My Finally Exciting Life!!!

Hello everyone! In my last few updates, I have said that not many new things have been going on. But since my last post, quite a bit has happened! First, school was boring as usual (I improved my grades-I raised two of my B's to A's :D). We completed the swimming unit which was fun until my groups' synchronized swimming routine. We messed up so bad-I think we all failed! But it was so fun doing the routine, it was something I will always remember! My group got the loudest applause in my class, because we were the worst ha-ha!

Blake and Maren's family visited, and that was fun! We all had a great time playing and having a small family get together. I gave Jessie and Eliza my old American Girl Dolls, so I really hope they enjoy them! The only down part was that Jessie was sick and I caught her illness also! I heard all of the kids in their family also got sick! I started with a fever and migraine for a few days, then a really bad cough, and pink eye, and I got hives during all that. Then, we thought I was getting better after my pink eye went away, but then I woke up with a very bad headache on Sunday, and we went to the doctor today and found I now have a sinus infection. I have been sick since April 6th! It is not very fun!

Another very fun thing during our two week Spring Break is going to Hawaii! I was sick the whole time, but it doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it! We went to Pearl Harbor and the Missouri, we visited Ashton up at the BYU Hawaii campus, went to the PCC, visited the Big Island and saw a volcano, waterfalls, and the a black sand beach. We also visited South Pointe. We enjoyed ourselves on the beaches (the water is SO much warmer than California!!!) and relaxed. It was definitely a vacation I will never forget! I cannot wait to go again! I decided I want to go to BYU there. :D I will post a slide-show of the pictures.

So basically, that is what has been happening. Some other small things, I finally saw Twilight, read the rest of the series and now I am in love with it. I also finally saw High School Musical 3 today on Pay Per View! I decided I want a really chubby chiwawa.

Oh, and something else VERY exciting, I was in a commercial on Saturday!!! My friend and I were at the promenade, and we saw a big crowd so we went to investigate. A Pizza Hut commercial was being filmed. One of the producers asked me and this lady I was standing by if we would be an extra. My friend asked him if she could be in it too and he said yes. We walked by the camera about 5 times. (We walked RIGHT in front of it, so you will be able to see me). It is a Pizzone one. The two main guys are in flannels, so I'm in that one. I have on a maroon sweater dress, black tights, and gold shoes. My friend has one beige and white shorts, a yellow sweater, and she has black hair. It wont air for awhile we believe (her mom is in the fashion and commercial industry so she says that it takes awhile for them to edit-we are thinking about a month), but look for me! Its my big debut!

So I hope you all are doing well! Enjoy yourselves and I hope I will be seeing you all soon!

xoxo

Anna Marie

My anniversary

I was married to my true love 26 years ago today. Way back then My mom was 38, my dad was 42, Bob was 21, Brian was about to turn 17, Brenda was 13 and Blake and Brent had just turned 12. Do the math and figure out how "old" I was.
It has been a great adventure being married to Michael and I have been able to see a lot of this country as well as parts of the world. He is a terrific husband and no matter how badly I was shaking while trying to put the wedding ring on his finger, I was glad to be marrying him. I'm still glad.
May all of you find the love of your life if you haven't already and may you kiss the love of your life if you have!
Becky

Hello!
I hope everyone is doing good & staying cool... It has been very hot here the last few days!
I miss everyone very much!

HAPPY late BIRTHDAY
Blake & Brent!!!!

Love, Alexa

p.s. 1 more month til I turn 23! :(

Ho paura di altezze (I'm Afraid of Heights)

This is an essay I wrote for my Essay Writing (Creative Non-Fiction) class about my trip to Rome last summer.

Ho paura di altezze (I'm Afraid of Heights)

“Ho voglia di un gelato, perfavore,” I told the street vendor, trying to make my accent seem natural and not forced.
“Sure, would you like chocolate or vanilla?” he asked.
It quickly became obvious that I should have been learning Latin instead of Italian. Everyone here spoke perfect English, and somehow figured out that I was American before I even opened my mouth. “Sono Americano” was never necessary.
All the signs had English translations written underneath, but the ruins did not. Catching an underground train and navigating the bus schedule was easy. Figuring out what the ancient letters"M AGRIPPA L F COS TERTIVM FECIT" written on the front of the Pantheon were supposed to mean was a different matter.
I spent all day at the Vatican. I was smart and got through the Sistine Chapel line early, and so I had time to spend the afternoon walking around St. Peter's Basilica. The prayer room that was sequestered off to the side was crowded. Mixed together in the quiet, candle-lit sanctuary were two distinct groups of people. There were the devout - easily picked out by their large crosses and bowed heads - who had come for a quiet time of devotion. And there were the weary, map-toting tourists who had realized that kneeling at a pew provides excellent relief for tired legs.
I stepped outside to get some fresh air, when I saw a simple green sign that was not translated into English.
I had no idea what it said, but it had an arrow pointing to the left, and a small note reading '5 euro.' I had plenty of extra coins and I'm always up for an adventure, so I followed the sign. If I'd simply asked a tour guide and learned what it read, I never would have walked down the stone path and given the fare to the wrinkled nun in an equally wrinkled habit who had trouble keeping her Official Holy See badge clipped on her chest pocket.
I received a ticket that had a picture of St. Peter's square on it, and joined a line of people waiting outside two large wooden doors. The green and orange-colored fanny packs told me that I was with fellow tourists. I stayed as quiet as I could and circled around, hoping to pick up bits of conversation that would give me some idea as to what was going on. German, French, Japanese - every language on the planet was spoken in that group, except for the only one I knew.
The doors opened and we started to climb. And climb and climb and climb and climb. The circular staircase was from a Frankenstein movie. The steps were short and obviously built for a time when Europeans didn't grow their legs so long. Every so often there'd be a wooden torch on the wall. We had enough daylight filtering through the gaps in the cold grey stones that we didn't need them.
I lost track of stairs somewhere after 1,000.
Turning around and going back was not an option. We had to stop frequently so the fat man two spots ahead of me in line could turn his body and squeeze through the narrow, rounded walls. I turned too, to avoid touching the sweat he left on the stone sides.
I don't mind closed spaces, but I am terrified of heights. I have no idea why, I just always have been. No matter how much rationalizing I do, the fourth step of a ladder is about all I can handle before I find myself paralyzed and trying to shrink to the floor. My senses are numb, and nothing – not the paper dryness of my tongue, not the spongy sweatiness of my palms or the wind chime jitteriness of my legs – seems real except the gap between myself and the ground.
I knew we were going up and I began to prepare myself mentally, but it didn't work. After about 20 minutes or so, there was a window. I was not happy. We were towering above the Sistine Chapel, which now looked more like a gingerbread castle.
Finally, the climbing stopped. We were shushed as we walked through another doorway and into an enormous circular room with a hole in the middle. It was like I was walking on the flat half of a cut bagel. I glanced across the chasm and realized that we were in the dome of St. Peter's – the tallest dome in the world.
It took me about ten minutes to summon the courage to look again, and about ten minutes more to finally walk over to the steel metal cage that kept us from falling, even if we'd tried. There was a mass going on, and I had to take some pictures.
My hands were shaking too much. With the flash off, all of my photos were sure to be horrible. I was sweating on the camera enough that I had to wipe off the dampness every few shots anyway.
I did the best I could. I marveled at the dome for a while, and even looked straight down a couple times. There was a mass below. The red, white and black figures moved up and down the aisles, drinking from the tiny golden up. Once again, I wished I had studied Latin, or at least Catholicism, as the reverent, strange sounds echoed up hundreds of feet. They bounced off the towering statues of the saints, up to the frescoes of the prophets, up to my ears and up to the clouds that were painted at the top of the basilica – up to God.

I patted myself on the back for overcoming my fear and walked through the door labeled “Uscita” for “Exit.” It wasn't until I was already five or six steps into the staircase that I realized we were going up and not down. There was something seriously wrong here.
But the stairs continued upwards, with the loops tightening and narrowing so that if I'd walked faster I'm sure I'd have gotten dizzy. A few hundred steps later, there was another open entrance; one that looked suspiciously blue.
There was no going back, so I walked out and quickly ascertained that there was only a flimsy banister to separate me and a 450-foot journey into ancient concrete. I kept telling myself that there was no reason the building would suddenly collapse after 400 years of stability, but the wind kept blowing and making me too nervous to be reassured.
I bent my legs and hunched down. I was now a foot shorter. Only 449 left to go.
Every instinct in my body said to lay flat on the ground and inch my way over to the exit. But at the same time, I knew I couldn't possibly come all the way up here and not take a photo. I slowly stood up. Very slowly. In order to capture my movement, you would need a time lapse camera like the ones they use to watch plants grow.
Somehow, I made it over to the front of the balcony, and looked at the city. It was late afternoon, and you could see the sun reflected off the Tiber, the orange glow of the houses and the shadow of the basilica on the shadows of the apostles, a hundred feet below me
It was breathtaking. The city seemed to grow out of the hills, like a Chia Pet of houses. The river didn't look like a snake, but more like a blue ribbon, with a green tree trim, laid over the tan rectangle wafers made of brick and stone. The color of wet cardboard sprinkled the city. These were Caesar's bricks, reminding me that I was in the new part of town.
I steadied my camera and took some photos. The pictures had no chance at capturing how incredible this was, but they might make some people jealous. I turned around and craned my head to see that about a foot of curved roof was all that separated me from very top of the basilica. The only way I could possibly get any higher was if I were to balance tip toe on the top of the cross.
I looked down at the roof of St. Peter's. I was looking at the tops of the haircuts of some of the same statues that I'd been afraid to look up at earlier in the day because of how high I thought they were. Ha!
I was more than a bit proud of myself. I had been too chicken to visit the top of the Vittoriano across town just yesterday. And now here I was, practically leaning over the railing with my camera now, on the very top of a building twice its height. The accidental nature of my triumph was a detail I planned to leave out when I told the story to my dad.
I got some more photos, looked around and left. This time, I made sure that the stairs were going down.

April

Hello everyone. If I don't get a response to this post, I will know it is time to discontinue the Beazer's Business Blog. I thought it would be a great way for our family to stay connected, but so far it seems more a chore than a pleasure. It is lovely weather here in California and I am looking forward to this weekend when Blake, Maren, Abram, Maggie, Richard, Eliza, Jessie, and Brent come to visit us. It will be a quick but fun visit. Next week Michael, Arica, Anna and I leave for Hawaii for a visit with Ashton and for Arica to check out the BYU-Hawaii campus. It will be a nice break for all of us. April is also tax time and for us that is a four letter word. Owing money is never pleasant!! Don't forget it is Rhonda's birthday on Sunday. And General Conference is Saturday and Sunday. Love to you all!
Becky