The Springfield Student Editors
Ben Rivera – Sophomore: “We eat the typical mashed potatoes, mac and cheese, and stuffing. But we do mix it up a little by getting yellow rice, beef, coquitos, and flan as well. After we are done eating around nine o’clock we go to the mall as a family and get started on Black Friday shopping.”
Mateo Aycardi – Sophomore: “[Favorite food is] Turkey! For [my favorite Thanksgiving] activity it would be watching football.”
Rob Mazurek – Sophomore: “My favorite Thanksgiving food is mashed potatoes, and my Thanksgiving tradition is going shopping right after dinner.”
Jason Robinson – Sophomore: “[My favorite Thanksgiving] memory [was] when Mark Sanchez ran into his own offensive lineman and fumbled the ball. The ‘butt fumble’ versus the Patriots on Thanksgiving Day.”
Heather King – Junior: “We always have a big dinner with the whole family. This includes my brothers, parents, my aunts, my uncle, my grammy, and a few family friends that don’t have anywhere else to go. There’s usually fifteen of us. Afterwards, all the kids go Black Friday shopping. My favorite memory was when we waited for seven hours outside of Best Buy to get Tyler a new TV. We just told stories and riddles the whole time, made jokes. It was great!”
Austin Leduc – Junior: “Basically, we rotate every year. We go to my uncle’s house first for a little dinner, hang out, see who we haven’t seen in a while, and then around six we go from there to my grandmother’s and have dinner there. Or we rotate from my grandmother’s, to my aunt’s in Jersey.”
Teresa Goggin – Sophomore: “My Thanksgiving tradition is making cinnamon rolls with my mom on Thanksgiving morning and watching the Macy’s Day Parade. It’s usually just me, her, and my brother Paul until dinner because my dad is a football coach for a high school and they have an annual Turkey Bowl game. My brother Joey also has a Thanksgiving football game. We usually end up going to my dad’s game for a bit, Joey’s game for a bit, and then my old high school’s game so I can see my old cheerleading coaches and teammates. After the games we go back to my house and my mom and I make desserts to bring to my aunt’s. Once we’re there we all have a fun Thanksgiving with my whole family. We watch football, eat until we explode, and share lots of funny stories and memories with each other.”
Kailee Oakes – Junior: “We eat a lot of food. We’re Italian, [so] my grandmother puts a little spin on it. So we do appetizers, pasta, turkey, dessert and you have to to pace yourself because how are you going to make it through four courses? I’m excited. I’m excited to wear my stretchy pants and eat a lot of food.”
Francesca Chirico – Sophomore: “So Thanksgiving morning we all get up and watch the parade together with my grandparents and we start cooking super early. Mom makes homemade stuffing and Grandpa makes homemade mashed potatoes. My aunt is in charge of making homemade apple pie that is out of this world delicious. As the day progresses on we all do like a little taste test of all the food to make sure everything is basically perfect and the whole family comes over to my house, and it’s extremely loud because we are Italian. We all talk so loud and everyone’s hands are going all over the place. Basically [we] stuff our faces and watch the football game. At the end of the night my brother and I break the wishbone of the turkey, we’ve been doing it for years and it’s always a stiff contest as to who will win taking specific measurements of each side to see who has the advantage. The the next morning me, my mom, my grandma, and my aunt all go Black Friday shopping to the Danbury Mall super early in the morning. It’s a tradition we have done since I was three years old. And then we have left overs.”
Zach Varnauskas – Sophomore: “When I come home from Springfield College for Thanksgiving I usually just have a dinner with my family and my grandparents because we all live in the same household. We don’t have too much extensive family, but we have a good time at home. And it’s just nice to catch up with old friends too. We just eat. Eat and football.”