Sweating for a Purpose :: Women's Sports Foundation Spin-A-Thon

On Sunday, April 15th, YAS : Yoga And Spinning Center in Venice hosted a Spin-A-Thon for the Women's Sports Foundation. With approximately 50+ individuals raising $1k per bike (yeah... do that math...) for the three hour event, and bringing tons of excitement to the table doing so, it was a super-success AND a good time, which will not be soon forgotten.

Here is the room, packed to the gills... happy/sweaty spinners. As people took a break here or there, they danced up and town the isle to keep the energy high throughout the room.

And, did I forget to mention, we had OLYMPIC ATHLETES in attendance? Yep... I got to hold the GOLD!

The day was PERFECT... lots of breeze coming through the doors to keep our athletes cool.

Here are some of the AMAZING YAS instructors.. LORI, SHERRI and TASHA.

Afterwards, there were a few things to be said... and, congratulations all around. Special thanks to exercise guru, Kathy Smith, for taking part in the event!

I, for one, can't wait till NEXT YEAR!! Yes, it will be something we can look forward to in 2008.

Cherry Blossoms in Washington, D.C.

My Dad and his wife Chris had the best timing recently for their visit to DC to see my niece, Merete, and nephew, Finn... here they are on the Mall, taking in the day and enjoying their coffee and the company:

And, apparently, they hit the timing PERFECTLY to see the blossoms in full bloom! I've never seen it like this... I have always just missed this perfect timing. Just amazing! Below, Chris stands in front of a marvelous flowering tree.

Sea Otters, Sharks, Ray's - Oh My!
Behind the Scenes at the Aquarium of the Pacific, Long Beach

Chris Plante, generously took the Hekimian's and I behind the scenes to see what really makes the 5th largest such aquarium in the nation run smoothly. The first thing we did, and a highlight of the afternoon, was meeting the lovely sea otter named Summer. I took photos of her, but they didn't turn out so well, so I found this little guy and included him here for your viewing pleasure. We were allowed to feed her some tasty fish and squid. She was marvelous!
Then, we went and checked out the main 2-story high shark/fish exhibit from above. I love this pic here of Sylvia holding Lucas because it looks like little Lucas is afraid of becoming Shark Bait! Chris let us try to feed the sharks... but, they were not too interested. Apparently, they're very spoiled, and so not overly hungry to eat just anything and anytime.

The sharks at this aquarium are very happy, and they lay many eggs. Here is Chris showing us a shark egg & the shape inside is the tiny baby shark. There were several tiny hatched babies in some other tanks besides this egg tank where little 3-4" sharks were being kept while they grew. Very cute little guys, kinda reminded me of lizards.

Next we headed to the lab area where they do a lot of water testing and algae growing. It looked like a mad scientists lab! There were lots of tanks of brime shrimp in both size big and small, for the various varieties of sea life that the aquarium raises.

This whole visit was soooo interesting for me... another highlight was these Sea Horses. I've never SEEN so many! There seemed to be hundreds of them, a few varieties and a few tanks of them at various ages. Amazing little creatures... it's hard to capture them on film though.

Lastly -- here are a few of the older teenager sharks -- not yet old enough for the display tanks. These sure are lovely creatures!

Thanks a million Chris for the wonderful back-stage tour!