Family Thanksgiving Traditions

Thanksgiving is a time to reflect on the year past, and be with the family and, of course, eat a big 'ole turkey until you feel stuffed yourself. In fact, according to the National Turkey Federation, over 90% of Americans eat turkey on Thanksgiving Day. Many of us have Thanksgiving food traditions ranging from deep fried turkey fried green beans to sweet potato pie, but there is often more of a Thanksgiving bird beautiful. Many families have adopted other traditions that are passed from one generation to the next. Here are some fun Thanksgiving tradition ideas that will surely delight your family.

1) Have each person create a "What I am grateful for the List." You could go around the table before the big dinner is served so that each person can say out loud what he / she is grateful for or you could have each person write their list on sheets of paper so they can be hole-punched and stored in a 3 ring binder. Throw in some photos of all the Thanksgiving holiday and the binder can serve as your family Thanksgiving memories book.

2) Look at the NFL football games on TV with beer and snacks of course. Watching the Detroit Lions and / or Dallas Cowboys is considered by many the most part of Thanksgiving as the turkey. Better yet, gather the family in the basketball court yard or premises to have a thanksgiving game of your own.

3) Watch "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving." Published in 1973, this heart-warming story chronicles the misadventures of Charlie Brown as he tries to put together a traditional Thanksgiving dinner for all his friends. Snoopy and Woodstock intervene to save the day. A fun idea would be to make and eat all the foods served as Snoopy toast and jellybeans.

4) Vai Tree Farm in choosing the family Christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving. It could mark the delivery of a week or two later to make sure it does not dry out before Christmas.

5) Make a wish on the wishbone from the turkey. Let two persons of the family to grab each end of the wishbone and pull, and make a wish. Who gets the larger piece (the one with the head on it) will have his / her wish come true. Make sure not to share your wish with others or will not come true!

6) Watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade on TV with your family. For nearly 80 years, Macy's celebrated Thanksgiving, Christmas and called back with their big parade in New York City. The show has huge balloons, bands, beautiful floats and, of course, Santa Claus.

7) Volunteer at a local shelter to serve meals to the elderly or to provide a Thanksgiving meal to those less fortunate Americans.

8) Make a Thanksgiving craft or hostess gift for the cook (s). This is a great project to do with children.

9) Getting up early the day after Thanksgiving to go shopping. This is especially fun for women of the family. Known as "Black Friday", the day after Thanksgiving is traditionally one of the busiest shopping day of the year with special early bird sales and in many retail stores.

10) Draw names for Christmas gifts. Many families draw big names for the annual Christmas gift exchange and Thanksgiving is the perfect time to figure out who is buying a gift for anyone .......