So Charlie tells me that my skipping over Thanksgiving to listen to Christmas songs is demotivating for him as the family Thanksgiving dinner cook.
“Wha?”
“Well,” he says, “It’s like if a football team…”
(What is UP with men and sports analogies?)
“…is prepping for the final playoffs before the Super Bowl and my teammate starts shouting ‘Woooot! Super Bowl, Baby!’”
“Ooooohhhh. Of course, Honey. I totally get it.”
(The only way to keep him cooking for me is to humor him.)
(That and caving in to his totally unreasonable request to stop with the Christmas talk and music until Friday.)
***
So a Thanksgiving post it is.
Today I brought The Tablecloth up from the basement. The Tablecloth has been a tradition for only three years in our house, but a potent tradition it is.
Please prepare yourself for the crafty genius that you are about to witness. Yes, I did the big lettering All By My Self.
What this is, is a plain gold polyester tablecloth (because the ironing, it is not my friend). In 2005, I used fabric paint to write, “I’M THANKFUL” in the center. And then before we sat down to Thanksgiving dinner, I put out fabric pens for everyone. We all traced our hands, made them into turkeys, colored them, and wrote what we were thankful for on the body.
We’ve done this every Thanksgiving since. Every guest at the table does a hand turkey. Except babies. We have one baby foot turkey on the table (my nephew Jack’s), and we’ll have another this year (his little brother Grant’s).
Grownups transcribe whatever the non-writing kids say.
In case you can’t tell, this is what Abby was thankful for when she was four: “For my toys and stuff and water and milk.”
The previous year her cousin Connor shared his gratitude at age three:
For hats.
Hannah has expressed thanks for God, while LC mentioned video games last year. We expect her to become a missionary. We hope to keep him out of reform school. (I’m totally kidding.) (Kind of.)
Of course the adults also honestly express our gratitude – for even the little things in life.
In 2006, I was thankful for love and acceptance and Oreos and M&M’s Dark.
Because those particular “little things” are definitely gifts from heaven.
My sister, brother-in-law and one son last year:
She had her baby Grant eight days later.
One thing we’ve enjoyed about this tradition is its effect on our guests. My brother-in-law’s parents come visit them every Thanksgiving and join us all here for dinner. Christine filled all the space on her turkey. Ron was a little more to the point.
This year they’ll do their third hand turkeys. I think it means a lot to them to be included.
Personally, I look at this tablecloth as a record. A diary or fabric blog of sorts. It’s a snapshot of our meal together. Each year, we can go back and read the turkeys (hee. read the turkeys) and be reminded of who ate with us, what was going on in their lives, and in the case of the kids, how big they were.
Sometimes touching, often funny, our hand turkeys mark our Thanksgiving.
***
Thinking about this tradition and how it works for me, I think this year I might write on mine:
“for our hand turkeys.”
For more Works for Me Wednesday,
visit Rocks in My Dryer.
HAVE A HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
See you Friday or Saturday!
15 responses so far ↓
1 missy @ It's almost naptime // Nov 26, 2008 at 12:51 am
Ok, this is the coolest idea ever. I am off tomorrow to find a big enough tablecloth.
Thanks for sharing!!
2 Nicole // Nov 26, 2008 at 1:26 am
love this! i have a tablecloth, and i was just thinking of doing handprints every year with a note of what we were thankful for, but we should do this instead. so cute!
3 Lainie@ Mishmash Maggie // Nov 26, 2008 at 2:34 am
So stealing this idea. Thank you for sharing your “turkeys” with us
4 Stonefox // Nov 26, 2008 at 3:05 am
I would love to do this tomorrow (if I can find a tablecloth in time)!
5 Kim // Nov 26, 2008 at 4:57 am
This is an amazing idea! Love it.
6 Steph // Nov 26, 2008 at 9:05 am
I’m so glad this idea is good for all of you!
I forgot to mention: It’s not totally MY idea. I got it from Family Fun Magazine awhile back. I think I modified it, but I don’t really remember.
Have fun with it!
7 elizabethchannel // Nov 26, 2008 at 1:08 pm
This is the grandest Thanksgiving idea I’ve seen! I want to do this but have one question: how do you keep the fabric paint from leaking onto your table? Do you cover it with something? I’m seriously going to do this if I can figure out how to do it without staining my table!
8 Steph // Nov 26, 2008 at 1:15 pm
@elizabethchannel Okay. I forgot that part of the instructions, didn’t I? I must admit that when I painted “I’m Thankful” it totally leaked thru. Fortunately it was on a cheap folding table. It’s now our “Thankful Table.”
My fabric pens are really fine-line, so they’ve never leaked thru since. But this year I spread a “leakproof” paper tablecloth just in case. A vinyl one or a table pad would work too.
9 thefarmerfiles // Nov 26, 2008 at 6:37 pm
This is so beautiful!!! And inspirational! With our impending move I am storing all of these great ideas for “some day!”
10 @ngie // Nov 27, 2008 at 11:38 pm
Oh wow! This is great! I love love love the idea.
THANK YOU for sharing it.
11 Michie // Nov 28, 2008 at 12:06 am
I love this tradition. I believe I saw the same idea somewhere for birthdays once.
I guess I’ll have to wait and start this tradition next year – I’ll have to write it down somewhere to remember it.
12 Rachel @ Grasping for Objectivity in my Subjective Life // Nov 28, 2008 at 2:55 pm
SUPER COOL IDEA! I wish I had taken time to read this BEFORE I hosted Thanksgiving dinner yesterday!
13 thedomesticfringe // Nov 28, 2008 at 11:15 pm
What an amazing idea…I LOVE it!
14 Charlie // Nov 29, 2008 at 5:37 pm
Okay, what I said was that having someone playi\ Christmas music BEFORE Thanksgiving is like having a teammate shouting, “Oh yeah, Super Bowl!” before you’ve played the last playoff game–when YOU are the one who has to win that playoff game by shopping for and cooking Thanksgiving dinner for twelve people!
15 Bdogs // Nov 29, 2008 at 6:49 pm
I love the hand turkeys. And when in a few years, it’s full, you can frame it!
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