Meet Star Vigil | Entrepreneur & Mom

We had the good fortune of connecting with Star Vigil and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Star, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
My thought process for starting Sweet Ella’s…

Well, it wasn’t something me or my husband ever thought we would be doing.

The year was 2017 and I was enjoying being a mother well working the after noon’s at a salon and my husband was experiencing a highly successful career in Corporate America.

But life has a funny way of happening. It was December 21, 2017 and it would be a day that forever changed our family. That morning our sweet Ella woke up with a swollen knee and couldn’t walk.

As a parent it was very alarming, but we had no idea what was to come next.
After months and months of hospital visits and specialist after specialist Ella
was diagnosed with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis. I will never forget the feeling of not only receiving the diagnosis, but having a doctor look me eye to eye and say I will never do the research that you will as a parent to help your daughter. After the initial anger that pulsed through my body, I actually felt grateful for the honesty. And in that moment, we knew we were in for journey.

We then sought help from a Naturopathic and Functional Medicine doctor.
Surprisingly they both recommended a change in diet. Diet? Food as medicine was a foreign concept to us at the time. But after countless hours of research, prayer, and sleepless nights we had come up with a plan of treatment. We started off with an anti-inflammatory diet (Paleo AIP) next we incorporated chiropractic care, massage therapy, physical therapy, occupational therapy, and a focus on her emotional well-being.

Within weeks we began to see an incredible change in Ella as well as ourselves, both me and my husband lost 20 + pounds following our new diet. It was a family affair and things really started looking up, we felt like we were living life again. But like I said earlier, life has a funny way of happening.

Ella was just a toddler and holidays / birthdays / celebrations all started to
become very stressful. She would constantly ask why she couldn’t have the
food or eat what everybody else was eating. So, we started creating recipes
with our ingredients that mimicked what everybody else was having. To say
it wasn’t an easy task is an understatement, but nobody wants to be left
out, and soon, everybody started wanting what we were having. Things
started looking up again.

Then we had a follow up visit with Ella’s functional medicine doctor in Colorado Springs and received great news about her progress. We were overjoyed and wanted to celebrate with a sweet treat. We drove all over the city looking for something that met our needs (Gluten Free, Organic, NON GMO, no refined sugars, no refined oils, nothing artificial) but were unsuccessful. As we drove away from the last stop this little voice (Ella) spoke up and said “we need to do something, we need to help people like me.”

It really affected both me and my husband. Afterwards we talked about what
had happened and decided that we didn’t want any parent to experience
the pain that we had felt. Little by little things started coming together and
Sweet Ella’s was born!

With the help of countless people, we were able to turn our mess into a
message. Today we get to serve our community, not only with Sweet Ella’s,
but through educating, encouraging, and helping families work towards achieving healthier lifestyles.

What should our readers know about your business?
What sets us apart is the care and attention to detail that goes into our product.

Our Sweet Ella’s standard is Gluten Free, Non GMO, Organic ingredients, no refined oils, no refined sugars, nothing artificial, original recipes, and made from scratch.

But doing all of that and still making something that people want to eat regardless of their lifestyle or how they eat.

It was not easy, standard baking is an art a science, now throw in completely different set of ingredients to try and produce a product you remember was challenging to say the least.

We’ve learned too many lessons to just list one, but through the challenges is where you grow and learn what not to do. Understanding that you need to be a constant student and actively search for the lesson to be learned in every situation.

I would want people who are struggling with health issues to know that they are not alone, it is the whole foundation of our business. We are here to turn our mess into a message.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
The Pueblo River Walk
The Pueblo Reservoir
Pueblo Motorsports Park
Center for American Values
Depending on how they eat or lifestyle

the places to eat are:
21 Steak
Coors Tavern
Passkey
Do Drop In
Iannes
Mill Stop Cafe

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
First and foremost we would like to thank our Lord and savior Jesus Christ.We have been blessed and supported by so many incredible people throughout this journey.

Special shoutouts to Patricia, (mother in law) Cindy, (mom) the Padula’s, the DeRose’s, all of our friends, family, and customers.

We’ve had some great mentors Tony Robbins, Ed Mylett, Dean Graziosi, Jeff Lerner, and Todd L. Campbell just to name a few.

We love books but if I had to name a book that I think the world could benefit from and had an influence in my life is The Power of Positive Thinking by Dr. Norman Vincent Peale.

Website: https://sweetellasco.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sweetellasco/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SweetEllasDesserts/

Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@sweetellas16