On February 26, 27 and 28, 2010, I will be hosting a weekend gathering called SISTER GIANT: Rousing the Sleeping Giant of American Womanhood.
This seminar/conference speaks to the role of women at this pivotal moment in history. It’s a critically important time to transition from disastrous probabilities to fantastic possibilities, and women can lead the way.
If you are a woman who feels a prompting in your heart that goes something like this: “Okay, it’s time. I might not be perfect, but I’m good enough. And I’m ready,” then this invitation is for you.
During SISTER GIANT, we will review the historic forces that quelled the voice of the Western woman, as well as those that both challenge and invite us to speak our truth now. I hope you will come to Los Angeles on February 26th to join with other women who feel moved to both find our greatness and to do something great.
We will journey from an understanding of our history …. to a reclaiming of our personal power …. and ultimately to a vital commitment to be a powerful collective force in eradicating hunger and poverty on the planet today. It is time for us to change the world.
We will look within, and we will look without. In partnership with the RESULTS organization, we will work on forming a women’s delegation to the regional Microcredit Conference in Nairobi, Kenya, in April 2010.
Sister Giant will take place at the Hilton Los Angeles Airport Hotel. The cost of the seminar will be a suggested donation of $250 but no one will be turned away for lack of funds.
I’ll admit it I bought the Dance of Shiva DVD months ago. I tried it a few times, but my shoulder started acting up (for some odd reason, I sleep with my right arm thrown up above my head as high as I can – go figure) so I didn’t push it. I’d pick it back up from time to time, but even though I was enjoying it, I just didn’t feel like it was doing much for me. So I went about with my business.
But in the back of my mind, it was always there taunting me.
Havi promised that there’d be hot buttered epiphanies and dammit, I wanted my epiphanies! I figured the new year was the perfect time to start up again. This time, I’d commit to 3 or more days a week.
Instead of constantly playing the DVD from my computer, I figured I’d look into burning the Level I practice onto my computer instead. Easy peasy, right?
Not.
But before we even get started talking about today’s Shiva Nata experience, let’s take a brief moment to learn more about it what it actually is (according to Havi Brooks)…
Andrey Lappa’s Dance of Shiva™ — is a unique (and visually stunning), flowing yoga-based movement form that actually restructures neural connections in your brain.
Cool, but why would someone want to do that? Because creating more connections in the brain means you are inviting more light bulb moments into your life. “Light bulb moments”, “hot buttered insights” or “moments of bing” — it doesn’t matter what you call them. You know them when they show up.
And really, who wouldn’t want more “moments of bing,” right?
Here’s a quick Havi video (no sound, quite beautiful) so you can get a visual of what it’s all about.
Okay, so back to my return to Shiva Nata…
The short version: I couldn’t get the right application to pop open, so no downloading for me today. No biggie. I’ll just set a bookmark instead.
The longer version: I’ve been doing it wrong this entire time!
I know Havi tells us over and over that we will be doing it wrong and that that’s just fine. She tells us that it’s not about getting it right. It’s the very wrongness, the clumsiness if you will, that keeps those synapses snapping and the “hot buttered epiphanies” coming.
But, um…I don’t even know what I’ve been doing here.
The “practice” I’ve been well, practicing just had some very basic horizontal and vertical movements. Simple, single, flowing movements. And well, I was actually quite impressed by how much better I was getting at them each time. It was like my brain recognized the movements and just kind of went with the flow. Flubs and all.
I felt like even in my wrongness, I was doing it right.
Today though, since I was looking to see if there was a way to make a copy, I found the Main Theory and Practice Menu. Giving up on the copying thing, I figured okay, one practice with Level I it is.
Only, I’d never seen this Level I before.
And what in the world were these combination things he was doing?!?!?!
So much for my perceived level of comfort. Now I get what Havi was talking about when she suggested you learnmemorizehave burned into your brain the names of each arm position before ever really jumping into the practice. Because once you get to the actual Level I practice you’ll be combining shit left and right, vertical and horizontal. And holy crap, but slow was even to fast for me.
Now I’m at a loss. Do I try to flub my way through the actual Level I practice? I mean if you can’t do it wrong, then it must be okay to flub it all up, right? Or do I go back to whatever it was I was doing when I thought I was doing Level I and just get more comfortable with my movements? And maybe learn the positions and their names a bit better?
And what in the world was I doing if it wasn’t Level I? I mean it was called some sort of practice…a beautiful, doable, sloooow practice. Without mixed movements.
Now that I write this out, I’m thinking that going back to that practice just might be the better plan.
The good news through all of this…there wasn’t a big freakout involved. No massive frustration or outrage. No disappointment. Just your dog-like, tilt of the head, huh? moment. Well that and the urge to come here and blog about it, of course.
That said…I’m so loving this new energy that’s all around lately. It’s some good stuff.
I’ll admit it, I’m a geek. I’m not a total geek mind you (I’m totally not a fan of gaming), but I do have many geeky loves. One of my geeky loves (aside from all things social media related)…Dr Horrible’s Singalong Blog.
Check out this AmberMac interview with Felicia Day from the Guild (talk about awesome geekiness) for a little geeky fun.
Was a new iPod ready, car stereo system. Nothing extravagant. Just something that will let me listen to something other than shitty LA radio.
Then my husband did something amazing.
He said I could go to a jeweler friend’s house and pick out something sparkly! This was awesome! I’d been eying a WTF diamond necklace that I know had his okay to buy (even though it was totally and absolutely frivolous…but so very me). Of course, once present with a bevy of sparkling pretties, I fell in love with a pair of earrings. Since they were more than the necklace, I figured I’d run it by him first and get his thoughts.
So home I went.
Until I overheated. And called AAA. And found out that it would cost an additional $70 to tow my car home since we were out of the “7 miles free” zone.
Three hours later, we managed to get it safely to my friend’s house while we headed home to figure out what to do with it the following day…Christmas Eve.
We took about 3 hours, driving in small, three mile increments until we got within range and had it towed home. Where it sat until we were able to tow it to the guy that worked on the radiator last time out in West LA.
Which brings us to today and my Christmas present…no sparkly jewelry. No new car stereo.
Nope, instead, I get a new radiator cap (seems that was the whole problem), a new timing belt, a new water pump and some new spark plugs (which he suggested I get last time he had my car).
I can’t say it’s what I’ve always wanted. But it will be nice to know that for the most part, my car will be set for the next five or so years.
Hope your holidays brought you something that you’ve been wanting (rather than needing).
And hey, I have one last fall semester pay check coming my way. I just might buy myself that new car stereo after all 😉
It was a very laid back kind of vacation. We’d been to the Mendocino coast quite a few times before, but this was the first time we went in the winter. The best part of the whole visit, since we’d been so many times, there wasn’t any sort obligation to do anything vacationy. Very cool. And it made for a very relaxing time.
We needed something that was pet friendly since we drove up and brought the little guy with us. We found a lovely cottage that not only had it’s own kitchen (nice) and allowed dogs…the Cottages at Little River Cove.
I must say, this place rocked!! It was a compound of nine cottages (some one bedroom, some two bedroom) with a central courtyard. It wasn’t right on the bluff, but on a clear day, we could see the waves crashing below. With the beautiful large windows, you could see it all – well, on those days when you could actually see through the fog.
And since out cottage had a kitchen, we were able to have some meals (snacks) in and didn’t need to go out for everything. Though I have to say, nothing beats enjoying some good wine and cheese fireside.
We also made sure to stop by our favorite restaurant in Healdsburg, Zin. This place has never let us down. Everything we’ve ordered has been awesome. And of course, the wine is always good 😉
I think this was easily our best vacation ever (though last year’s trip to Ireland was quite awesome, just not quite as relaxing).
So now the vacation is officially over and it’s time to get back to work *sigh*
Oh yeah he is. And if it wasn’t for Mr. Ian Somerhalder I wouldn’t even be watching this show. He’s so much hotter than when he was wimpy ol’ Boone on Lost. Ooh, but rumor has it, he’ll be back for this final season on Lost. Woohoo!
Thank God for Turkish video sites…otherwise I wouldn’t be able to embed this hotness (my fave part about a minute in).
Enjoy and Merry Christmas!
If you need a better quality video, you know, to appreciate the fine cinematography and whatnot, try this YouTube clip (I have a feeling CW was blocking all embedding ability which was why I was left to find a Turkish, embeddable clip).
Sitting in my coastal vacation cabin on a rainy day, I’m reminded of what a fun time I had last weekend in the rain. Let’s face it, on most rainy days, you don’t want to leave the house. But for cupcakes, seventeen bloggers will brave the rain! Even better knowing that it’s a Best of Tour and that we’ll be chauffeured around in the rain from cupcake shop to cupcake shop thanks to the good folks at Chevy GM and Best of Tours.
The Best of Tours are new concept with Chevy and General Motors. It’s a way for consumers (or in this case, cupcake fans) to get out and not only try our the 2010 Equinox and Camaro, but to also try out their favorite food stuffs. Prior to our cupcake tour, they were on the USC campus taking college students to various fast food restaurants during study breaks.
I’ll admit it, I might be a Jersey girl, but I’m not a girl that loves cars…even if they are Transformer-edition Camaros (though it did look hot!). I’m more about luxury so I was sticking to the Equinox. I must say, it was a perfect ride for a rainy day, very smooth, very comfortable, and a great sound system. It comfortably fit five (including the driver) and that was all that mattered to me. 😉
To be honest, I’m not even sure where to begin. So I guess I’ll play the obvious card here and begin at the beginning.
First stop…Crumbs Bake Shop. I have to say, up until this point, I pretty much wrote Crumbs off. I’d been to both the Beverly Hills location and the Glendale location a couple times and each time, I was less than impressed. This visit changed all that for me. I have to say, Crumbs will now be my go to cupcake shop. I think tasting fresh cupcakes at the beginning of the day vs. tasting cupcakes at the end of the day might have something to do with it.
We were treated the best out of all four shops here. It all started with our own personal greeting by the west coast partner, Harley Bauer. Nothing makes you feel as welcome as entering en masse into a shop and having the owner walk out loaded down with bags of cupcake goodness. He invited us to help ourselves and reminded us that if there was anything else we wanted to taste to just let him know and he’d set us up. I tried the chocolate pecan pie and fell instantly in love. I’ve never been one to say that something is too rich, but wow, this was rich (but in a good way, of course!).
I also wanted to try the winter flavor, White Hot Chocolate. I’m not really a fan of white chocolate (I just can’t get over the fact that it’s not real chocolate), but it looked amazing. I was lucky enough to mooch a small taste from one of the gals and was quite impressed. Before passing us on to the next shop on the tour, Harley gave us all bags to store our leftover cupcakes and sent us on our way back into the rain with hot coffee (or water). Smart move and very, very much appreciated.
Next up…it was a quick walk to Sprinkles. These guys pretty much started the cupcake craze here in LA, but it was my least favorite of the bunch. It probably didn’t help to sway me by offering up their most boring traditional flavors: chocolate, vanilla and red velvet. The good thing about Sprinkles is that they’re predictable and you always know you’ll get a good cupcake. But with most of my friends, we’ve pretty much decided it’s just not worth the hype. It didn’t help that we had to taste our cupcakes curbside in everyone’s way (then again, their space is so small, there wasn’t room for us inside anyway).
From there, it was back into the fabulous Equinox to head over to SusieCakes. At this point, I just wasn’t feeling trying to eat another cupcake standing up. I also thought that since I was bringing leftover cupcake goodness home, that the least I could do was bring home something for the hubs. So I picked up a lemon cupcake* for him. I didn’t find out until later (lack of research on my part, I know) that SusieCakes’ strawberry cupcake is known as being Martha Stewart’s favorite cupcake. If I’d known, I would have definitely tried that. Lucky for me, Tara let me have a taste of the strawberry frosting and wow, it was good!
The last stop…Vanilla Bake Shop. I wasn’t so impressed with this location. Or maybe it’s just that I’m now used to so many flavors and choices (like with Crumbs and Sprinkles). This time around again, I decided to pick something up for my husband and again went with the lemon flavored cupcake. I loved it and thought it was very tasty. Quite a few folks in the group were turned off by the raw sugar sprinkling and passed to try the key lime cupcake instead (later to write it off as horribly dry and lackluster). I liked the crunch of the sugar (my husband, on the other hand, did not).
Management was also a little grumpy about photos (and samples…duh, we didn’t expect any samples and who would???) so I don’t have any photos from here. H.C. of LA/OC Foodventures took a photo of his chocolate cupcake in the bathroom (photo here). Point taken, I’d say.
Then it was back into the rain to hop into the Equinox one last time to head back to the Pacific Design Center to head back home. We were told to try the Onstar button for turn by turn navigation, but it wasn’t activated in the car we were in. Like any good hostess, Tara wouldn’t let anyone go before we got a cupcake-inspired goody bag chock full of cupcake stickers and lip gloss, a stylish InStyle book (which I love more than you can imagine being someone without style), and the coolest thing to ever find in a swag bag..a Tiffany keychain with the GM logo. Yes, I said TIFFANY!!!
Overall, it was an awesome way to spend a rainy day. Keep your eyes open for more Best of Tours in your neck of the woods. Better yet, just follow along on Twitter.
*Of the two lemon cupcakes I brought back for him, this was his favorite.
8 oz. milk
2 tbsp. powdered non-dairy creamer
3 tbsp. powdered chocolate (If you don’t have powdered chocolate, you can make your own by combining 2 parts sugar to one part cocoa powder)
16 oz. ice
To finish: whipped cream and sprinkles
DIRECTIONS:
Combine all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth and creamy. Pour into a tall glass and top with whipped cream and sprinkles.
INGREDIENTS:
6 oz. milk
6 oz. eggnog (store bought works fine)
2 oz. espresso or strong brewed coffee
DIRECTIONS:
Warm milk and eggnog together by either steaming or warming on stove. Put espresso at bottom of cup and top with eggnog mixture. Enjoy!
INGREDIENTS:
8 oz. milk
2 tbsp. sweetened condensed milk
2 oz. fresh espresso or strong brewed coffee
4 oz. heavy whipping cream
2 tbsp. powdered sugar
To finish: whipped cream and maraschino cherry
DIRECTIONS:
Combine whipping cream and powdered sugar and whip until forms stiff peaks. In a mug, combine freshly brewed espresso and sweetened condensed milk and mix well. Steam milk and pour on espresso. Top with a scoop of fresh whipped cream and a maraschino cherry.
