The Thankful Turkey Bag

My sister-in-law Rhonda recently mentioned a Thanksgiving tradition they had of decorating a bag like a turkey and filling it with the things they were thankful for to then be read on Thanksgiving. I thought this sounded like a great idea, so I stole the tradition for us.

So, for family night the Monday before Thanksgiving, Mike did a little Thanksgiving lesson, and then the kids decorated the turkey bag. I'd envisioned a cute little lunch bag looking fully like a turkey, but we only had a very large bag, and here was the end result.

I am glad my kids found so much to be grateful for, but I was a little shocked by the amount of time they spent cutting up little papers and writing thing after thing after thing. In fact, when Mike first opened the bag he suggested, "We'll read a few every day . . . FOREVER." Our kids weren't buying that though. They weren't going to go to bed til we'd read every last little thankful paper!

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A few high-lites were:

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-- Goldie's squeals of happiness each time Mike read one of her papers (they'd put their names on the back because they wanted us to know who had written what).

-- Mike reading that Abe was thankful for hoses. Abe insisting he hadn't thought of hoses. Me suggesting, "Noses?" "Horses?" before Abe realized he'd left the "u" out of "houses."

-- Mike reading that Abe was thankful for "Spontee." And Abe glaring at how poorly Mike had read his lettering of "Squanto."

-- Seeing that each of their names had ended up in the bag as something someone else was thankful for. (And someone, apparently, thankful for their own self).

-- Mike reading that Abe was thankful for TVs and then turning to Abe and saying, "You're grounded."

-- And (half way though the million and one papers) Mike saying, "Have you guys ever heard of a game called 'speed thanks'?" -- They laughed alright, but they were not about to let him speed his way through one of their special papers.

There were a lot of the traditional good things they thought of to be thankful for, "Family," "Jesus," "The Prophet," "etc." and a surprising number of papers mentioned, "bowls" or "cups." Here are a few others I liked.

Some of Abe's:

Some of Daisy's: (Mars? Sweet).

Some of Goldie's (Often she would go whisper to some grown up what to write, but the three on the left are my favorites because I don't know that she is truly that grateful for "Hat," "Dog" or "Book" but she figured out how to spell them, so in they went -- along with quite a few that Mike was wholly unable to decipher from her cute self):

And, you can easily tell that they even got my mom involved as evidenced by this paper found in the bag!

Anyway, I thought I'd share because it is always fun to get ideas for new little traditions from others, and I thought some of you might like this idea . . . you can even make your turkey way cooler . . . if that is even possible.

Oh, and P.S. 4 mile Turkey Trot + Tons of Thanksgiving dinner and pie = No Labor.