Merry Christmas to all! This has been one great year for our family. We are so blessed.  Our biggest news was finding out about baby girl #3 who is due to join our family in Feb. 2017. Claire and Emma are so excited to both be big sisters and are constantly talking to my belly.  We are excited to see how they will be when sister arrives.

Kory is in his 2nd year of  being a school counselor at Dixon Middle School in Provo. The school is just a few blocks away from our home yet he drives to work every day because he drops Emma off with Grandma in the mornings. Haha!  All of the counselors except Kory accepted positions at other schools over the summer, leaving Kory as the "head counselor" at his school after only being there for a year.  He loves his job and the faculty and students that he works with.  He spends most of his Sunday mornings fulfilling his calling at church as a ward clerk. He also loves to wrestle with Claire and Emma and enjoys the fact that, for now, they are such daddy's girls and they love being around him. In fact, Emma is so attached to him right now that he has learned to braid her hair and put it in a ponytail because she won't let mommy do her hair.

This year marks my 10th year of teaching, still in Spanish Dual Immersion teaching the English side and still at the same school I started at. It is my 3rd year in 2nd grade and I am enjoying it. Like Kory, my school is just one block farther than his school from our house. This year is a little different for me because I take Claire with me in the mornings so she can head off to her Kindergarten class when the bell rings (more on that in a minute).  I also stay busy with my church calling as the 1st counselor in the Primary presidency. We serve a lot of children from our ward and so we stay busy. Being pregnant on top of everything else makes life just plain crazy around here. I am excited to be able to welcome our baby girl when she decides to come.

Claire (5 1/2) FINALLY got to experience the day she has been waiting for since before her 4th birthday--Kindergarten.  She was so excited to start and asked me at least a dozen times on her first day if it was time to go to her classroom yet. She absolutely LOVES Kindergarten and is soaking up everything like a sponge. She also has finally started to get interested in reading and tries to sound out every word she sees. She was also thrilled to find out that her teacher, just like mommy, is having a baby girl too.  Claire has won the hearts of much of the faculty and aides at the school with her sweet smile and happy attitude and is now counting down the days until 1st grade so she can eat lunch at school. She also loves church and primary, especially seeing mommy in primary each Sunday. We love her sweet spirit, her caring and thoughtful attitude toward her sister, and her imagination. She also loves to have sleepovers at grandma's house, play with her cousins, build things with her Duplos and Legos, help daddy build Legos, read books, draw pictures for others, and climb all over and wrestle with daddy. She is so excited to be a big sister again and likes to help Emma "learn" about being a big sister.

I think Emma (3 1/2) was sent to our family to helps us learn early on about how to deal with a teenager.  We call her our threenager! With her sass and her fiery personality, we often forget that she is ONLY 3 and still trying to figure out life. She is our girl, 100%.  She often requests to wear dresses, especially the twirly ones and loves to dance and curtsy and pretend she's one of the many Disney princesses. She started preschool this year at the same place that Claire went and enjoys it. She loves to do everything Claire does and it's uncanny how she seems to be hungry or hurt the same time Claire is!  The two of them are the very best of friends and play well together but she also doesn't mind just playing on her own and being independent. One of her favorite things is to try to do the same homework that Claire does for Kindergarten. She loves Minnie Mouse, watching Frozen and Inside Out, singing "Let it Go", dancing, playing with cousins, having sleepovers at Grandma's house, feeding Grandma and Grandpa's kitty, having breakfast with Grandpa and wrestling with her daddy. She too loves church and will get to join Claire and mommy in Primary in January. She is so gentle and caring with her younger cousins. We know she will be an excellent big sister!

Well, that's our life in a nutshell.  It will only get crazier. We are thankful each day that we have each other and that we enjoy so many blessings. We hope this season finds you happy, healthy, and blessed.

With love,
The Sekaquaptewa's
Kory, Michele, Claire, Emma, and baby girl

Yeah, and BYU won their football game...among other things that happened today.

Nevermind that it's been nearly 2.5 years since I've written on my blog. I've had good intentions, honestly, I have.  I even formulated a mental list on several occasions of things I wanted to write about.  Some of those ideas may one day become blog posts, but for now I'll just write about today, because for some reason, it turned out to be a super fantastic day. Here's why:

1) Went to the grocery store and saved 44% on my grocery bill.  That's generally a norm for me, but it always gives me a rush. I love it. If you want to learn how to do it, ask me.  I'd love to help others save money on their grocery bills.

2) Got our cell phone bill lowered by $50 per month. Cha-ching!

So, if saving major amounts of money today wasn't enough, I had no idea I'd have an even better day.

3) BYU won their football game. Trivial--maybe, but still a win's a win and this Cougar fan is happy!

4) I got to attend a beautiful ceremony for my cousin and his wife and son.  They were sealed today in the Mt. Timpanogos LDS temple for time and all eternity.  They're an eternal family now.  It was perfect and beautiful and so wonderful to see family. Okay, okay, they're not actually family, but my dad and their dad pretty much grew up together and are the best of friends so we've always referred to each other's families as cousins (among the kids) and aunt and uncle for the adults. It felt good to be in the temple, to experience the peace and sweet spirit of the Lord. I hate to admit it, but it's been a while since I've been to the temple. Upon leaving, I felt renewed and having a desire to be better. My heart also desired for others to be able experience this joy, and ached that so many don't know or don't have a deep enough desire to participate in these sacred ordinances.

5) AAAANNNNNDDDDD, as if this day couldn't get any better, my girls got to shake Elder Jeffrey R. Holland's hand. YEAH! they got to meet him and talk to him for just a second.  He was eating dinner with some of his family at the same restaurant as us and he sat right behind Claire and my mom. Seriously, I've thought before if I could only meet one of the twelve apostles, it would be the hardest choice to make, ever, but Elder Holland would probably be at the top of the list. I didn't stop to meet him or shake his hand. He was with his family and I didn't want to take any more of his time. But, I wanted my girls to have the chance to at least shake his hand. Claire told him she loves the temple, and Emma told him she's going to be a big sisters. Precious moments. I thanked him as we were walking away and thought maybe that was my one and only chance to actually meet Elder Holland, but that didn't matter.  I want my girls to have that opportunity more than me and to understand how important all of those men are, especially in these days when following the prophet and his apostles is so critical.

Well, I'm tired and ready for bed.  I don't know if I portrayed how wonderful this day was in my hurried typing, but I felt like it was a day worthy of noting so, I noted.