Bambini!

Found one!

We recently wondered if Mission Viejo had any cool new businesses catering to the really very quite small set. While weighing only 7 pounds or so, they carry a lot of economic weight.

We’re talking babies, and yes, there is a cool new business in town catering to them.

It’s Living Textiles Baby, open roughly six weeks in The Shops at Mission Viejo. And that’s the last time you’ll see the word “roughly” in this column. Babies don't like it.

The retail store is the first one in the United States, the offspring, if you will, of the No. 1 Australian wholesaler of baby bedding products Down Under.

So, yes, it’s a good pedigree.

They wholesale in the U.S. as well through websites like Target, Bed Bath & Beyond and Babies R Us, with a new deal to supply Nordstrom retail stores starting this month.

“Everything we do is for the safety and comfort of the baby,” says Jeannie Yoon, president of the American wholesale unit and the new retail store effort.

All its products are cotton, for instance, and it matters where you buy: quality of cotton varies, she say, based on where and how it’s grown and processed.

LTB buys its cotton in the U.S., makes its products in Shanghai and ships it internationally.

Along with this store—a choice spot in The Shops—there are two or three more the company wants to open this year. Living Textiles Baby caters to young families with high incomes that are starting families.

“There are lots of kids and baby stores here,” Yoon says. “People need to touch the products and test-drive the strollers.”

Related stores help, too. LTB is on the lower level, in a long line of women’s clothing stores, as well as the Baby Gap and such.

Grandparents buy from the store, and just about everyone else, so far.

“We see people come in, and they’ll get right on their cell phones and call their friends to tell them they have to come see this store,” Yoon says.

The Rock

Hand & Stone Massage & Facial Spa reminds all of us that St. Valentine’s Day is on its way.

It caters to the half that doesn’t usually go to spas, and that has been known to buy calendars missing the 14th of February, as well as the half that cannot believe the first half is so dense.

Because who wouldn’t go to a spa that offers hot rocks?

Snakes love hot rocks. Forgetting our lady love and what she loves makes us snakes.

For Feb. 14—just two weeks away … check the calendar—the spa is running specials, including on its hot stones, called Warm Your Heart. The store is at 27762 Vista del Lago, on the lake.

“It’s a tranquil setting, right by the fountain,” says owner Shahira Raineri.

Raineri is the first California operator of the New Jersey firm franchising the chain. The location replaced three suites, including a dress shop and a computer store, opening on Dec. 15.

The shop overall focuses on massage, plus lotion and skin care products. The idea is you join for $60 a month, which gets you a facial or massage every 30 days, plus an array of discounts on the rest of the place.

Raineri spent 25 years in corporate work, primarily health and biomedical efforts. She rose as far as she could there, she says, then took everything she knows about health into this venture.

“I’m a healer,” she says. “I want to help people feel better.”

You Hula?

If not, now is the time.

Leilua Hula is moving from Rancho Santa Margarita to Mission Viejo today. It’s been in RSM digs for 11 years, and owner Lorna Cole wanted a location more central to her clients.

A good number of them are in Irvine she says, so a Taladro Circle location is closer to the freeways. Cole also lives in Mission Viejo.

An open house before the launch drew about 30 people, she says. They saw the new studio and munched on cupcakes baked by the mother of one of her students.

Some 40 families pay $70 a month to learn this traditional Polynesian dance.

“The ages are from 3 to 60,” she says. “We did also have an 87-year-old student once. It’s a beautiful thing to see, and learn how to do.”