Thanksgiving Ideas

Since the Fall, I have been attending a Mothers of Preschoolers (MOPS) group at our former church, Wake Crossroads. It is a fairly large group, maybe 40 or 50 moms, all who are in the same phase of life as I. I haven't really been super excited about going each week (it is a 30 minute drive & it is my day off from work), but it is nice to be around other moms, to fellowship, and also learn new things. And Leah gets to play with other kids her age. Each week we have breakfast, then a speaker (with topics like contentment, time management, etc.), then small group time, and then a craft.



All this to say-- Last meeting the speaker just showed us & talked to us about different traditions her family celebrates around the holidays. She was quite crafty, which I like, but no one could quite figure out how she had time for all those things!! She did inspire, me, though, to come up with some ideas & traditions of my own. Most of her ideas were for Christmas, and I'll do a separate entry about that, but since Thanksgiving is upon us, here are some crafts I have found that might be fun in the years to come.

Thankfulness Can

Her main Thanksgiving idea was a "Thankfulness Can." They decorated a regular tin can with just cut up pieces of construction paper. Then, each day leading up to Thanksgiving, each of the kids puts in the can a piece of paper telling something they are thankful for that day, with their name-- anything from "I'm thankful we ate spaghetti today" to "I'm thankful my family spent time together"-- whatever is age appropriate. Then on Thanksgiving Day, you can pull out the slips of paper & read them together to remember all you are thankful for.

Here is an alternate idea along those lines:

Thankful Wreath of Leaves

Hands-and-Feet Turkey Craft

Leah actually made a turkey like this in preschool, with her feet and hands (but I'm pretty sure the hands weren't her own-- they were too big). But I think it's a really cute idea & could be cool to show growth of the kids' hands & feet.

Card Cut-Out Placemat

I don't have a picture of this, but this is another craft we did in MOPS. We cut out phrases, cute pictures, and other cute things off greeting cards that people had already received. A good idea would be to save old birthday or Christmas cards you get, and then cut them up. We glued them all in a pretty arrangement onto a piece of legal sized paper and then covered it with contact paper to make it a placemat that can be used during the holiday season. I thought this was a great way to showcase old cards that just get stuck in a drawer.