3 ways to inspire gratitude this Thanksgiving …

I bet some of you who read my last few posts regarding Christmas prep thought that I must be skipping right over Thanksgiving this year. Never fear, I am not! I love Thanksgiving. I love that our country was the first country to set aside a day just to give thanks. I love that Thanksgiving comes right before the rush of Christmas. It is the perfect time to count our many, many blessings before we start into the commercial Christmas season of "I want, I want, I want."

Each year, I make a point to have some sort of activity with the girls to talk about what we are Thankful for. That activity creates something visual that I leave up into after Thanksgiving. I often try to incorporate whatever we have created into our Thanksgiving dinner decorations. Here are three of my favorites. I hope they bless your family this Thanksgiving.

The Thanksgiving Tree: Take a tree limb and put it in a decorative pot. Support the limb with floral foam or rocks. Cut out paper leaves and string each leaf onto a ribbon or raffia bow. Set aside some time as a family to talk about the importance of Thanksgiving and of having a spirit of gratitude. Write down what each family is grateful for on the leaves. Hang the leaves on the tree. I like to leave some leaves blank so that guests will be able to write on them on Thanksgiving day. During dinner, take all the leaves off and read them out loud. ( I will post a picture of our later this week – it is so pretty!)

I'm Grateful You're Here Mats: Make a paper placemat for each person who will be part of your Thanksgiving dinner. Have your kids prominently write the person's name on the placemat, decorate the mat with drawings, stickers and pictures of that person. List things that you are grateful for in that person. For example: Grandma, thank you for taking me to the library each week. Take the finished placemats to an office supply store or Kinkos to have them laminated. They may not be the fanciest placemats you could use on Thanksgiving but they are surely the most meaningful!

Grateful Turkeys: These little turkeys remind me of elementary school. I use to love making them every year. Make a turkey using a pinecone for the body and construction paper cut out for the head, weird red neck thing (I am sure it has a name) and the feathers. Before your children put in the feathers, have them write something on each one that they are thankful for. You can also do this for your family members, similar to the placemats, and have each person's turkey sitting on their plate when they arrive on Thanksgiving.

I hope your family enjoys these ideas. I would love to hear about projects your family does in preparation of Thanksgiving.