Notes about upcoming meetings - August & September

Fun and different meetings are planned for August and September!

August 19 is a social meeting all about pleasing our palates and strengthening our community. It's an Ice Cream Social! Please bring a pint of your fave flave (or just something you've been wanting to try out) and a scoop. By no means is this party limited to traditional moo-cow ice cream. There are tons of non-dairy options out there including coconut, almond, hemp, soy, rice, and cashew, not to mention sorbets! You might even find some goat's milk yogurt somewhere. Let's have a variety!

It would also be great if everyone could bring a bowl and a spoon so we can use a minimum of back-up disposable supplies. As always, feel free to bring the kiddos, or leave them home if you don't want them around so much sweet, even if it is agave or honey. Speaking of sweeteners, it would be great to have a discussion about types of sweeteners if anyone wants to bring opinions or info, and I'm sure we all could benefit from swapping stories about how we deal with "treats" with our children.

Weather permitting, this social meeting on August 19 will take place on the patio and front lawn of our regular location, the AUMC church at 716 S. Glebe in Arlington. If it's too hot or raining, we'll be inside.

For the September 16 meeting on local birth options, we will be inviting birth professionals -- midwives, OBs, doulas, childbirth educators, etc. -- to attend for something of an open house (after a short presentation and some group Q&A). We are still working out the details for this event, but because of the large crowd we anticipate, this meeting will be held at a different location: Mason Regional Library at 7001 Little River Turnpike, Annandale, VA 22003. We will probably open doors at 6:00 or 6:30 to have ample time. More details to come, but please note the location change and that we'll have an earlier start.

Hope to see you there!

Bellydancing Moms Night Out!

What a lot of fun we had at Zalya's Studio in the Woods for our Bellydancing Moms Night Out! Even though last-minute missing babysitters meant we had a small group, it was great to learn to shimmy together! It was a fabulous workout and a blissful community event all in one, followed by fresh blackberries and apricots our instructor, Jeneen (aka Zalya), had just picked from the farm. We learned about -- and experienced! -- the many benefits of bellydancing and enjoyed playing dress-up with the fun scarves and skirts Jeneen made available to us.

Thanks to Jeneen for hosting us and to her assistants for inspiring us, and thanks to Natalie for organizing such a wonderful event. Even just being in the beautiful woodsy neighborhood felt like a retreat, and I think we'll all be checking out more of Zalya's yoga, bellydancing and art classes for ourselves and for our children!

July meeting: Intro to Acupuncture

Thanks to Sarah Shupe, L.Ac. of Acupuncture Alexandria and Allison Kitchen, L.Ac., M.Ac., NCCAOM, of DC MindBody who shared with us the basics of acupuncture. Both practitioners work with a variety of conditions, including fertility and women's issues.

We discussed the differences in various acupuncture traditions, talked about what ailments and conditions acupuncture can treat, looked at diagrams and models of the body's energy meridians and answered a whole bunch of questions. We also had a demonstration as Sarah did a mini treatment on HMN co-leader Leigha