My Life

At 4 o’clock in the afternoon on Sunday, the first day of March, 1992 I was born in Upland, California; name, McKenna Eleanor Grotefend, born to Mark George Grotefend and Sabrina Louise Scanlan Grotefend. My older siblings were Ashley Marie, born February 23, 1985, Matthew George, born March 22, 1988, and Dallin Edward, born October 28, 1989. On April 12, 1992 my father gave me my baby blessing.

My family lived in California for another year until we moved to Thornton, Colorado in 1993. After being there for 19 months, we picked up and moved again to Tigard, Oregon in 1995. I started school at McKay Elementary in 1997, afternoon kindergarten. I then went on to Mr. Paul’s 1^st grade class. I can remember one time waiting for my dad at the Portland airport and playing on the big play airplane, and I split my chin right open. When he got off his plane, we rushed me over to the ER and I had to get stiches.

Once again, my family decided to pick up and move. In August of 1999 we all moved one last time to Federal Way, Washington. In September, I started the 2^nd grade at Enterprise Elementary School in Mrs. Schellenberg’s class.

On February 29, 2000 I got my ears pierced for the first time, the day before I turned 8. Then on March 4, 2000 I was baptized the newest cleanest member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It was definitely a wonderful day, my favorite thing to say was, “8 is great” 8 was also my favorite number at the time. I remember doing a bunch of mini plays in the 2^nd grade also; I was the fairy godmother in Cinderella. We also did a planet projects, mine was Mars, and I was sure to bring plenty of Mars Bars for the class to taste. I also started to take piano lessons from my best friends sister, Cosette Birtcher, I was her first student.

2000 started the 3^rd grade, which lead to 2001s 4^th grade, Mrs. Marston’s class both years. I remember she would read us The Series of Unfortunate Events books as well as the Harry Potter books during our reading time circle. This year is also when September 11^th happened; the twin towers in New York were hit by planes that had been hijacked and thus began the war on terrorism. About this age is when I joined a recreation basketball team with some of my friends since one of their mom’s was the coach. In 2002 I went on to Mrs. Brown’s 5^th grade class. We broke up into different reading group classes, there was the high level reading, the medium level and the below reading level classes. I was in the medium reading level, and I remember coveting the above average readers.

In 2002 the junior high school and the high school were changing from 7-9^th grade and 10-12^th graders to 6-8 and 9-12^th. In my elementary school the 6^th graders went to Camp Thunderbird every year, but because my 5^th grade class wouldn’t be able to go 6^th grade, we got to go in the 5^th grade. It was such a great experience. For one week each class got to go to this camp and do all sorts of fun activities. We stayed in little cabins with a bunch of girls from other elementary schools in our school district. My cabin was A-1. Each cabin had their own chant, ours was; “A-1 girls are having fun, A-1 girls will get it done. A-1 is boom, dynamite. A-1 is boom, dynamite. A-1 is tick, tick, tick, tick, boom dynamite. To the left, to the left, to the right, to the right, to the front, to the front, to the side, to the side.” It really was a fun week, most people lost their voices or got strep throat; I had neither.

The year 2003 came, and I began the 6^th grade at Illahee Middle School, which was right down the street from my house. In my 5^th grade my mom bought me a flute and my best friend, Clarissa Birtcher began teaching my how to play. Once we get to middle school we played in the band together all three years. Not many of the sports were open to 6^th graders at the school, so I tried gymnastics. My obstacle of choice was the hurdle. I was on the JV team, and was pretty terrible. I then realized it was not my sport, I was too tall and no good. At this point in my life I had always been a little tom boy-ish. Some of my friends talked me into trying out for the cheer team at the end of our 6^th grade year, so I did. It turned out that none of them made it, and I did; totally new experience for me.

The summer before the 7^th grade I went to cheer camp at the University of Puget Sound. I remember being so tired from long days in the sun working hard and learning new cheers and dances. We all got really sunburnt as well, but it was so much fun. Once the school year started up again we cheered for all the sports seasons. We were allowed one season off to play our own sport so I took the season off to play basketball. I was a starter on the JV team; we went our season 10-0. Half way through the year, my dad’s dad died from lung cancer, Grandpa Robert George Grotefend, we flew to Texas for the funeral. (I had really bad motion sickness all my life).

Then the time came around to pick the next year’s student body officers. I thought that it would be fun to run for the secretary/treasurer. I got all dressed up in school colors, wore my cheer skirt, painted my face purple and gold, taped fake money all over me and put it in my hair, and I gave my speech to the whole student body. I ate a raw egg and a dog treat, but later that day when they announced the winners, it was all worth it. I was the 2005-06 Illahee Middle School Secretary/Treasurer, which meant I would get to do the morning announcements. We had cheer try-outs again and began a new team. I decided that I would try for cheer captain and won that as well.

We went to cheer camp the summer before 8^th grade at UPS again. This year I made the starting varsity basketball team; our season was 9-1, losing the one game in a double overtime by one point. I also decided I’d try out for volleyball, where I also made the varsity team and realized my love for the sport.

In 2006 I started high school at Todd Beamer. This school had 4 different academies within the school as a whole. There was Math, Science, Health and Fitness Academy, Business and Industry Academy, School of Global Leadership & Economics Academy and then there was Academy X. I was in the Math, Science, Health and Fitness Academy. The summer before school started, instead of trying out for the volleyball team, I attempted to run cross country. After a bad experience of throwing up after a run once, I realized that I was not a cross country runner and quit the team before the try-outs. When basketball season came around, I tried out and sprained my ankle. I had a really bad experience with the team and the pushing of the importance of winning so thus ended my long lived relationship with basketball.

The summer of 2007 I decided to go back to my beloved volleyball, I tried out for the team and ended up becoming a starter on the JV team. Occasionally I sat in and played with the varsity girls, which was very intimidating. I joined a club called FCCLA (Family Career and Community Leaders of America) where my friends and I participated in a STAR (Students Taking Action for Recognition) event. We helped an underprivileged school in our community get the things they needed such as school supplies and new school uniforms. We first went to regionals and received a gold star, which meant we would go to state. At state, we were able to receive a gold star again, however not exactly high enough to go to nationals, but it was a really fun learning and growing experience. The rest of the school year went just fine, for the most part I was a straight A student with the occasional B, but never lower. I also went to the “Mormon Prom” this year and got my first kiss. This year, I also started at the Federal Way Community Center as a referee for an adult league of volleyball.

In 2008, I decided to do a program through my school called running start. This program allowed high school juniors and seniors to attend the local community college and take credits there that would count for both high school courses and towards getting an associate’s degree. So I began attending Highline Community College, while still participating in volleyball at the high school. This year I made the varsity team and had so much fun. Being 6 feet tall, I played middle blocker/hitter. My sister got married in September 2008 in the Seattle Temple and then moved to Las Vegas, Nevada. 

2009 started the beginning of my senior year of high school. Once again, I made the varsity volleyball team and enjoyed every minute of it. Applying for colleges was number one on my to-do list. I knew that I wanted to attend a church school, so I only applied for BYU and BYU-Idaho. After a lot of prayer and contemplation I knew that I wanted to go to BYU-Idaho. However, I knew that if I was accepted to BYU, it would make my decision harder. So I prayed that if I were really supposed to go to BYU that I would get accepted, if I didn’t, then I would know my decision to go to Idaho was right. Eventually, the letters came and BYU rejected me, so I knew that Idaho was where I belonged. It wasn’t like I was totally ineligible to be accepted into BYU either; I did have quite a few extracurricular activities as well as a great GPA. However, I was accepted to BYU-Idaho on the Winter/Spring track. Still attending Highline, I was able to graduate in June 2010 with honors as well as my AA degree.