For a few months now, Crystal, the owner of Everything Birth, has been working on a transition for the company. She has been meticulously planning and arduously preparing. The time has finally arrived for Crystal to begin a new path, one that she has been working diligently for years towards, and she has passed the company on to a new owner: Nicole Beers.
Nicole, as it so happens, is a dear friend of mine. She is the attachment parent of two precious, young children. Nicole is a trained paramedic with extensive knowledge of medical language, procedure, and equipment. She has strong ties to the metro Detroit area’s natural parenting and natural birthing communities. She has a strong rapport with both doulas and midwives in the Southeast Michigan area. She stands behind genital autonomy, extended breastfeeding, and small farming. She is a hard worker and, quite frankly, an unbelievably strong woman.
Crystal built Everything Birth into a dependable company with a spirit of its own. Her customer service has been impeccable and she has built strong business relationships and wonderful friendships because of the way she conducts business with honesty and integrity. She chose carefully when she was deciding who to pass Everything Birth onto. She chose my friends Mike and Nicole Beers, because she knew they would care for it the way she needed it cared for.
Everything Birth allowed Crystal to maintain flexibility while her daughter spent her younger years in and out of the hospital, and as it turns out, this company ended up in the hands of this new family at a time when it would be most needed.
Mike and Nicole wanted their children to know a peaceful, simpler life. The plan was for Nicole to stay home with the children and sooner or later (either before or after retiring from his career) Mike wanted to end up at home with his wife and children as well. He talked about building a sustainable, small farm and homeschooling their kids. Tragically, after the process of purchasing Everything Birth began, Mike was killed in a car accident on his way to work, “and the motivation for a job that keeps Nicole home became all the more important,” Crystal explained.
Crystal is committed to working with Nicole even more through this transition, so that Nicole will be able to remain an at-home mother for her six-year-old daughter Eisley and her infant son Oliver. Crystal is dedicated to making sure that Nicole will be able to continue to parent the two little ones in the style to which she and Mike were committed, Crystal explained.
For now, Crystal can still be reached at her same email address. The toll free number will be the same. Nicole can be reached at her new Everything Birth email address. Shipping times should not change much, although for some people in the Northeast part of the country, orders might take an extra day. Nicole is more centrally located within the U.S., so most Everything Birth customers will actually see faster delivery times.
As for me, well… I’m not going anywhere. It has been an honor to write for Crystal and it will be a blessing to be able to write for Nicole. See, Mike was a dear friend, who I incidentally met on this very blog that he happened upon while researching gentle, natural parenting. He left a comment on one of my posts on Everything Birth Blog many years ago, and before long, our families became like old friends. I had already anticipated helping him learn the ropes of the blog, because he was going to be doing much of the blog posts and social media. Mike and Nicole were going to run Everything Birth together, you see.
Mike would have been a natural at blogging. In fact, he has even guest blogged for another fantastic mama from within our community about what it’s like to be an attachment dad. He loved what Nicole stands for. A few of us even coined him the honorary leader of our mom’s group, because he was that into parenting peacefully and networking with good people.
Anyway, for awhile, I will actually be posting more than normal, because there’s so much more to say. I want you to know this beautiful family like I do. I want you to trust that this intelligent, loving woman will be there to support your birth and parenting needs just as Crystal did before her. I also really want you to see pictures of the homestead they built and the awesome kids that they made! I’d also like to give Crystal a proper EB Blog thank you for all that she has done for the birthing community, for Nicole, and for me.
Look for these posts in the coming week or two.
In late October, less than two months before Mike was killed, he asked me how things were going. I told him I was juggling a bunch of things, and mostly, trying to meet all the unique demands of my special needs child swiftly, gently and thoroughly, even under pressure. I told him that I never would have thought that waitressing all those years ago would have taught me so many skills that I now utilize as a mother. Keeping calm under pressure, dividing my attention as fairly as possible, calming irate “customers,” and endlessly wiping down tables and chairs are things I couldn’t have mastered on the job as quickly as I needed to as a work-at-home mom of three.
“See, that waitressing was a life learning experience that you needed for later on,” Mike told me. “There’s a reason for everything we do.”
There’s a reason for everything we do.
Now, more than ever, I see that.
If you want to keep up with what’s going on with the transition or the serendipitous way this all unraveled that I have only hinted at thus far, please make sure you’re following Everything Birth on Facebook.
For now though, just know that even though Crystal is moving forward on a new path, her beautiful company, you readers, and Everything Birth’s amazing customers will all remain in very good hands.
