Yes.. This blog has been hijacked!!

This is Catherine, Bea's daughter, making sure you all know my mom, yes... IS ALIVE!! She hasn't posted for about 5 months!! Hard to believe... time does fly! My mom has been unbelievably busy.. typical Bea, right! Well, with Dance Festival, Girls Camp, YW, and being super mom, she just hasn't had the time to sit and post, let alone breathe.. so i figured I would! (= Juggling is my mom's specialty! She works her magic under pressure.. I love love love her! She is the best Mom ever!! She's not only beautiful but passionately young.. Bubbly, yet always brilliant.. Even when shes stressed she always makes me laugh! She has officially won the most selfless Mom award! Hopefully we can all convince my mom to come back to the blogging world soon and share all of the happenings in the Woodwell Family.. yes, we have TONS of pictures.. hopefully we'll see them here sometime in the next 5 months! haha ;-) Love you mom!! Catherine

A page out of life...

I read that title in a new book I bought to read and thought to be appropriate for this new post.  It has been a long time... I know...  I will be posting about our summer soon.

This week's YW's activity was a "Talent Show" and my girls decided they would do their own music video.  Enjoy!!! This is what they do best....

So he says he's working...

James is in Europe this week working really, really hard, allegedly. So I find it interesting that he was able to summit Ben Nevis while he was there. I've never heard of Ben Nevis and I'm sure you haven't either but according to Wikipedia, "Ben Nevis is the highest mountain in Great Britain." He compared it to Half Dome without the last 420 feet of slick rock and steel cables. In fact, Ben Nevis is exactly 100 meters shorter than Half Dome. Another difference was the 70 mph wind and the 50 feet of visibility on the summit. It was miserable, cold and dark, and James was all by himself. He took the picture below in a feeble attempt to garner some sort of sympathy for his endeavor. He made good time: 2 hours 55 minutes up and 2 hours 45 down. Great job James, keep working those legs. Sad photos courtesy of James, nice photo courtesy of Wikipedia.

The icefield approach 15 minutes from the summit The summit of Ben Nevis - nearly abscured by the fierce cloud movement.

James on the summit with his sad, windburnt face - think balaclava and goggles next time

A beautiful shot of Ben Nevis on a clear snowcapped day

Caroline Graduated!!!

Graduation was fabulous!!! She was happy, as you can see... now she thinks she's a grown-up and can take on anything. She received her first official calling in the church to work in the primary for the summer... she's extremely excited about that. My life these days feels like a big blur... my days go by so fast! I consider my time valuable just like anyone else, but time slips by me without warning... how does that happen? There's a lot of shifting and pulling in all different directions, and although I have a lot going on in my life the most important thing are my girls.

The closer it gets to Caroline leaving for college the more I don't want to let her go. I know I shouldn't fear letting go and letting her experience all the good that its about to come her way. I know how much she's looking forward to this new adventure and experience in her life, but I can't help but have reservations.

I know I will be a mess as time approaches and sometimes I hate even thinking about it... so, I'm going to focus on the good and positive right now. The good being that I will celebrate this time of her life with all the excitement and joys that comes from being a new graduate... I will reassure her of her abilities and great strengths and I will let her know how much she's loved and appreciated.

Here's to YOU baby girl!!!!

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Mi vida en estos momentos esta llena de tantas cosas que tengo que hacer... me parece mentira de lo ocupada que me siento. Pienso que mi tiempo es valioso, asi que todos los dias tengo que hacer una lista de prioridades y asi poder determinar como dedicar mi tiempo. Y aunque mi vida cotidiana me tiene un poco ocupada, mis hijas son mi prioridad. Ya Caroline se graduo de High School... siento una gran anciedad, ya que no quiero que se me vaya a Idaho para ingresar en la universidad de BYU. Mientras que los dias pasan volando siento miedo al saber que pronto embarcara en una de las experiencias mas linda de su vida. Asi que tengo que apoyarla y celebrar con ella esta etapa tan bonita de su vida. Caroline dejara un gran vacio en nuestro hogar.

What are the odds...

Tuesday morning I received a call from Caroline -- "Mom, I got tickets to the American Idol Finale for tonight!" It took me a couple of minutes to process everything as well as the implications this would have. Of course, my first thought was to check flights to see if we could actually make it to L.A. by the mandatory 12 noon check in. With Catherine's help I soon found a flight that could get us there on time. We had 10 minutes to get ready. Caroline and Jac showed up, we got in the car and raced to the Oakland airport. By this time I had completely convinced myself we weren't going to make it, our flight was departing in 15 minutes and we just arrived at the airport. Lucky for us not many people were there. We all raced to the gate and amazingly made our flight. After landing in L.A., we rented a car and drove straight to the Nokia theater. Getting there with 15 minutes to spare, we took our place in line and waited... and waited.... and waited. After 4 1/2 hours, we were nearly at the front of the line. We were getting closer and closer to where we were supposed to pick up our tickets when one of the producers told us there were no more tickets. I was irritated when I heard that but also confused at the site of hundreds of people in front of us running. We asked what was going on and why is everyone running? Someone yelled that they were selling the last few tickets at the ticket booth 4 blocks down. Believing we still had a chance I excitedly exclaimed to my girls,"RUN GIRLS... RUN!" and of course I'm right behind them walking in my extremely uncomfortable high heals. By the time I got to them we were in the middle of the line and the show was to start in 7 minutes. I thought to myself we came all this way so no matter what we are getting in. With my girls still waiting in line I walk up to the front of the line and pulled a Bea Woodwell and amazingly enough got four tickets. Unfortunately, they were separated all over the place but I was just grateful we even got in. Before we walked in, we had to get our tickets scanned and for some odd reason mine wasn't valid but all of my girls tickets were. I explained my situation to one of the executive producers and she handed all of us new tickets and told us to hurry in. Walking into the Nokia theater was breathtaking... in this place were 7,000 people... I couldn't spend a lot of time looking around because the show was to start in 3 minutes. I quickly asked another gentleman to please help us find our seats and he directed us to the front row right next to the "Cook Family"... that's right, David Cook's family! We got to meet David Cook's mom, grandparents, brother, niece, and nephew. It was pretty exciting and I had plenty of moments where I truly didn't think we would make it!!! But there I was front row and five feet away from Ryan, David C., David Archuleta... all the girls loved lil' Archuleta! The girls missed school that day but we hope they will always remember it as fun and exciting with the knowledge that mom and dad were willing to do fun things for them when it was within our reach. Over all it was a great night!!! Next morning we woke up early for seminary and off they went to school to share their tale... I should have posted this last week but my time its taken up by so many other things. Lately, I find myself wishing for more time...

The results are in...

And I am soooo happy to say that I was selected in a lottery to participate in the St. George Marathon this upcoming Oct. 4th. This will be an extreme challenge for me but I'm truly excited to have one of my dreams become a reality. I'm really hoping I can pull this one off. I started running 10 years ago with my best friend Mary... she introduced me to this great sport. She's always been a runner and a fast one I might add! There's no way I could ever keep up with her. Ten years ago she challenged me to run... she knew this was no easy task for me but she was patient. I would show up at her house and we'd run a circuit around her neighborhood. After a while I realized that she had already ran her 5 miles for the day and then she would run with me, that should tell you something. I was so slow that there's no way she would try to exercise with me. Since then... I have gotten a little better. I'm just so grateful to her for always encouraging me to do things that sometimes I couldn't possibly think I could do... and this is one of them. Here goes to fulfilling one of my long time dreams!!! Anything is possible... ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ No me van a creer, pero me voy a hacer un maraton... parece mentira que pronto va ser realidad. Me tengo que poner las pilas... son 26.2 millas. Estoy loca ya lo se!!! Pero, esto siempre a sido para mi unos de mis grandes suenos. La preparacion para este maraton comienza manana... Mary es una de mis mejores amigas, y ella me introdujo a este deporte. Pronto sabre si podre lograr esta meta. Nosotras corriamos juntas y yo pensaba...hay que chevere, me encanta pero me era un poco dificil! Luego me di cuenta de que ella ya habia corrido cinco millas antes de correr conmigo... asi seria!! Le doy muchas gracias a ella porque siempre me da animo a lograr mis suenos.

Marathon anyone?

Most of my friends know that I have been wanting to run a marathon for sometime now. In fact, I recently entered the lottery for the St. George Marathon in October, I'll keep you posted as to my success in getting in. Now the hard part. I am like many people out there, with great dreams and personal ambitions, however, at the end of a six mile run, the spirit is still willing but the flesh is indeed overwhelmingly weak and is beginning to convince the spirit, that this may be too difficult to endure. Last week was the Boston Marathon and in reading about the race, I came across this little article in the "USA Today" which I found so inspiring. The runners mentioned in this story did not let physical circumstance, age, or work schedule deter them from running their race. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.