Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Thanksgiving Countdown

On November 1st I wrote a Facebook status announcing my excitement that the holiday season was here. It's my all time favorite time of year.

In the past people have scoffed at my excitement and rolled their eyes at me, claiming i'm "forgetting all about Thanksgiving." This year I wrote a disclaimer in my status, stating that I wasn't forgetting Thanksgiving...it's part of the holiday season!

And it really is. I adore Thanksgiving just as much as I adore Christmas. I love the traditions, the food, the excitement that's in the air when we wake up in the morning. I love the football games and the parades, the family time and the "official" start of Christmas shopping. (Well, for most people. I try to be done by Thanksgiving.)

Thanksgiving also means I get to decorate for Christmas. I would love to decorate the week before Thanksgiving (My friend Melissa from Growing up Geeky has decorated her house already! I have to say i'm jealous.) but my husband would have a fit. So I resign myself to waiting for the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

Stephanie is already excited for Christmas. She talks about Christmas morning, about visiting Santa at the mall, about watching Christmas movies, reading Christmas books, listening to Christmas music and writing her Santa list. While I love her excitement, I also want to make sure she doesn't forget about Thanksgiving, so we've been talking about it a lot.

We borrowed a ton of books about Thanksgiving from the library and have been reading them every day. We talk about things we are thankful for and how Thanksgiving is a day set aside to reflect on all of our blessings. We talk about the trip we're going to take to NY that day, and the yummy food we're going to eat while we're there.

All this chatter has led her to ask, every morning since Halloween, if it's Thanksgiving yet. Yesterday I must have said "not yet" at least 25 times. Before 7am. Finally I decided that she needed a visual to see exactly when it would be Thanksgiving. Our traditional family calendar is high up on a wall, and isn't the easiest thing for a 2 year old to understand, so I made my own. Here is "Stephanie's Thanksgiving Countdown"


Every day from now until Thanksgiving she can put a sticker in that day's box. Once she puts her sticker on, we count how many days are left. She decorated it with crayons, and was jumping out of her pants excited to show "MY Thanksgiving calendar" to Dan when he got home from work. It was such a simple thing to make, but she is filled with pride over having her very own countdown. (She still asked me about 15 times today if it was Thanksgiving yet. So it didn't entirely fulfill it's purpose. But it's still fun.)

Are your kids excited about Thanksgiving? What kinds of things are you doing together in anticipation of the day? 



16 comments:

  1. Oh my goodness what a great idea!!! We've been talking about Thanksgiving but the BIG thing I get asked every 2 seconds is "Are all my friends coming for my birthday now?" ALL DAY LONG. I love this idea and am going to adopt it for a "birthday countdown calendar!"

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    1. Aww, you definitely have to make her a birthday countdown calendar :)

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  2. Hahaha my husband is such an enabler ;) Enjoy the holidays this year; all of them!

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  3. I'm with you on this being the best time if the year. Thanksgiving included. We host for my hysband's side of the family and I have fallen in love with cooking the turkey. We decorate for Christmas that weekend too.

    On the oddball side of things - I am a Black Friday crazy shopper. Not kill or push over for a deal but get up early (like 3:00am on average). I love it!!!

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    1. Oh, I have never shopped Black Friday, but someday I'd like to...just to say I did it! lol

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  4. I LOVE the holidays too, Megan! I am so glad that we're finally in Thanksgiving month (followed closely by Christmas month)! Yay!

    Also, please check out my most recent post - I'd love your thoughts (and any of your fellow mom bloggers who might have good advice)!!!

    http://re-discoveringhome.blogspot.com/2012/11/baby-fever.html

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    1. I'm so glad we're finally in that time of year too :)

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  5. I think I'm going to start putting out the Christmas decor! Why wait?! :) I love this idea. Maybe next year I can try this with G.

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    1. Haha I love that attitude...why wait? You're right! Well, as long as your hubby won't get mad. Mine would take them right back down, I swear. Haha.

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  6. I love decorating too!!! Pumpkins go out Labor Day night and my Christmas decor goes out Thanksgiving night!!! Cute idea with the count down!! Happy Thanksgiving!!

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    1. Thank you, Happy Thanksgiving to you, too! And I wish we were home on Thanksgiving so I could put my Christmas decorations up that night too, instead of waiting until the Sunday after :(

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  7. I feel the same as you! I love this time of year, too!

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    1. I love to hear how many other people love this time of year. Too often I come across scrooges who view Christmas as more of a hassle than something to enjoy.

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  8. It's wonderful that you are so excite, I love Thanksgiving too but a totally embarrassed to admit that I haven't really talked with Jackson about it yet. Need to make sure to do that tomorrow!

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    1. I feel like for little kids, the holiday kind of gets lost in the shuffle of Christmas. I never appreciated Thanksgiving until I got older! (I mean, for little kids, it's just a big meal...they don't really "get" it as toddlers.)

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