Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Thanksgiving Day Traditions

Family traditions are like the spiritual and emotional cement in the foundation of a happy home. They create fond memories, and these memories bond us together as nothing else can.
I heard of a couple of great idea's the other day at Enrichment, that I just had to share with you. First of all it was about Holiday traditions. Mostly we talked about Christmas and I am so EXCITED to share some of the idea's with you, but I realize that Thanksgiving is a holiday that kind of gets skipped over. So first a few things about Thanksgiving.

This has nothing to do with giving thanks, but one of our traditions is that we go out shooting after Thanksgiving dinner. This started the year we were dating and it just kind of stuck. We get together with our group of friends and all of their kids and we go shooting clay pigeons. The kids love it and so do the adults. It's just a fun time to relax and have fun. We do give thanks around the table and we do FHE on gratitude and giving thanks, but here are some great idea's for some new traditions!

One tradition that was mentioned was a Thanksgiving quilt. They have one set up so that after dinner everyone in the family can put in a few ties. When the quilt is finished it's donated to a local shelter or the humanitarian aid center.

Another tradition would be to start a Thanksgiving Book. Every year each member of the family is given a sheet of paper to write down the things for which they are thankful. You then put the sheets into a binder and save them so that next year you can look back and see what everyone wrote the year before and then compare it to the current year.

A fun idea would also be to create a Thanksgiving table cloth or runner. Buy a white cotton table cloth and set out fabric markers. Let everyone write down what they are thankful for and then on Thanksgiving day have fun looking at what everyone wrote. Make sure everyone writes down what year it is. The next year, pull out the same table cloth and let them write down new sentiments. Every year you can add to your Thanksgiving table cloth.

Hopefully this will give you a few idea's to think about and possibly add to your Thanksgiving Holiday! What is your favorite Thanksgiving Day tradition?

4 comments:

Jenette said...

I love the idea of a Thanksgiving book! I think I might try that this year! Thanks!!

Kellie said...

Those are all great ideas and fun for the kids/family! I really like the table cloth idea! Thanks for the ideas.

Angela Shaw said...

I love the table cloth idea! I am going to do that for sure!

Candy @ Mommypalooza said...

I've started a tradition this year of blogging my month long entries of "Giving Thanks". I usually keep a written journal of what I am thankful for - picking something each day that's different. This year, my daily "giving thanks" entries may be viewed on my blog and other bloggers can join in and post their entries on their blogs.