Thanksgiving Day – Thursday, 26 November 2020
This year’s Thanksgiving Day is likely to be quite different for many in the United States due to the restrictions imposed by the Covid-19. To help your planning here are 10 Creative Ideas for Thanksgiving Day during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Although we might not all be able or willing to travel across the country to see our family and friends, with a bit of creativity, there are plenty of things fun things we can do make this year’s Thanksgiving Day just as special as previous years!
In this blog, we’ll explore 10 Creative Ideas for Thanksgiving Day, including our very own Thanksgiving Bingo!
Let’s not let the pandemic spoil the Thanksgiving fun!
What is Thanksgiving?
Thanksgiving Day is one of the most important national holidays in the United States and celebrates the harvest and the blessings of the past year. It is a great chance to express gratitude with family and friends. It also starts the fall / winter holiday season leading up to Christmas and New Year.
Thanksgiving Day is modelled on “The First Thanksgiving” that was celebrated by the Pilgrims Fathers and the Wampanoag people in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1621. That feast lasted three days – sounds like some party! Records suggest that the “The First Thanksgiving” feast included a menu of waterfowl, venison, lobster, clams, berries, fruit, pumpkin, and squash!
The first few years in the Plymouth Colony was incredibly tough for the Pilgrim Fathers with many of the early settlers dying from starvation and disease. It is therefore not too surprizing that these early colonists quickly developed a custom to celebrate “thanksgivings” – days devoted to prayer to thank God for blessings such as the end of a drought or a military victory.
Thanksgiving Day has been regularly celebrated across the United States since 1789, when George Washington issued a presidential proclamation at the request of Congress.
What are the main traditions?
Thanksgiving holiday is rich in legend, symbolism, and tradition. The day usually centres around the Thanksgiving Dinner, which traditionally consists of seasonal foods indigenous to America including turkey, bread stuffing, potatoes, cranberry sauce, corn, and pumpkin pie. So popular is turkey as a main dish that Thanksgiving is sometimes called “Turkey Day”!
In addition to giving thanks for a bounteous year, Thanksgiving traditions also include giving to charity, attending parades – such as the famous Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York, watching sports – especially American football or College basketball, sitting down with the family to watch Thanksgiving TV, and probably most important of all travelling the country for family experience days to visit and celebrate with family and friends. Not surprisingly Thanksgiving is usually one of the busiest travel periods in the year – we will have to how busy the roads will be in 2020!
10 creative Thanksgiving ideas
We’ve trawled the web to find 10 fun and creative ideas that we think will help you to make a socially distancing Thanksgiving one of the best you’ve ever had. We will look at some new and old traditions and crafts to help your family and friends celebrate a very happy Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving Activity Sets
At Fun Crafts Kids, we’re always looking for fun and educational activities to keep our children occupied and entertained during the holidays or a wet afternoon, therefore we’ve created our Thanksgiving Activity Set. It includes a big bundles of things to do including: Bingo Cards, Sudoku Games, Word Search, Coloring Pages, Journal Pages, Dot and Boxes and Tic Tac Toe. The activity pack can be downloaded here.
20+ Turkey Crafts for Thanksgiving
For those of you with younger kids and are wanting to keep them busy during the holiday season, then look no further than RedTedArt who have collated over 20 simple turkey themed crafts. We particularly like the Quilled Thanksgiving Cards and the Leaf Turkey Thanksgiving Dinner Place Cards
Thanksgiving Turkey Piñata
Now who doesn’t like stringing up a heavily stuffed papier-mâché turkey then, whilst blindfolded, beating it with a big stick until its hidden treasure explodes over the ground? “No-one” is what I expect to hear you shout!
Now you can always buy a pre-made piñata (see the link to Etsy, for example) or if you are crafty like us why not head to instructables.com where they have a step-by-step guide to make your own. We think a homemade turkey piñata will make a great Thanksgiving craft for adults and children alike. Half the fun is in the making and particularly choosing the goodies to pack inside your Thanksgiving piñata. Why not click here to give it a try!
DIY Gratitude Tablecloth
Thanksgiving Dinner is the showcase of any Thanksgiving Day. Why not make it extra special by having a tablecloth that everyone can write their thoughts, play hangman, draw doodles or even write short stories on! Just have lots of felt tips, pencils and crayons to hand! Fun for old and young! Take a trip to Boulder Locavore for ideas.
Autumn Leaf Maple Cookie Wreath (Vegan)
We love the idea of having a Thanksgiving wreath that you can eat! Now I don’t know about you, but I love maple syrup, so these Autumn Leaf Maple Cookies arranged on a wreath look amazing! Head to Domestic Gothess to find out how to make them! Even though my baking is great, I really want to try to make these! The best thing is that if they don’t look great, you can just eat them and start again!
Go Pumpkin Picking
Now how much fun is picking your own pumpkins – lots! The kids love choosing the biggest pumpkin they can find for Halloween, but why not double-dip and go again to find your pumpkins for Thanksgiving Dinner? Now who can resist a delicious pumpkin pie? Want to know where the best pumpkin patches are? Why not head to Good Housekeeping’s article on “The Best Pumpkin Patches Near Me in Every State”
Fall Harvest Pumpkin Watercolor Art Project
As a parent I love putting my children’s art on the wall. At Thanksgiving why get your kids to make some simple and engaging fall painting ideas? I really like the pumpkin paintings from Rhythms of Play using the salt painting technique. Not only is it fun to sit down and have some quality time with your family with a fun craft, but these painting turn out so well you’ll want to hang them on your walls. Full instructions here.
Thanksgiving Thankful Trees
We really like getting everyone involved in decorating the house and table for Thanksgiving. Another great idea from Rhythms of Play is to have a Thanksgiving Thankful Tree to remind us of everything we are grateful for. It’s a great way for family and friends to share memories and everything they are thankful for. Once complete the tree can decorate the house or even be the centrepiece for Thanksgiving Dinner. Click here to read the “Best Thanksgiving Thankful Tree Tradition Ideas”
Thanksgiving Games for Kids and Families
We want our kids to enjoy Thanksgiving Dinner – but if your kids are like ours, then they can get quite bored listening to all that adult conversation – even if Grandma comes out with a racy story after a few glasses of wine! So, we are fans of livening up these sometimes stuffy with some Thanksgiving games! We headed over to The Spruce for inspiration with their 13 Thanksgiving Games for Kids and Families. We particularly like the Turkey Waddle and Thanksgiving Pictionary.
Go for a Thanksgiving Walk
Having feasted on Roast Turkey and Pumpkin Pie, one of the simplest things we enjoy doing is going for a long walk – well maybe not too long – to fill our lungs with fresh air, stretch our legs and help digestion! We love seeing the fall colours and then returning to the warm snug of our home for hot chocolate and an maybe afternoon snooze (not that the kids will let us!).
We hope you enjoyed these 10 10 Creative Ideas for Thanksgiving Day during the Covid-19 pandemic. Have a very happy Thanksgiving Day 2020 from the Fun Crafts Kids team!