Greetings! I hope you have had a great, although hot summer! WE are on the move and very excited to celebrate our 2 year birthday/anniversary on August 21st! I cannot believe how much has happened in just 2 years! It boggles the mind! We began with one tiny cottage, 15 amps of electricity (!), 1 full time employee (me! I was a one dog-and-pony show!!) and 1 part-time employee to soon-to-be SEVEN offices and 10 employees! Who would have ever thought that our passion to talk to women, listen to their stories, validate them and then EDUCATE them on their options for natural hormone balance would have impacted so many? It just reaffirms to me that when we listen to our hearts and that voice in our heads that urges us to take a risk and "just do it," miracles can happen!

To celebrate our 2 year birthday, I took my employees IN STYLE to a fabulous play, "Menopause the Musical," at the Aronoff Theatre in Cincinnati. (see photo)  We had dinner, enjoyed the play, stopped by my alma mater (that would be Graeters!!), enjoyed HHC client, Sue's, fabulous chocolate dipped oreo cookies (to die for!) and had a fabulous time! It is always important to celebrate our successes, and I really just wanted to thank and honor my wonderful employees for ALL they do for our women!

We are in the process of opening our 7th Happy Hormone Cottage satellite office in northern Kentucky. We have a lot of interest generated from that area, so instead of making them drive all the way to Mason satellite office, we thought we would bring ourselves to them! So, we hope to have this office up and running by October 1. We are looking at the Crestview Hills - Ft.Thomas area.....stay tuned for details!

David Zava, Ph.D., President of ZRT Laboratory and Lyn Hogrefe, M.S.Ed., Executive Director of the Happy Hormone Cottage

In July, Jeff and I traveled to Vegas for a Cardinal Health trade show (yes, it was HOT and what do they mean by "dry heat"??? Geesh!) and then on to Portland, Oregon for a great educational seminar hosted by ZRT labs. They have their facility in Beaverton, Oregon, which is a suburb of Portland. We were privileged to listen to speakers on the cutting edge of what we do in the realm of BHRT and natural hormone balance AND then tour the awesome ZRT Lab itself in Beaverton. David Zava, Ph.D., (pictured with me) is the founder of ZRT-Zava Research Testing Laboratory and is probably one of the smartest men I know. He also has a "crackerjack" team of highly educated and specialized people working for him who just do outstanding work in the area of saliva and bloodspot testing. I am honored to have worked with them for the past 2 years and look forward to many more years. They continually work to "up their game" to provide the highest service possible to their clients.  It was fun to actually meet the gals I speak with on the phone and to put a face with a name. I enjoyed saying, "Hi! I'm Lyn from the Happy Hormone Cottage!" and they would squeal and say, "Oh, I KNOW you! We see your clients' labwork come through here all the time!" Considering we had 103 kits go through their facility in June alone, I believe them!

You know how I enjoy meeting our clients and working with them to get them started on their natural hormone replacement therapy! I met a darling gal a few weeks ago, Angie, who just cracks me up! She sends me the funniest emails! Last Saturday she sent me one that made me laugh! She says that after starting her natural hormone therapy, "I leaped out of bed for the first time in years, cleaned the bathrooms, got laundry done, folded AND put away and vacuumed the family room...ALL before the rest of my family even got up! My husband said to my kids....Look kids! Your mom is BACK!!"  I responded with, "Wait til your husband sees what's next...sex IS in his future!"  Gotta love it!

In early August, I had the pleasure of presenting a talk with Dr. Matt Holten of the Holten Wellness Center in Centerville, "Happy Hormones Meet No Jelly Belly!" We had 65 women attend and receive much valuable information on natural hormone balance, belly fat and the relationship between the two. Most importantly, they learned that all women over the age of around 35 become estrogen dominant as progesterone levels deplete. Guess what estrogen is? It's a fat storer! So estrogen dominant women, i.e. all women over age 35, have a lot of estrogen to store a lot of fat! (look around you!) Dr. Holten and I discussed ways to lose this belly fat through balancing your hormones (replenishing depleted progesterone levels with progesterone!!) and a lifestyle change. He gave a lot of valuable tips that women can apply, to lose this annoying belly fat! To hear more, join us as we present this talk again on Thursday evening, September 8, 6:30pm at the Holten Wellness Center. Details are on my websites events page and below. This well-attended event is FREE, FUN and FABULOUS and RSVP's are appreciated so we can reserve your seat today by calling us at 513-444-6343 or call Holten Wellness Center at 937-435-8480 and ask for Angie's voicemail!

Don't you just love backhanded compliments?? I also just celebrated a birthday in August and am blessed and excited to be 56 years old! I love being this age and embracing all life has to offer with energy and gusto! And I thought I was looking pretty good....until one of my employee's husbands said to her, "Boy! That Lyn must have really looked hot back in her day!" So I guess my question is, "Wow! So what does that make me looking today??!!"  Wait! Don't answer that! LOL

Have a great rest of your summer and a fabulous Labor Day Weekend. Looking forward to meeting you and serving YOU in the future.

Warmly,

Lyn