Megan at Disney World.

The sun is getting up earlier these days in our neighborhood.

Megan is heading to FL with her showchoir. We will miss her!

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Aloha! Another fun year at the Arizona Aloha Festival!

Cameron loves her Zhu Zhu pet...the rest of us don't understand it.

Pinkwood Derby

While her mom and dad were in Vegas watching the big racecars, Cameron was racing her own car in the Pinkwood Derby. She won a few and lost a few, but had a great time.

Beauty and the Beast

Ryan played "Cogsworth" the clock in Akimel's production of Beauty and the Beast in February. He was so cute, and did a great job. As always, you can click on the photos to view them larger.

We were so happy that Grandma and Grandpa Woods could come watch the play as well as Susie, Kreston and Conner. Kreston is pretty happy that he's as tall as Trish now, and still growing.

Megan's Showchoir

Megan is getting ready to go to Florida this weekend with her showchoir. They will be at Disney World, and get to do a workshop with the cast members while there. They had a parent preview show last weekend. I'll post part of a video (the camera quit halfway through) so you can see them in action. Click on the still photos to see Megan up close.

Nascar in Vegas

Trish got NASCAR tickets for Christmas, so she and Mike went last weekend. It rained and was freezing cold the whole day we were there. You could hardly see the Vegas strip because of the rain. At one point we went and sat in the car and listened to a book on CD, because we had to thaw out. Still, NASCAR is fun! We plan to go when it's in Phoenix in April and take the kids.

Catching up

Megan did get her drivers license the first week of February. She's turning into a great little driver.

Megan is 16!!!

Megan is officially 16 years old now! We had a wild "Winter Luau" to celebrate, and about 30 of her friends were able to attend. We decorated outside as well as inside, but even with the fire pit, it was just too cold to stay out for very long. Everyone had lots of fun playing Guitar Hero, Pool, Foosball, "Do You Love Your Neighbor?", and Karaoke!!! Her generous friends brought her presents, and among the cute gifts, she received 8 pair of fuzzy socks, more than a dozen scents of lotion, and a poster of Taylor Lautner, the guy who plays the Werewolf from "New Moon" (causing all of the girls to scream with envy).


Hard to believe she has reached this magical age; but she is such a sweet girl, and she is very loved! Click on the photos to view them larger.

Olivia by Megan

It is official! I have been in exactly 10 shows. I just finished performing a show called "Olivia". It was written by my fabulous director Michelle Rubino and it is a combination of Oliver and Annie. It is about a little orphan girl named Olivia who gets taken to an orphanage by the character Megan... ;). While Megan starts to love Olivia like a daughter she can't adopt her herself, so she lets other families adopt her. One family is obsessed with animals, but Olivia was allergic. Another family believed that aliens were coming any day so they don't send their kids to school, so Megan takes her back. Finally, Olivia finds her real aunt, Aunt Polly. I played Aunt Polly. Except Aunt Polly abused her children, including Olivia. Yes, I beat children... Ha ha! Me and the little girl who played Olivia became really good friends so she knew that while I was yelling at her and pushing her she knew I still loved her. This was definitely the hardest part I have ever had to do, but also the most fun. My notes during rehearsals were that I needed to be meaner and louder, the exact opposite of me. So I practiced on Ryan and Cameron... JK. Not really. I was really sad on closing day. I got so close to all the little girls in the cast. There was a scene when I was crisp and clean and pretty, and then 2 scenes later I had to look like a slob in curlers and a pink robe. So I would spend an hour curling my hair for the first scene, then I would run backstage flip my hair and all 20 of these little girls would swarm around me messing up my hair and ratting it and making it huge, then wrapping it in curlers. They would then form a line and put some lipstick all over my face. They really enjoyed that. I know that it wasn't my last show, but it was really fun, and I will miss it. :)

Ryan's Latest

Yola familia! This is Ryan here. I am currently on our school soccer team. We are the Akimel A-al Rattlers, I play stopper (mid-defender). Our record is 1-8 (1 win and 8 losses), we aren't very good. The problem that we keep having is that we get the ball and then we can't pass the ball well, so we have the ball and then we give it up often.

Recently, I also auditioned for our school play,

Beauty and the Beast. I made it. I wanted Lumierre (the magical talking candle) but instead they asked me to play the part of Cogsworth (the magical talking clock). It's all good.

~!POKEY!~

Aloha people I am here to talk about Pokey. Pokey is a tortoise, he is my class pet, so I asked my teacher if I could bring him home for fall break? She said "yes!" so on Thursday me and my mom took Pokey home. Pokey is a weird tortoise. So the other night I was holding pokey and he pooped on my shirt. I was so grossed out. Pokey eats lettuce and tomatoes. He has a tongue it is so cool! My class is so jealous that I got to bring Pokey home. Pokey is cute but not as cute as my older sister she is beautiful! I will be very sad when I have to bring pokey back to school.
-Cameron

First Day of School

Megan: 15 1/2 years old; Sophmore at Desert Vista High School

Ryan: 13 years old; 8th grade at Kyrene Akimel Middle School

Cameron: 9 years old; 4th grade at Kyrene de los Lagos Elementary

Randy and Natalie came for a visit

The Randy Woods bunch were in town for an Awerkamp wedding, and we got to see them for a little while this weekend. Harry and Cassie joined us for dinner. The cousins had a great time getting reacquainted. As always, you can click on any picture to view it larger.

Cameron sings "Beautiful Things"

Cameron was asked to sing in Church. We video taped a practice session, and it's so cute we wanted to share. Click the link below to view it. Her hair style is of her own design.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SI2McKavoU

David and Demi

Before our Cruise vacation, and while Ryan was at Scout Camp, Mike and I took Megan and Cameron to the David Archuletta/Demi Lovato concert. Outside the arena, Radio Disney was set up, playing music and having contests. Cameron volunteered for a game and won a Jonas Brother's guitar pick necklace and the Pocahontas DVD. Each of us had a David Archuletta button to wear on our shirt.

This was Cameron's first concert, and she had a great time. She danced and sang all night. It was good practice for when she gets to go see Hannah Montana in September. (She got tickets for her birthday.)

David has come a long way since his start on American Idol. He still seemed pretty humble and star-struck, though. Megan is in love. Demi Lovato can Rock! She is a very talented girl for just being 16 years old.

RYAN!!!

Hello! This is Ryan again, I was not fortunate enough to make the all-star baseball team (Awww). But, however I was fortunate enough to go to scout camp again this year. We got the same campsite as last year and I earned two really cool merit badges; Horsemanship and Rifle-Shooting. I really liked riding the horses because they were easy to control. Also the merit badges had simple requirements. I had to name 15 parts of a horse, a saddle, and a bridle. Then I had to show how to control a horse which was easy. The Rifle-Shooting merit badge was great because each day we shot the rifles. We had to have 5 sets of 3 rounds in the size of a quarter, and then 5 sets of 5 rounds in the size of a quarter. It was easy for me because I am just cool like that, but other scouts were still trying to get their shot groupings on the last day.

As you might have heard, my family and I were recently on a cruise. We went to Cabo San Lucas Mexico. While there, we went zip-lining. We repelled down a 180 ft. cliff. Megan and Cameron were hesitant but I was all for it. Another thing that was included with the zip-lining was a tarzan swing thing where they strap you into a harness and spin you around while you zip-along and near the end of the line you hit a stopper on the cable and you are shaken around violently. (It is really cool!!!) If you click on the picture, you can see how high I am.

Summer!

Hey guys! It's Megan! So like I wrote in my last blog, my summer started off crazy! And I haven't stopped going!!! After I got home from my show choir trip which my Mom wrote about, (2nd out of 23!!!!), I helped Cameron with her play which my Mom also wrote about. That was so much fun being the head grip. Anyway, after the play finished I was chained to our dining room table and a laptop. I had to take Health class online. It was so wierd! Since there was no face to face interaction, they added in tons of details because it wasn't so awkward for them. It was for us, though! A girl in my ward was in the same class and we were both uncomfortable during it. Anyway I had to finish a week early so that I wouldn't have to work on it while on our cruise.

So I took the final and the next day we left for San Diego to get on a cruise ship and sail to beautiful Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Saturday and Sunday were sailing days where we really just hung out around the boat. I met a really great group of kids and we all went on a Scavenger Hunt looking for things on the boat. One of the items we needed was something with teeth. So we thought and thought and finally came to the conclusion that children had teeth! So as we were coming back to the club to turn in the stuff we collected we saw a kid and his mom looking at pictures, so we ran up to him and asked the mom if we could borrow her son. She looked at me like I was crazy. I told her he would help us win a Scavanger Hunt and that we would just be down the hall for a second. She said "yes" but the kid looked scared out of his mind! We walk into the club and our director asks us who the kid belongs to and we explain how he is our something with teeth. She starts laughing so hard and we let the kid go back to his mom. He practically ran the whole way.

The next day we docked in Cabo and went Zip Lining! It was so fun and scary at the same time. They made us put on these ugly Doo-Rag type things and then a bulky helmet and a harness. Then we hiked up this mountain and went on about 10 different zip lines across canyons and off huge cliffs. If you looked down you saw pointy rocks and cacti. It was awesome! Then they took us to this really high cliff and told us we are about to repel down it.... 180 ft!!!!!!! It was so scary! I hate heights, and was practically in tears. When I finally reached the bottom I was shaking so bad and had to sit down. It was so crazy. The next day we went parasailing, which is where you are being pulled by a boat in the air with a parachute on your back. When I was up there I looked down on the ocean and saw a school of sting rays! It was so cool, but no one else saw them! I was so mad!

The next and last day was a day at sea while we traveled back to California. I hung out with a girl I met on the boat all day and her siblings. We traveled all over the boat and saw a whale while we were getting ice cream! I can't believe all the wildlife I saw this past week. It was an amazing vacation and gets better, but I have to leave something for Ryan and Cameron to write about!