The Bar Method | Allison McCurdy

An avid snow skier, hiker, and “anything cardio” enthusiast, Allison McCurdy remained mainly outdoors to exercise until she found The Bar Method™ in 2007. The Bar Method™ introduced a whole new level of fitness to her mind and body by not only completely changing her body shape but also her career direction. After 12 years in corporate America, The Bar Method inspired Allison to pursue a life dream of opening her own business with a focus on health and fitness. Allison and her husband, Mike currently own and operate The Bar Method™ Point Loma. Aside from leaving her two toddlers at home to go to the studio, she cannot wait to jump out of bed in the morning and share her passion for The Bar Method™ with the world. Allison’s other passions include time with friends, family, and global travel.

Allison holds a BS in Marketing from The U. of Colorado at Boulder, a MBA from U. of Colorado at Denver and a Master of International Management from Thunderbird Graduate School of Global Management. Her professional background includes over 12 years of marketing and business strategy for domestic and international companies including Fujitsu, AC Nielsen, VNU and Black & Decker.

CorePower Yoga | Yvonne Bartels and Racquel Tristan

Yvonne Bartels discovered and took her first Yoga class at the local gym more than a decade ago. Yvonne views her practice and teaching as a continual journey and exploration of body, mind, and spirit. Since then she has continued on her path and immersed herself in studying, practicing and assimilating the fundamentals of yogic philosophy and the ancient wisdom of this mystical practice into her teaching and into her own practice. Forever a student, she continued to acquire knowledge in Anusara, Hatha Yoga, Power/Vinyasa Flow and Bikram/Hot Yoga. Yvonne became a Yoga Alliance Certified instructor through CorePower Yoga in April 2011. Shorty thereafter she also completed Hot Power Fusion, Yoga Sculpt and Core Restore (a Yin style of yoga) training. She approaches her teaching and her practice with an attitude of soft-hearted devotion, and with an open-mind. When she begins class she asks her students to silently choose an intention for their practice, once that intention is set she connects to that intention and intuitively adjusts and guides the class based on the individual and collective energy of each class. Yvonne enjoys balancing her students energy Chakras in Savasana through touch.

Yvonne lives in Sherman Oaks California and is currently assistant manager at CorePower Yoga Sherman Oaks. She also participates in leading the teacher training workshops and Lifestyle programs such as the Wellness Cleanse. Yvonne teaches a variety of different classes, but her favorite class to teach and take is Hot Power Fusion. Set to inspiring music, her class is uplifting and empowering for the experienced and novice yoga practitioner.

Racquel Tristan is a native Angeleno of mestiza descent; Native American, Mexican, and European.  Holistic living ingrained through her ancestry and upbringing, she is now also Reiki Master. In addition, she now has her 200 hour Yoga Certification.  She was introduced to fitness at a young age by participating in sports ranging from softball to ballet before beginning a lasting love in Ukidokan "a way of life" karate with Benny "The Jet" Urquidez and family of warriors.  Life began to change in 2008 while studying at LAVC under Khia Lee in Iyengar Yoga and continues to blossom in ways she had never imagined. Then she studied Kundalini Yoga with Fatehbir Kaur, before making her way into CorePower Yoga and completing her yoga certification.

Just as all elements from physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual are essential to this life experience yoga binds all of them together through physical postures, asanas, a peeling of the onion process; providing physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual activation.  An experience, that is unique to each person.  Whether it is flexibility, toning, or a deepening of your practice, she says that it is her honor to be of service and be able to guide you through it.

Racquel Tristan is currently Studio Manager at CorePower Yoga Sherman Oaks and teaches wonderfully inspired Vinyasa Flow classes.

Culinary Experiences at La Cocina Que Canta | Visiting Teacher Amy Pennington

Author, Gardener & Cook Amy Pennington is the creator and owner of GoGo Green Garden, and edible garden business wherein she builds, plants and tends edible gardens for city folk in their backyards. In March of 2009, Amy launched UrbanGardenShare.org, a garden website that pairs city gardeners with unused garden space via an online matching site.

Amy is a regular contributing writer to Edible Seattle, a bi-monthly food focused magazine highlighting the culinary bounty of the Puget Sound region, Crosscut.com, Food52 and SIP Northwest. Her first book, Urban Pantry, was published in spring of 2010 and was chosen as one of Amazon.coms Best Cookbooks Of The Year. Her most recent book was published in April of 2011, Apartment Gardening – Plants Projects and Recipes for Growing Food in Your Urban Home and will launch a monthly ebook series launching this coming year, January 2013. She is the host of PBS’ Check, Please! Northwest & has been featured on Whole Living Martha Stewart Sirius Radio and in national and international publications including Woman’s Day Magazine and the Toronto Star.  Amy lives in Seattle.

Visit www.amy-pennington.com to learn more.

Amy offers three hands-on culinary experiences, 3.5 hours each, during which you will enjoy preparing your own meal along with fellow cooks. Classes take place at La Cocina Que Canta, our new culinary center.

For more information and registration, please click here.

Exercise and Play: A Way to Keep Your Brain Young | John Ratey, M.D.

Dr. John Ratey will present three programs during the week:

• Exercise and Play: a way to keep your brain young
• Exercise to maximize school performance
• ADHD the mystery and non-medical treatments

John J Ratey, MD, is an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, Research Synthesizer, Speaker, and Author, as well a Clinical Psychiatrist maintaining a private practice in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He has lectured and published 60 peer reviewed articles on the topics of Aggression, Autism, ADHD, and other issues in neuropsychiatry.

Dr. Ratey has authored "A User¹s Guide to the Brain" (2000) and co-authored "Shadow Syndromes" (1997) with Catherine Johnson, PhD. From 1994 to 2005 he co-authored "Driven to Distraction" (1994), "Answers to Distraction" (1995) and "Delivered from Distraction" (2005) with Edward Hallowell, MD, all published by Pantheon/Random House. Additionally, he has edited several books including "The Neuropsychiatry of Personality Disorders" (1994), published by BlackwellScientific.

Most recently, Dr Ratey has penned, "Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain" published by Little Brown. In Spark, Dr. Ratey guides the reader to an understanding of neurobiology and inspires the reader to reach for their potential, and embrace exercise that is crucial for the brain and body to operate at peak performance.

Spark is fueling a movement to re-engineer school practices and medical recommendations to establish curriculum, lifestyles and corporate practicesbased on scientific principles. Providing the scientific foundation and research data, Dr Ratey has been drafted into the groundswell of those whose mission it is to revitalize schools, combat the obesity crisis, stave off the encroaching epidemic of Sedentarism, by returning to evolutionary principles of physical exercise and proper diet thereby combating syndrome X, the underlying causation of much chronic disease.

"Dr. Ratey's work is going to save physical education, by reforming it. Exercise and the youth of this generation will be the vanguard that will lead the nation back to health." Phil Lawler, Architect of the Naperville PE Project.

Each year since 1995, Dr. Ratey has been selected by his peers as one of the Best Doctors in America. In his dedication to the changing the world, Dr. Ratey has founded The Ratey Institute whose mission is to broadcast life changing science and establish the best practice policies first in our school and then other organizations to reclaim human health

"Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain," released in 2008, is the culmination of years of experience with the brain body connection, new research data, and the synthesis of biological sciences. Spark isrevolutionizing how we see the human species. A call to return to our evolutionary roots; to get in sync with our metabolic design honed through eons of survival to optimize mental and physical health. Dr. Ratey is thespark that will set your old paradigms on fire, which will clear your mind to see a new vision for mankind, and inflame a passion of commitment to create a healthy future for our posterity.

Locating the Writer in Everyone | David Milofsky

This lecture/demonstration shows that good material for writing fiction or non-fiction is not restricted to a lucky few who then become writers, but it is in fact a part of life, as available as the air we breathe. Writing is really a way of validating our lives, and whether the written record of those lives is good or bad, published or unpublished, is ultimately less important than the act and experience of thinking creatively on the page. Professor Milofsky's initial presentation will be followed by a four-day writing workshop.

David Milofsky is the author of four novels and many short stories, articles and reviews. For 15 years he served as editor of Denver Quarterly and Colorado Review. He was also editor-in-chief of the Center for Literary Publishing. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, The MacDowell Colony and the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference; and has taught at Middlebury College, Iowa State and the University of Wisconsin. At present, he is professor of English at Colorado State University, where he previously directed the MFA Program in Creative Writing.

Concert | Martha Aarons, flute, Lev Polyakin, violin, Miles Graber, piano

After 25 years with the Cleveland Orchestra, Martha Aarons embarked on a freelance career that has taken her to many major orchestras around the country. Most notably, she is a regular guest with the Philadelphia Orchestra and performs and teaches every summer at Aspen Music Festival. Other guest appearances have included the Metropolitan Opera, Minnesota Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony, San Diego Symphony and Baltimore Symphony. Her CD, History of the Tango, is a collaboration with pianist Frances Renzi and guitarist Jason Vieaux.

Lev Polyakin, who at 21 was co-concertmaster of the prestigious Moscow Chamber Orchestra, is now assistant concertmaster of the Cleveland Orchestra. He has won prizes in international violin competitions, such as Carl Flesch in London.

Miles Graber received his musical training at the Juilliard School, where he studied with Anne Hull, Phyllis Kreuter, and Hugh Aitken. He has lived in the Bay Area since 1971, where he has developed a wide reputation as an accompanist and collaborative pianist for instrumentalists and singers. He has been associated with numerous solo artists, as well as with such ensembles as the San Francisco Chamber Soloists, Midsummer Mozart, the Oakland-East Bay Symphony, Oakland Lyric Opera, and the San Francisco Camerata. He is principal pianist for the Bay Area chapter of the National Association of Composers USA, an organization that sponsors and promotes performances of new works by contemporary composers. He is on the faculties of the Crowden School in Berkeley and the San Domenico Conservatory in San Anselmo. In addition, he regularly coaches and accompanies students of the Young Musicians Program at UC Berkeley, and he is a member of the accompanying staff at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

Reading Frida Kahlo: How Does Her Art Speak?| Renee Sandell, Ph.D.

Enjoy a new way of understanding art as you unlock the unique ideas and feelings embedded in a painting by Frida Kahlo (1907-1954)--one of the most influential Mexican painters of the 20th century. This interactive presentation will help you develop essential observation skills in successfully reading the form, theme and context in Frida’s artwork. Together as a group, we will share discoveries and interpretations of Kahlo’s life and artwork, informed by judgments based on our direct visual experience.

VISUAL JOURNALING: Easy Access to Your Innate Creativity

Treat yourself to the playful experience of VISUAL JOURNALING to activate your innate creativity. By using our “forever available” childhood experience of making lines, shapes, dots, doodles, symbols and words, we will actually be practicing a form of art expression known as marking – something all of us have done and can do virtually at will. When we choose to organize our marks to visually share an experience or tell a story or capture a memory, we practice the art form of mapping. Through these accessible mark-making skills, plus some gentle yet expert instruction and the use of special art tools, you will create a beautiful artistic expression -- a map -- of your own ideas, thoughts, feelings, and actions enhanced by your unique experiences here at the Ranch. Your map will become a celebration of your insights at Rancho La Puerta and a special souvenir to take home – created by you with absolutely no previous art experience necessary. Come join in the fun and surprise yourself!

Renee Sandell’s artistic installations of ink and water-media markings explore the human condition in time, space, and place. See her video and click here for images from the opening by Renee Sandell Marking & Mapping: Finding Time, Space, and Place at the McLean Project for the Arts on Thursday, January 19, 2012. Believing in the power of art to facilitate human interaction, healing, and transformation, Renee uses Visual Journaling through Marking & Mapping™ in her Access Your Innate Creativity workshops to foster insight and vision for individuals within organizations, health spas, businesses, and museum-based learning programs such as SummerVision DC, which she developed and directs for the National Art Education Association. Awarded the 2013 National Art Educator of the Year by the National Art Education Association, Renee Sandell, Ph.D. is Professor of Art Education at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. She has published widely and served as a consultant to various school systems, museums, and cultural institutions. She has received numerous awards for her leadership and scholarship on her Form+Theme+Context (FTC) balanced approach to creating and understand art.