We call our mothers circle The Bowery Babes because the first women who inspired it all took yoga together at a special corner of NYC called Lila Yoga at 302 Bowery Street, a second floor walk-up with more life and hope and poetry in the air than anyone can imagine. The neighborhood around it is a complex one, with the famous CBGBs club across the street now transformed into a clothing store, and high-rises appearing while small theater companies continue to plug away, The Bowery Poetry Club continues to thrive, and the Bowery Mission continues to offer refuge.

The Bowery is the oldest thoroughfare on Manhattan island, and to quote Wikipedia "preceding European intervention as a Lenape footpath, which spanned roughly the entire length of the island, from north to south.[3] When the Dutch settled Manhattan island, they named the path Bouwerij road—bouwerij being an old Dutch word for farm—[4] because it connected farmlands and estates on the outskirts to the heart of the city in today's Wall Street/Battery Park area."

Its history is far too rich to discuss here, but you can feel the diversity still of this area, and the contrasts and the vitality. It is not the simplest place to stroll a newborn, seeking quiet and the lull of a nap. But we have tried to create our own sort of natural world-- peaceful and growing and breathing-- and wild and happy and fruitful-- where once there were so many trees and farms.