It was a peaceful, steady life. After finding a niche teaching foreign medical students how to obtain their visas at Cedars-Sinai, Robin Barr was in her 40s when she was unexpectedly laid off. To make matters worse, her best friend died soon after. Left with a bit of money from his will, Barr decided to give life to an idea she had been incubating for a few years. Without any science training, Barr was investigating natural treatments to ease the symptoms of cold sores. She visited New Age bookstores and looked up books on natural remedies and began "playing around with some herbs," she said…

Christine De La Torre, owner of Christine’s Bookkeeping, specializes in small business and personal bookkeeping. Why? She actually enjoys it. I'm shaking my head in disbelief, since I glaze over when it comes to bookkeeping. Just ask Mr. Riley, my high school bookkeeping teacher. As a child, De La Torre was organized. She enjoyed sorting and storing like things together, and had a knack for numbers. Her father had a four-foot-tall glass bottle full of loose change, and De La Torre loved to pour the change out, sort and count it, put the change back in the jar, and do it again on another day. …

Brian Hoksbergen is the owner of The Mud Puppy Do-It-Yourself Dog Wash in Mission Viejo that opened three years ago in the Los Alisos Village Shopping Center at Trabuco and Los Alisos. It’s not a stretch to say Hoksbergen is a dog lover. He's had many throughout his life. All have been adopted from a shelter, and almost all were in sad condition when he got them, the very dogs most people would pass over. Not Hoksbergen. Describing one heartbreaking bald, cowering dog in a back corner of a shelter’s kennel, he remembers saying to the dog "You’re coming with me." With the love and care of …

After visiting John Wang, owner of Energy Touch Foot Massage and Reflexology, an old question came to mind: Which would you rather have, money or a massage? In my experience, massage provides a benefit I value more than money: the feeling that all is right with the world, that I want for nothing. On the other hand, with an endless supply of money, I could hire a masseuse to follow me around all day. In fact, the cost of massage is the only thing that separates me from having them uber-frequently. But today, my life has changed! In the Village Center at Marguerite and La Paz, between CVS Drugs…

"OK, we're going to move 3,000 miles—it sounds crazy now that I'm saying it—and we're going to put our spa in Mission Viejo." That's Shahira Raineri, owner of Hand and Stone, describing her decision to move out West from New Jersey and start her first business. Hand and Stone opened last December. Back then, the business had 12 employees. In seven months, the staff has tripled, and a new location has been opened in Tustin. That second location has always been part of the plan, said Raineri. She always planned to capitalize on the economies of scale and uses her 30 to 35 employees in both …

A deal several months in the making, Italy-based Eurotech has announced it will own Mission Viejo's Dynatem for $1.9 million starting June 1. Dynatem makes fast, sturdy computers, President Mike Horan said. Many of them are bought by major U.S. defense contractors like Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin. The computers have to withstand high altitudes, drastic temperature changes and rough conditions, Horan said. They're also used in RADAR systems, he said. And since they're top-secret, even Dynatem employees have a hard time finding out how their computers are used, Horan said. The purchase…

When your car breaks down you take it right away to your mechanic. But where do you take your soul, your body and your mind to get a tune up from the daily grind and sometimes overwhelming stress? Hidden inside a Dojo within the Japan Karatedo Federation in Mission Viejo is Shanti Love Yoga.  Shanti means peace. Shanti Love Yoga is a yoga class that uses aromatherapy and candle therapy to take you away to a place where you can be yourself, feel safe and relaxed. There is no rush here or competition. The idea is to breath in and out and relax your body and mind. Instructor Gia Anderson's …