By June Stoddard
Special to the Daily Press

My 12-year-olds and I were among the lucky mothers and daughters to attend the first ever “Mother Daughter Spa Day” Feb. 4 at the New Main Library. The moment I saw the notice in the library’s calendar I signed up, and it’s good I did because there was a waiting list to get in.

The three-hour event included a yoga class with Jill Miller of www.jillmilleryoga.com, as well as a healthy smorgasbord lunch of delicious food from Whole Foods. There was an in-depth discussion of nutrition led by Valerie Page, Shape for Life Coordinator/YMCA; a discussion of books on the topics covered during the day led by Shana Johnson, youth services librarian; an introduction to the new Exhale Spa in Santa Monica by their gorgeous representatives, and hand-outs of free Astara facial products.

Eager mothers and daughters ranging in age from 11 to 55 filled the spacious bright multi-purpose room with yoga mats. Miller gauged her class to accommodate and challenge beginner to advanced level yoga students. Starting with simple stretches, she built on each series of moves until we were a room full of warrior women. A simple prayer to the light within each of us wrapped up the yoga portion. Miller performed a rare yoga abdominal exercise called the “wave,” which had us all in awe. After rolling up yoga mats, girls and their mothers quenched their thirst with the bottled water provided while Johnson displayed library books to help with yoga, homemade spa products, and nutrition encouraging us to check them out.

Page gave an in depth talk on nutrition, exercise, portion control and helped everyone learn to calculate their own body mass index (BMI), a mathematical feat in itself. Page runs a program at the YMCA that allows teenagers to work with her on a three-month plan, once a week, to help enforce healthy choices. Those choices were easy as we dove into the incredible lunch of fruit salad, mixed green salad, turkey sandwiches, and grilled vegetable panini.

Exhale Spa representatives informed us that Santa Monica now has a destination spa for beauty, fitness, and health, which includes acupuncture, facials, massage, mineral baths with a view of the ocean, incredible core fusion and yoga classes that we were given free passes to. Free spa facial products were a major hit. At the end of the three hours, all mothers and daughters left relaxed and rejuvenated by this mind body program.

More innovative programming for teens at the New Main Library are:

n The Teen Advisory Council for high school students Mondays at 4 p.m.

n The Anime Club which meets once a month on a Friday

n Recent programs such as Video Game Programming for Teens where teens learn from a pro how to create their own games, and Learn How to Build a Computer for Under $400.

The new teen lounge is a comfortable space with lots of seating, computers, study rooms, books, magazines and more exclusively for teens. Suggestions for future programming are welcomed.

For more teen info http://www.smplteens.org/library/index.htm or www.smpl.org.