It’s November! Thanksgiving is quickly approaching, and it’s time to celebrate with a grateful heart. My kids are just getting old enough to begin discussing the idea of gratitude and being thankful. I’d really like to establish an intentional way to practice gratitude daily, especially with the Christmas season approaching and all the shopping and list-making of the holiday season. I’m hoping to start the holidays off with grateful and humble hearts rather than greedy ones. So this year, we are starting a new family tradition with the Thanksgiving Gratitude Tree.
A Thanksgiving Gratitude Tree
Here’s what you’ll need:
A large blank wall space
Large brown paper bags from the grocery store or a roll of brown butcher paper
Autumn colored construction paper
Scissors
Marker or crayons
Tape, stapler or sticky tac to attach tree and leaves to the wall
What to do:
- Cut the paper bags so that they lay flat
- Hold them up to the wall so you can decide how many bags you wish to use to make the trunk of the tree and branches
- Sketch an outline of your tree trunk and branches on the brown paper
- Cut out your tree
- Attach to the wall using tape, staples, or sticky tac
- Next, take various colors of construction paper and cut out leaves (great for kids!)
- Each day in November, have each child (and parent) write something they are thankful for on a leaf
- Attach leaves to the wall using tape, staples or sticky tac
By Thanksgiving, you should end up with a tree like this one by Hapari
Isn’t that cute?! This is a wonderful family activity for the holiday season, and I’m sure it will become a tradition in your home just as it will be in ours. I can’t wait to hear all the things my kids come up with to be thankful for, can you?
Looking forward to a month full of gratitude and thanks. Happy Thanksgiving!