Hypnotherapy and Hypnosis in San Fernando Valley. CALL AVA EVANS TODAY: 818-314-5905 See a hypnotherapist for problems with weight loss, smoking, and anxiety. http://www.localvideo.tv/california-ca/san-fernando-valley/hypnosis-and-hypnotherapy-weight-loss-quit-smoking-anxiety-help

When you are put into a trance by a trained Los Angeles hypnotherapist, it is a pleasant and calming experience. If anxious, stressed or upset, being in hypnosis can be among the most relaxing and soothing experiences.  It allows the hypnotherapist to pass on positive suggestions that go directly into the subconscious and allow change to begin and immediately.

CALL FOR HELP TODAY: 818-314-5905

For more information visit: http://www.localvideo.tv/california-ca/san-fernando-valley/hypnosis-and-hypnotherapy-weight-loss-quit-smoking-anxiety-help

Hypnotherapy and Hypnosis in Woodland Hills, CA. CALL TODAY: 818-314-5905 See a hypnotherapist for weight loss, smoking, and anxiety issues. http://www.localvideo.tv/california-ca/woodland-hills/hypnosis-and-hypnotherapy-weight-loss-anxiety-quit-smoking

Hypnosis is one of the most effective and calming therapies available today to help people overcome anxiety. The use of imagery as well as other techniques  the client can use when he/she is having difficulty in their life can be a personally empowering experience.  Whether the anxiety is of recent onset or reflective of long-term difficulties, hypnotherapy can be highly effective.  It is true that living in a big city like Los Angeles can create much more stress than living in a small town or in the country.

For more info visit: http://www.localvideo.tv/california-ca/woodland-hills/hypnosis-and-hypnotherapy-weight-loss-anxiety-quit-smoking

Sunset in LA

It was totally unexpected and I was completely caught off the guard when a sudden assignment to LA threw me into a frenzy post birthday week of packing and last minute prep. I consider it a good fortune ofcourse! Last minute flight booking landed me at LAX  airport in LA from whence I reached the hotel at Woodland Hills. My office is located in one of the many buildings in Warner Center and a walk on sunday is all it took to discover the neighborhood.

Glimpse of Warner Center against the cloudy backdrop

Woodland Hills is part of the San Fernando Valley and is one of the primary business hubs in LA or that is what I was told atleast.

The Warner Center is made up of blocks of building that span almost the whole area that you can in the picture here.

While LA is not exactly tropical as India, it does project a similar weather with the sun shining bright in your eyes The only disappointing factor here is it gets dark bang by 4.45PM and you are left in a lurch if you don’t have a vehicle.

A Voltswagen showroom

LA is a hot spot for fast cars, Porsches, shopping and partying. If you aren’t into any of these then forget it! I must’ve stepped in when the weather was transitioning to winter because my first glimpse was beautiful hedgerows of some berries, roses which never seem to fade and lush maple trees.

One of the many beautiful christmas trees

So far I’ve been to Santa Monica on a brief trip and well checked out Woodland Hills thoroughly for sure. Restaurants to visit here are Little Orchids (they serve amazing Thai food and its a good deal), Zen Buffet (for people who luuve Japanese cuisine – you can try fish eggs, octopus and well clams if you are looking for something exotic). The steamed buns and sesame balls are really good though. Then there is the Whole Food Market for the calorie conscious folks and Daphne’s Greek Cafe which serves very good Greek cuisine.

Now food apart, its christmas time and so you’d get that fresh scent of pine everywhere. Trees are so beautifully adorned and lit up that its a sight to see for sure. LA sure makes up for not having that perfect white christmas!

I took this picture of my sister Roxanne in a field behind our house in Woodland Hills.   My sisters, all younger than me, were my muses in photography.

Come to Juicy Ladies for Smoothie Happy Hour. All organic, vegan, fruit smoothies are $5.99

1 Day Only!!!
Green Friday November 27th, 2009
25% OFF Everything in Store & On-Line

All Green Things wishes you & your family a Happy Thanksgiving!!!!
Header****************

Black Friday is going GREEN! All Green Things wants to remind you about our 1 Day Event on November 27th, 2009.
Everything in our Store and On-Line is 25% Off!!!!!
Spend less on more meaningful, green gifts.
Stock is limited so shop early!

Extended In-Store Hours on Nov. 27th 8AM-8PM
Store Location:
5321 Topanga Canyon Blvd.
Woodland Hills, CA 91364

*Meter Parking In Front Of Store & Free Parking On Surrounding Streets

*Discount does not apply to sale items, shipping, taxes, surcharges, gift cards, certificates or codes, previous orders, international orders, or our Vintage Category on-line.

On-Line Coupon Code to be entered at checkout: GRNFRI09

____________________________________________________

Green Networking Event

WH Green Drinks
We meet on the third Wednesday of every month at All Green Things located at 5321 Topanga Canyon Blvd. from 6:00 – 8:00PM.

Next Woodland Hills, West Valley Green Drinks:
Wednesday, December 16th, 2009, 6PM @ All Green Things

* Parking: Available on the surrounding sides street of All Green Things.

The intention is to support the growth of green businesses and lifestyles through networking and sharing information about green living, products and services. This is a great chance to mix with other like-minded people, share info, make friends, and do business.

Bring some friends and meet other community members who are interested in leading Woodland Hills and the surrounding area toward a more sustainable future.

Contact: Tanya at info@allgreenthings.com

Start one in your local community!!!
www.greendrinks.org

- The Woodland Hills band of the 350 tribe -

As did tens of thousands of people around the Earth, in 181 countries and at least eight languages, at 5,200 events – today I laid on grass in a park with 67 others, enumerating “350.”

Would you like to know what 350 means? See our little band’s link at the 350 organization’s Website.

Tanya Peel of All Green Things in Woodland Hills, California organized us. Thanks, Tanya and thanks to photographer Jim Brammer!

Shade's a good thing.

In the six weeks or so that I’ve been back in metro Detroit, I’ve been spending at least an hour a day in the woods, walking and thinking (or trying not to think too much).

From my apartment, it’s a five minute walk to a steel-caged footbridge that carries me over I-696 to Woodland Hills, a rough, root-knotted walking trail looped around a brambly 74-acre nature park. At the back of the park, just past a trail heavy with goldenrod and dogwood, there’s a marshy pond, goose families, and a few no swimming signs.

Suburbs have long seemed like no-places to me — invented miles of strip malls, office parks, curlicue’d subdivisions with no sidewalks, their continuity interrupted by perpetually widening expressway corridors. The suburbs, especially when I lived in the suburbs, were inconvenient, alienating and colorless at their best — at their worst, resource-sucking, psyche-ravaging holes in space.

But Farmington Hills is my hometown and, for now, the no-place I call my own, and although I felt strange and scared to move back here, I am learning to reconsider the suburbs — or rather this suburb — as an honest-to-goodness place. It’s a complicated reckoning, especially in Detroit, where every attempt at so-called normal life seems infinitesimally examined.

There’s a lot that has dazzled me about Farmington Hills and environs, a freshness that comes as a luxury of my many years elsewhere. My small suburban apartment complex is unquestionably the most diverse place I have ever lived, and the sprawling aisles of ethnic food at grocery stores — and the languages I hear there — are dizzying. And I still see good movies and good art shows and hear good music and hang out with smart, creative people — my biggest fear about leaving a “real” city and moving to a satellite suburb in a huge, fragmented metropolis.

But my search for a spiritual core of suburbia has taken me time and time again to several local parks, all of which I call, in casual conversation, “the woods.”

The woods are part of the natural history of a place and reminder of the human history around it that I often want to deny the suburbs. In Heritage Park – Farmington’s 200-acre jewel — there’s a pet cemetary from the 1930s where the Spicer family dogs are buried, near an English-style countryside manor, built in 1926, where Eleanor Spicer lived until her death in 1982. The land that’s Heritage Park now was her farm — she rode horses, raised sheep and often referred to her land as “the only unspoiled place” in the city.

(Aside: stumbling around the internet for some basic fact-checking has led me to this excellent guide to historic Farmington buildings and sites, organized by architectural style.)

Farmington’s abundance of megaplex movie theaters and big box-anchored shopping centers belies the city’s history. The area was first settled by Quakers; Farmington founded a post office and organized a township in 1827. My parents live a few suburbs over in Novi (apocryphally, the number six — No.VI — train stop); a half-mile from their house, nestled between two industrial parks, is a little farmstead cemetery started in the mid-1840s by the Knapp family. Just past the graveyard you can hook a right into Rotary Park, a 67-acre swath of barely-tended woodland along the Middle Rogue. I walk my mom’s border collies down a trail crashed with deadfall and overgrown with water grasses; the dogs like to race down the trail ahead of me and leap through the brush into the river.

Today, Novi is the mall capital of Oakland County, with the Fountain Walk and Twelve Oaks and the Town Center causing immediate aneurysm to anyone who finds herself at the 696 and Novi Road interchange. Then again, my brother lives in Novi on a gravel road and has watched herds of deer (and an occasional coyote) caravan through his backyard.

The woods are also, like the suburbs, a kind of no-place. These parks seem less like parks to me than slices of Farmington unstuck in time, shaken loose from the tended lawns and chain restaurants and allowed to be what they have always been. Just as the strip malls I’ve known in Michigan don’t look too different from the strip malls I’ve known in Iowa, Wisconsin, or Indiana, I call all of the nature trails I love — Woodland Hills, the river bluff trails in Milwaukee, even those modest few acres that buffer my elementary school from the subdivision behind it — the woods. And all of them make me feel basically okay about wherever I am.

What am I going to do during the winter? Maybe I should learn to cross-country ski.

We were invited back this morning to harvest more of  the tomato crop at Pierce College  in Woodland Hills – with 100% going to SOVA and will be back for more later in the week (Tuesday and Saturday – weather permitting) – It’ll be a muddy and fun time – so if you missed out on other October picks and can join us for a few hours, please email info@foodforward.org to hold a spot!

Update: SOVA picked up 14 crates totaling 416 pounds of tomatoes from the Monday am harvest. Great work team!

As the weekend comes to a close it’s incredibly rewarding to look back and see that nearly two dozen FF volunteers helped make three picks a reality these past few days.

Yesterday over a thousand pounds of otherwise forgotten cluster and beefsteak tomatoes were plucked from Pierce College’s fields (and there’s much more awaiting us if we can get there this week!), we did a full day of outreach in Northridge signing up several more homes for gleaning, and today hundreds of pounds of persimmons and grapefruit were liberated from two different homes on opposite sides of the Valley.  (pix to come)

MEND will use the fruit to fill nutritious boxes for their over 20,000 clients a month, and additionally every piece we harvested these last few days not handed out directly will go to cooking sauces and other dishes, for the hundreds a week which depend on their soup kitchen.

Yes, the weight is great, but more so, its humbling to meet the number of new volunteers and see then see them come back, wanting to get more involved. We’re doing all we can to add more picks and take in all the great ideas and offers being floated our way – it may take a little time.

October is a month which saw its first 8 picks fill in 48 hours – something a bit daunting to us all at FF – so as we try to keep up, we hope you’ll keep joining us and making great picks like this a reality. Thanks!

When you’re Britney Spears, even the mundane act of buying a pair of pet birds is enough to whip the paparazzi into a frenzy. Only Paw Nation has all the details on the parakeet purchase, including the news that it was not just one parakeet that Spears bought, but two!

It was just another day at work for Brieanne Kirby, manager of the California Pet Center in Woodland Hills, California, when Spears walked into the store last week and things took a surreal turn. “I didn’t even notice her at first,” Kirby tells Paw Nation. “She was wearing sunglasses and had her hair in a bun.” But a mob of paparazzi soon surrounded the pet shop, prompting Spears’ security guard to ask Kirby to lock the doors. “I have never seen so many paparazzi in my life,” says Kirby, saying that the police showed up to control the crowd.

“She’s a nice, sweet lady,” Kirby, 22, says of the famous singer. “She asked me which type of bird would be best for a family with kids.” Kirby walked with Spears around the store, pointing out different birds, from African Grey Parrots to Cockatoos. “She asked me lots of questions about how to care for the birds, which I was happy about,” says Kirby.

As paparazzi clamored for photographs through the store’s glass front, Spears picked out two parakeets that she “fell in love with” — a yellow and blue parakeet, and a second with pretty feathers in a shade of sky blue turquoise.

“Parakeets are ideal for new bird owners and families with children because they’re easy to care for and their beaks are much smaller compared to other birds,” says Kirby, adding that parakeets do better when they have a fellow parakeet to hang out with. “They have their own little chirps,” Kirby says.

Spears bought the parakeets for $19.99 each, as well as a large, roomy cage, toys and food. “We recommend parakeets stay on a pellet diet and avoid seeds,” says Kirby, explaining that seeds are fattening. “Every couple of days, you can treat your parakeet to bits of vegetables, boiled pasta or fresh fruits — anything but citrus,” she says. “Their cages should be cleaned out once a week.”

Purchase complete, Kirby escorted Spears and her security guard to the store’s back door so they could leave. “It’s a heavy wooden door, so I couldn’t see outside until I opened the door,” recalls Kirby. “As soon as I unlocked the door, there were flashbulbs popping and paparazzi were yelling [Spears'] name. An hour after she left, there were still paparazzi inside the store taking pictures.”

Kirby doesn’t know what Spears decided to name her two new parakeets, but is sure they found a good home.

Woodland Hills back in the days

Developer Victor Girard did his part to improve the appearance of the Far West Valley of Los Angeles and his legacy remains on the winding streets south of Ventura Boulevard in Woodland Hills. Girard’s subdivision in the barren west end of the Valley needed to be dressed up, so he planted 120,000 shade trees and shrubs including seven varieties of eucalyptus, five kinds of acacia, Arizona elms, and Monterey pines. On the corner of what today are Ventura and Topanga Canyon boulevards, he built false storefronts and garish Turkish-style mosque towers to make the community look more established. Folklore has it that he spent time in jail for this “false city”.

The town of Girard was born on February 4, 1923, on 2,886 hilly acres purchased from the Brant dairy. The young real estate developer, Victor Girard Kleinberger, came to Los Angeles from Louisville about the turn of the century as an ambitious 18 year old that would develop towns all over the county. He was called a “devious genius, a natural dreamer and big spender”. His dream for the west Valley was a little crazy. There was no streetcar access to Girard, as there was to other Valley towns. Girard expected motorists to negotiate Cahuenga Pass plus miles of twisty Ventura Boulevard and pass countless new real estate ventures to reach the 6,000 lots that Girard hoped to sell.

To lure prospects, Girard ran ads emphasizing that his town was closer to the beach than any place in the Valley, since there was a winding road through Topanga Canyon. He also published the Girard News, built stables and a riding club, and opened the Girard Country Club and golf course with a championship size pool and tennis courts. Today the golf course is known as the Woodland Hills Country Club. “Sucker buses’ brought potential buyers out to the far end of the Valley, where teams of sales agents put on the pressure.

In 1941, the community was renamed Woodland Hills, an appropriate name because of all the trees that Girard had planted years earlier. There are still a few “Girard” homes in Woodland Hills today.

A bit of history only because Woodland Hills is where our feet rests. Although Amit’s stomping grounds is Malibu, California, he’s got a lot of love for Woodland Hills and there’s a bit of surprise to come. What would make Woodland Hills a more desirable place to “hang out” at or “live in” despite the thirst-quenching weather?

We are hoping for the same changes as you are! …more to come on this matter

*wink*

Two years ago, my Dad Matthew David Wolf, succumbed to illness after more than a decade-long battle with Lymphoma and related illnesses. There have been so many advances in science and medicine in the last 10 years, that many lives are being extended, if not saved altogether, today.

But MORE can be done. MORE needs to be done.

On Saturday October 3, my wife and I, along with my family, and led by our Team Captain Hannah (my niece), are walking in the Leukemia and Lymphoma’s Society’s Light The Night Walk to help raise money in this fight. You can help by visiting my web page:

Russ Wolf’s Light The Night Walk Fund Raising Page

My Dad underwent Stem-cell transplant about 9 years ago, at a time when it was still experimental. “We are going to basically take his life, then try to give it back,” the Doctors told us. For 2 weeks that seemed like years, extreme chemo treatments drained my Dad. His body was broken, but not his spirit. Those same Doctors then told us if he survived the treatment, we would be lucky to have 2 more years with him. But he didn’t listen. His will was strong.

We got 9 more years with my Dad.

If they can do that a decade ago, before the days of the iPhone, imagine what they can do tomorrow, and every day beyond.

Organizations like this one are helping push the boundaries of discovery in the fight against these and other cancers. I am certainly not a scientist but I’m helping any way I can. Even in tough times, I hope you will consider doing the same. Every single penny, quarter or dollar will help in this fight – and are all very much appreciated.

If you have questions, feel free to email me via the link below or check out the page. Thank you – Russ

Got something to say to me? russellwolf.blog@gmail.com

Russ Wolf’s Light The Night Walk Fund Raising Page

View this 12:30 minute clip to learn what 60 Minutes had to say.

]]> http://malibuhometending.wordpress.com/2009/09/17/hometending-real-estate-mortgage-meltdown/ Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:06:51 +0000 preserveyourwealth http://malibuhometending.wordpress.com/2009/09/17/hometending-real-estate-mortgage-meltdown/

View this 12:30 minute clip to learn what 60 Minutes had to say.

WWW.MalibuHomeTending.com

800-350-2009

Malibu Home Tending is a reliable company ready for the clean up/trash out project on all of your foreclosed homes.  Not only does this reputable company specialize in staging and managing homes they also do the dirty work of clearing out and cleaning up foreclosed homes.

Malibu Home Tending’s Foreclosure Cleanup Department works with landlords, investors, mortgage companies, realtors, and REO divisions of banks. Malibu Home Tending gets your homes back into shape and ready to sell fast.   Call Malibu Home Tending today to get your free quote.

http://www.MalibuHomeTending.com

WWW.MalibuHomeTending.com

800-350-2009

Malibu Home Tending is a reliable company ready for the clean up/trash out project on all of your foreclosed homes.  Not only does this reputable company specialize in staging and managing homes they also do the dirty work of clearing out and cleaning up foreclosed homes.

Malibu Home Tending’s Foreclosure Cleanup Department works with landlords, investors, mortgage companies, realtors, and REO divisions of banks. Malibu Home Tending gets your homes back into shape and ready to sell fast.   Call Malibu Home Tending today to get your free quote.

http://www.MalibuHomeTending.com

The disciples are on the sea of Galilee.   A storm comes up out of nowhere.   Jesus is asleep in the back of the boat.     You know the story.

Jesus rebukes the weather.   That’s what it says.    But you thought God was in charge of the weather, right?

Let me do this topic justice by sending you to the source of my thoughts today.

1. Go to the sidebar for this blog and click on “Sermons – Greg Boyd, Woodland Hills”
2. Click on ‘recent sermons’
3. Select the one for August 22; it was a Saturday night Q & A they had when Rob Bell could only make the two Sunday services.  (Some of you might also like to hear Bell from August 23rd…)
   
4. Listen to the first 15 minutes.    Let me know what you think.   (To save it, right click and choose ’save link as’ or ’save target as;’ but you should also be able to just listen live.

It really helps put some things into perspective.   Boyd would argue that we attribute far too much to God’s direct involvement that is really the product of natural forces.    Like the tornado that whipped through his hometown while the Lutherans were voting on ordination of gay clergy, for example.   But let him tell it…

And now for something completely un-stormlike:

This picture is by a friend of mine, Vancouver artist Timothy Clayton from a collection titled, In God’s Country: Vancouver Landscapes.    See, and you thought you lived in God’s country!

For you Canadian left-coasters, Timothy has a show October 25th to November 7th at the Havana Gallery.   Of note:  Timothy is married to actress and film producer Gina Chiarelli.

Disaster Alert

California – The fires in Los Angeles has now burned over 35,000 acres. The blaze, which is moving both east and west across the Los Angeles Forest, is threatening communities from Antelope Valley in the northern part of Los Angeles County to Altadena and La Canada–Flintridge to the south. Firefighters have issued evacuation orders for hundreds of homes. Several Red Cross Los Angeles chapters are working together to open shelters, serve meals and provide volunteers to neighboring chapters. As of this morning, shelters had been opened at the following locations:

o La Canada High School, 4463 Oak Grove Dr. , La Canada-Flintridge
o Crescenta Valley High School, 2900 Community Ave.,
   La Canada-Flintridge
o Verdugo Hills High School , 10625 Plainview Ave., Tujunga
o Golden Valley High School, 27051 Robert C. Lee Parkway, Newhall
o Highland High School, 39055 25th St., West Palmdale
   (closing 4 pm 8.30)
o Marie Kerr Park Recreational Building, 39700 30th St., West Palmdale
   (opening 4 pm 8.30)

Equine from evacuations may be taken to Pierce College in Woodland Hills and to Antelope Valley Fairgrounds. Small animals may be taken to La Canada High School.

Our sunset pick in Woodland Hills yesterday yields 374lbs of grapefruits (and a few apples & peaches too)! A special thanks to the power picking team of Bee & Win, we so appreciate your energy & support!

Our first “Food Forward flyer” is almost ready to go to print. Never has so much tweaking gone in an 8.5×2.6″ space… LA farmer’s markets get ready!

We do have a few spots left for the following August picks:

Sunday 8/16 – NORTHRIDGE 10AM

Sunday 8/30 – TBD 10AM

Email: info@foodforward.org if you want to join us on a pick or help us spread the word! We look forward to seeing you on a pick very soon!

The Screen Actors Guild has voted to oppose closing a motion picture home where many actors and others have spent their last years.

By a slender margin, the SAG board voted Saturday to oppose closing the Motion Picture & Television Fund’s long-term care facility in Woodland Hills.

SAG has no formal say in the hospital’s future but many SAG members financially support it and some actors have vigorously campaigned against what they view as the destruction of a legacy.

The motion picture fund, which runs health care centers, assisted living facilities and other services, says the hospital is losing more than $10 million a year.

Fund Chairman Frank Mancuso says the hospital will bankrupt the fund in five years unless its 84 residents are moved.

(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)