I am sitting on the patio right now with a cup of coffee and my laptop. Birds are singing. Some are chirping.  A book I hope to read is at my side, and an old dog lies near my feet. The morning sunlight filters in, lighting up the succulents scattered about in colorful pots. Lovely, yes? What I haven’t mentioned is that inside the house, my two boys are bickering about how to make breakfast and what’s wrong with the toast and how stupid the other is, and now one is crying. And the youngest girl is making repetitive blathering noises while the oldest is shouting at her that she is SO anno ..read more

In the United States we recently celebrated the 4th of July which represents the honoring of our country’s Declaration of Independence. This made me think about my life and whether or not I have declared my own personal independence especially as it relates to food. I also wonder the same for you. When everything first shut down due to the Corona Virus I found myself falling hard and not able to get back up. All of my sources of income disappeared in an instant, and all the professional titles I had come to identify myself as disappeared too. My feet had come completely out from under me. Sud ..read more

When you grow up with a Mom and Dad who started their own Financial Firm and grew it to be one of the top independent advisors in California, it is easy to understand the drive and determination which was passed down to Gina Ellen. Born and raised in Calabasas California, Gina was engulfed in the financial industry as a young girl. “I tell people I knew the rule of 72 by the time I was 12.” Gina’s Dad loved what he did and shared it with his 5 children. “We would be driving to go get lunch, or to my basketball game or something and my dad would open up the stocks app on his phone, and he woul ..read more

Mother’s Day can be a tough day without your mother. I am seventy years old and this will be the first Mother’s Day without my mom. I am grateful to have had her for so many years, but it feels like there is a hole in my heart. So being a writer, researcher and storyteller, what did I naturally do? I queried my audience - which I fondly refer to as my “Preserve Your Bloom” gang - for any suggestions on how to deal with my loss. And how to get through that dreaded holiday: Mother’s Day. The floodgates opened and the comments poured in. Here are just some of the many received that I want to sha ..read more

We all know that artists can create their art in a myriad of different ways. The mantra of the art world, ‘art is in the eye of the beholder’ has been tested over and over; now we can add stretched to those tests. A Pakistan-based artist named Sara Shakeel has turned societal beauty standards upside down by starting a project to counteract those standards that tell women they should hide or somehow reduce the appearance of our stretch marks. Recently while photographing a friend, she was asked by the friend if she could somehow photoshop the stretch marks that appeared in the photo. That made ..read more

I am sitting on the patio right now with a cup of coffee and my laptop. Birds are singing. Some are chirping.  A book I hope to read is at my side, and an old dog lies near my feet. The morning sunlight filters in, lighting up the succulents scattered about in colorful pots. Lovely, yes? What I haven’t mentioned is that inside the house, my two boys are bickering about how to make breakfast and what’s wrong with the toast and how stupid the other is, and now one is crying. And the youngest girl is making repetitive blathering noises while the oldest is shouting at her that she is SO anno ..read more

In the United States we recently celebrated the 4th of July which represents the honoring of our country’s Declaration of Independence. This made me think about my life and whether or not I have declared my own personal independence especially as it relates to food. I also wonder the same for you. When everything first shut down due to the Corona Virus I found myself falling hard and not able to get back up. All of my sources of income disappeared in an instant, and all the professional titles I had come to identify myself as disappeared too. My feet had come completely out from under me. Sud ..read more

When you grow up with a Mom and Dad who started their own Financial Firm and grew it to be one of the top independent advisors in California, it is easy to understand the drive and determination which was passed down to Gina Ellen. Born and raised in Calabasas California, Gina was engulfed in the financial industry as a young girl. “I tell people I knew the rule of 72 by the time I was 12.” Gina’s Dad loved what he did and shared it with his 5 children. “We would be driving to go get lunch, or to my basketball game or something and my dad would open up the stocks app on his phone, and he woul ..read more

Mother’s Day can be a tough day without your mother. I am seventy years old and this will be the first Mother’s Day without my mom. I am grateful to have had her for so many years, but it feels like there is a hole in my heart. So being a writer, researcher and storyteller, what did I naturally do? I queried my audience - which I fondly refer to as my “Preserve Your Bloom” gang - for any suggestions on how to deal with my loss. And how to get through that dreaded holiday: Mother’s Day. The floodgates opened and the comments poured in. Here are just some of the many received that I want to sha ..read more

We all know that artists can create their art in a myriad of different ways. The mantra of the art world, ‘art is in the eye of the beholder’ has been tested over and over; now we can add stretched to those tests. A Pakistan-based artist named Sara Shakeel has turned societal beauty standards upside down by starting a project to counteract those standards that tell women they should hide or somehow reduce the appearance of our stretch marks. Recently while photographing a friend, she was asked by the friend if she could somehow photoshop the stretch marks that appeared in the photo. That made ..read more