My Story

My life as a Marine wife began in May of 2001, but my passion for cooking had been sparked many years earlier in my Grandma’s kitchen. I grew up in a small town in Ohio, surrounded by Amish. I have family that fills the hollers of West Virginia and we all love to cook. It’s what we do and we know we are good at it too. Before we get to the food, here’s my story…

When I moved to North Carolina in the spring of 2001, I was 18, ready to take the world by the horns and tackle it to the ground…my husband, Matt, was a Lance Corporal-just starting his career as a United States Marine. We had a whole lot of nothing and we didn’t care as long as we had each other. It didn’t take long for the Marine Corps to find someplace Matt needed to go, and about two months after we were married, he was getting on a bus to complete the Combined Arms Exercise (CAX) in Twentynine Palms, California. It was the longest two months of my life but a friendship was forged during that time. A girl from New York City, a city girl through and through, Cara, took me under her wing and taught me the most valuable lesson of being a military wife…the wives gotta stick together through it all! She took me to NYC and we ate some of the most delicious food I’ve ever tasted-Spumoni Garden Pizza, Wo Hop Chinese, Canoli from Little Italy…it was my first (and only) time on the subway. I saw Times Square. It was a country girl’s dream and her backyard! On the day Matt was supposed to come home, I got a phone call from my mom. “Kierston, you need to turn the t.v. on, terrorists are attacking New York City…” For a brand new Marine Wife, it was the scariest moment of my life…and the moment my life changed forever. I knew it meant Matt would have to go to war, and I had met an FDNY firefighter, Cara’s brother, while I was in New York. I knew Cara was a New Yorker through and through. She knew police and firefighters…and people that worked in the Twin Towers. I knew her heart was broken because her city, the city she was so proud of, was brought to its knees.

 A year and a half later, I was standing in a parking lot near the 8^th Engineer Support Battallion at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina holding my husband and saying good-bye-not knowing how long it would be before I saw him again. That deployment he saw Sicily, Kuwait, and Iraq. I sat on my mom’s bed and cried as we watch the initial push into Iraq…knowing my husband was part of the invasion force. Six months later, my husband came home a Corporal and 17 rolls of film told the story of what he saw. It was after this deployment, in the little apartment building in Sneads Ferry, that we met Ray, the crazy Texan and his wife Candace. We still laugh today about how Ray was afraid of Matt (because Matt outranked him) when they first met. And so began the era of grilling…every chance we could, regardless of the weather…only deployments stopped us.

The next two years were filled with training, a MOS change, and some more training. In January 2005, we found out we were expecting. A few months later, we found out Matt was leaving that fall for Iraq. My due date was September 13 and after pinning on Sergeant on August 1, we were told a date window of August 22-29. I was devastated that he was going to miss our child’s birth. Those three weeks flew by and we finally got the date he would leave…August 29. I begged my doctor to induce me at my appointment on August 22, but he refused. That week my husband had our living room filled with gear…it was everywhere and his checklist was like a short novel. My friend Ann came for a couple days before her husband left for Iraq too. Our husbands had become friends when they attended Intel School together and Roy had been staying with us. On August 23, we went to bed and within a couple hours I was having contractions. The next 25 ½ hours are a blur, but at 2:29 a.m. on August 25, 2005, our daughter, Tadum, was born. As soon as his Chain of Command found out, somehow, someway, his flight was changed and suddenly I was given two weeks-two weeks to experience life as a family. On September 9, 2005, Matt got on a bus and went to Iraq. This time things were easier-we could communicate through e-mail, he could call more, and we knew the deployment would only be six or seven months. Every time he called, I put the phone up to her ear so she could hear his voice, and we had pictures of Daddy everywhere! Six months later, Tadum and I stood in a parking lot on base and patiently waited for Daddy to come home. When he walked up to us, Tadum reached for him like she’d just seen him ten minutes before. They never missed a beat.

Eleven months later, Matt called me from work and told me he was deploying again…in less than a month. This one hit me hard…he had just got home! We had just moved into a new house, the holidays were barely over…I hated the Marine Corps and I hated being a military wife. My baby wasn’t even 18 months old and he was going again! That deployment was by far the hardest. The summer before, one of Matt’s buddies, Trent, and his wife Shannon, had come over for a cook out. Shannon and I hit it off from the beginning. They had a little boy that was 9 months older than Tadum, and Shannon and I had a lot in common-probably too much!! Looking back I can say it was that friendship with Shannon-all the time we spent together, all the fun times we shared, and all the places we went…even the matching tattoos-that got me through that deployment. In September of 2007, after missing Easter, our 6^th anniversary, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, my 25^th birthday, Tadum’s second birthday, and Labor Day, Matt was home again.

Within the first month of Matt’s return, we found out baby number 2 was on its way…and when the doctor told me I was 3 weeks pregnant only 24 days after he got home, I was in shock. The next 9 months flew by and on June 15, Father’s Day, 2008, we went to the beach. I still had about 10 days before my due date but my mom was in town for a visit and I was determined to have this baby while she was here. All day at the beach I kept having lower back pain and it was miserably hot. We got home and I hadn’t been in bed 30 minutes when the contractions started. Three hours and 10 minutes later, I was holding my son, Matthew. Two weeks later, Matt was promoted to Staff Sergeant, and from there we thought the Marine Corps might throw us a bone. We were looking forward to a break from the deployments-we were going to spend 3 years on Recruiting duty. “Never count on anything you don’t see in writing” was the lesson of the day when my husband called me on June 22, 2009. The words “Honey, I have some bad news…” always makes a Marine wife’s heart hit the floor. “I have 8 days to be in California.” Let my heart start beating again (I was expecting another deployment.) “My orders for Recruting got cancelled. We are being PCS’d to Twentynine Palms.” And my whole world got thrown in a blender…

Chaos ensued for a while…orders got modified, house hunting began, arrangements were made, and before I knew it, I was in my husband’s truck, following a Budget truck with my car in tow, across the country with two kids, 3 dogs, 2 cats, and a parrot! We saw 9 states in 6 days…and when we arrived at the rental in Twentynine Palms, we were so exhausted we laid a blanket on the floor and passed out. Two months later, we bought a house and were barely unpacked when Matt came home with bad news…another deployment-in 30 days. GREEEEAAATTT!!! Just what I needed! I had no clue how to get anywhere without my GPS, I was 3000 miles from anyone I knew, and I was about to be alone…for a year! The last weekend in November, Santa came early…I wanted Matt to be able to see the kids open their gifts. The next morning, Matt called me from work and told me dental wouldn’t clear him until he had a root canal-THANK GOD FOR ROOT CANALS!!! Or so I thought…

In December, Matt came home and said, “In January, I have to report to Miramar. The unit I’m deploying with is there, so I’ll be away for 3 months, then deploy for a year.” REALLY??!! 15 months? So Matt went to Miramar in January. Thank God he could come home on the weekends and the kids and I could visit San Diego too. We went whale watching, to Sea World, to the Aquarium, and even met up with some friends from 29, Jeff and Heather Ann, during one of the trips! In March, Matt deployed again…this time to Afghanistan. Heather Ann came up with a brilliant idea-a dinner club. There were 4 of us that participated. One day a week we would cook for everyone and take it to each family. So Cristina, Heather Ann, Sara, and I spent a couple months having blast-and only cooking a couple times a week. We found out a couple months into the deployment that our daughter needed surgery on her ears and Matt’s deployment was shortened. Matt came home in September 2010. The Marine Corps has finally given us a break from the deployments too. Matt is with a training unit now and he picked up Gunnery Sergeant in May. We are thankful to trade long hours and only a few days off every month for another deployment.

Life in the desert has been anything but what we’ve expected. There is untamed beauty in the mountains that surround us and the multitude of things to do keep us busy-but our favorite thing to do is hike. Even though all of our friends have moved on to other places or gotten out of the Marine Corps, they remain close to our hearts. The other day Ann said to me. “I miss your cooking. It’s the best.” It got me thinking, my cooking wouldn’t be what it is today without all the great recipes I’ve collected-most of which I wouldn’t have ever experienced without my life as a Marine wife. So now I’m giving credit where credit is due…and thanking all my friends for giving me such good recipes to use.