The one with Thanksgiving 2013

I didn't take any pictures this year. I know, not smart.

I made some rolls and an apple pie, and Jon smoked some turkeys and we headed over to Sgt D's house. (or as normal civilians would call him, Carlos Duliepre). Carlos and his wife, LaWanda, hosted a wonderful Thanksgiving for some of the soldiers that weren't going home to be with their own families. LaWanda is an awesome cook and she made some delicious food. I will say I was a little surprised with all the different foods she made. She made a lot more than just the traditional Thanksgiving food. There was mashed potatoes, turkey, rolls, dressing (stuffing), green bean casserole, mac and cheese, greens (collard greens that you eat with hot sauce), potato salad, corn, ham, roast beef, salad, candied yams, rice and beans. For dessert: my apple pie, lots of pumpkin pie, pecan pie, chocolate cake, strawberry cake, sweet potato pie and banana pudding. There was no cream pies. The banana pudding was the closest thing they had to a cream pie. I thought that was really odd. My family makes cream pies every Thanksgiving. We LOVE cream pies. In fact, those are really the only kind of pies we make. We're not huge on pumpkin or fruit pies. Jon then informed me that eating cream pies on Thanksgiving is not normal. We asked one of his buddies from upstate NY and he said they don't ever make them on Thanksgiving either. So I don't know if its just my family thats weird, but I sure did miss my cream pies. So the next day I went to the store and got a single serving coconut cream pie for me to enjoy :)

Taegen had a lot of fun with the daughter of one of the other soldiers. She was probably around 16 yrs old, so she probably didn't enjoy the company of a 3 year old as much as he enjoyed it. But she was a good sport about it.
Heres the only picture I have of that day;

Ellie loved the turkey!

We missed spending Thanksgiving with our families, but we had a good day none the less. It was my first time spending a major holiday away from family. Jon spent Thanksgiving in 2011 away at his mechanic AIT. It gave us a little taste of what Christmas will be like this year. Except we'll probably spend more time with just us as a family and less with friends.