top distributors of a high-end line of German culinary sauces for the Essendorfer Genusschmelzerei company. Staab partnered up with famed and renowned German chef and world traveler Andreas Essendorfer to bring these sauces to America. The two of them met at the National Restaurant Association Convention in Chicago.
It was at this meeting that Staab and Essendorfer teamed up to bring these sauces and condiments to the state of California.
“I tried one sample of Essendorfer’s and I was like, ‘I have got to be part of this wonderful endeavor,’” explains Staab. “The sauces were all of such high quality that it was just a product that inspired me and that I was able to endorse. It was something that I could believe in. Another thing that really inspired me about the products is that they are all coming from a non-GMO country. They have no preservatives and are all-natural. All of the sauces have been curated and preserved with German whiskey or brandy.”
The sauces are developed from the natural ingredients and recipes of ancient Germany, and are cultivated at the Taubenstein Summit, deep within the Bavarian Alps.
Essendorfer travels, and mixes spices, fruits, minerals and vegetables within his sauces with flavors from Asia, Africa, various parts of Europe and many other parts of the world.
Staab has lived with her family in Oceanside for over 20 years and simply loves the Sugar Plum Festival.
“Buena Park has amazing customers. They are loyal, friendly and they like top-class items. They have a very sophisticated palette when it comes to their sense of cuisine and food altogether. Many here seem well-traveled and very cultured as well,” she said.
Another very interesting vendor shared her story. Her name is Gisselle Sequeira of Honey Bunny Cottage Hand Crafted Items.
Sequeira specializes in handcrafted items, furniture and other types of carpentry. All of her products are made in America and are very beautiful and artistic. She has very trendy office box organizers that she has built herself to hold pens, note cards and papers.
Yet her journey to get this far in her artwork was not an easy road to travel.
“I used to work for Verizon Wireless Cellular Phone Company,” explains Sequeria. “Unfortunately they laid me off. They moved my job position to Chicago. They told me that I could still keep the job if I moved there. I couldn’t though, because I have to take care of my aging mother here in California, and she is very ill. I could not just pick up and leave her alone.”
Sequeria applied for over 700 different jobs during the great recession, to no avail.
“I was in my garage and home and I prayed and prayed. Then I heard a voice. Christ said to me, ‘I can teach you to make carpentry work.’ I honestly didn’t know what to think. I was a customer service representative for Verizon Wireless. I was more of a technological type of person with my expertise. I was not a craftsman of any sort. Then Jesus Christ spoke to me again, and told me just to trust in Him. So I did. I went down to some stores by the Circle of Orange and bought a bunch of supplies.”
For two years now Sequeira has been making her handcrafted woodwork.
“It is all Jesus Christ,” exclaims Sequeira. “He taught me how to make every single one of them. I am a believer and I can tell you that I truly believe that. I have never went to school to do this type of artwork.”
Sequeira is an Anaheim native and plans on taking some art classes at Cypress College to help her learn to perfect her craft when it comes to carpentry.
“I give Jesus Christ all of the glory,” says Sequeira. “I am here at the Sugar Plum Festival because of Him. Christ will use you and your talent if you want to be used. I am going to continue to make my office boxes, furniture and ladders, and am still going to continue to chase my dreams. My ultimate dream is to be able to open a store in every state here in America so I can sell my carpentry work.”
To view or inquire about the products described, visit www.albisacandles.com or www.essenco.us or email gisselle.sequeira@gmail.com.
