Leaves of Thanksgiving

Remember when I couldn’t remember if we had any Thanksgiving traditions?

This fall we’ve completely acquired an idea from our friends – and probably dozens of other families too –

A Thankful Tree.

Or  – more accurately – A Bunch of Thankful Sticks.

It was easy to designate the task of securing branches to my boy – he took the assignment seriously.

We stashed the sticks in a jar of chickpeas (because I had a jar of them and I do not recall the day I ever bought them which means they most certainly had long since expired).

I cut out some leaves on autumn-colored paper and Otto Fox gleefully punched holes in the leaves.

It’s so easy.

All I did was place the leaves and a sharpie on the table by the tree.

And suddenly – our little tree is loaded with thanks.

We haven’t even had to encourage the kids to jot down their thanks.  They’ve been spontaneously filing it up since we stuck it there.

(Why don’t I leave one of those out all year long?)

They’ve written down food and friends and family and fishing.  (No, not all of them begin with the letter f!)

Otto and Piper have been drawing pictures when they cannot spell the words they wish to write.

The branches are really being filled every day.

All I know is – it can never be too many leaves of thanks for me.  I’ll happily cut out dozens more.

Our friend suggested that we just take these down on Thanksgiving day and read all of our thanks out loud together.

I think it’s a perfect little plan.