Matt and I hosted Thanksgiving at our house for our Minot friends. We had approximately 12 people come over and like always I made lots of food for us. We served Turkey (of course), cream corn, green bean casserole, stuffing, mashed potatoes, deviled eggs, and marshmallow yams plus several desserts.
We had a lot to be thankful for. The friends at the table that joined us for dinner, our time here at Minot (we've had better opportunities than others who have come here and we are thankful for them), the love that we continue to receive from friends and family, and for the bountiful food we shared on Thanksgiving. It was a great night to be with our family and friends from Minot.
Christmas was a busy holiday for Matt and I filled with our Minot friends. We normally spend our holiday together on Christmas Eve however we were so busy that we needed to have it the 23rd. Instead of having Oyster Stew, which is an Aswegan tradition, we started our own with Crab Corn Chowder. Mandy's parents gave us an iPad and the XBOX kinect so some of our gifts we gave each other were to use for those (iTunes gift card and kinect games). It was a nice relaxing night with the girls and we watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation like we do every year! Gotta love Chevy Chase. :)
Christmas Eve we went over to our dear friends house, The Moore's. Natalie made an early Christmas dinner for us so we could go to the candlelight service at their church. When we got back we were going to have pumpkin pie (Tim and Matt's favorite dessert) however, after an hour and a half of checking it and wondering why it was still "gooey", Tim realized he forgot to add the eggs! :) We all got a BIG laugh from that since Tim is a pumpkin pie addict and thinks his pies are the best. So, Natalie and I made pumpkin bread real quick to have some type of dessert. We exchanged gifts and watched as they let Elizabeth open many of her gifts before she went to bed since Tim was going out for Christmas. We had a wonderful Christmas Eve and enjoyed spending time with one of our Minot families, the Moore's.
The very next day, we walked across the street to spend the Christmas holiday with our other Minot family, the Coopers! We brought green bean casserole to add to the meal. Veronica Cooper made delicious fruit salad, pineapple ham, and other assortments of goodies for Christmas dinner. It was good to get to know the Coopers, Veronica and Ben, and their four kids Benjamin Scott II, Sydney, Matthew, and Xander. We were able to see the kids play with their new gifts they had opened earlier. We played Hex-bugs with Xander, watched Matthew do some amazing Mario action on the Wii, and got to see Scott play his video games on the PS3. We sat at the grown-up table, drank coffee, and had an awesome time talking with Ben and Veronica. It is always so easy and relaxing when we spend time with our good friends across the street. Since we began hanging out with the Cooper family last summer, Minot has gotten much better and the bad days don't seem so bad any more. The holidays with our Minot families will be remembered for years to come and we hope there will be many more holidays spent with our family friends at Minot and also wherever the Air Force decides to send us next.
We are so grateful to have such wonderful friends so close since there were many cold, snowy winter days that boredom was setting in and a run to their house was our only option to get out!
Matt and I hosted New Years Eve also. I made many "good luck" foods from all around the world (a black eyed peas bean salad, collard greens with bacon and onions, homemade sauerkraut, pork tenderloin, mashed potatoes with feta and chives, green bean casserole, scalloped corn, and pineapple/orange upside down cake). All of the food ended up turning out great so we now have foods to start our own New Year Eve tradition! The rest of the night we played board games and stayed up for the ball drop at midnight before turning in since Matt had to go out on alert New Years day.
