by A. Y. Ford

Created on: October 21, 2009   Last Updated: April 10, 2010

A favorite, easy, inexpensive Thanksgiving craft idea at our house is making a thankful turkey. This craft requires a few supplies and a little bit of creativity. This craft is also a great way to discuss the real reason for the holiday of Thanksgiving - thankfulness.

Supplies need:

Glue or Glue Dots (I recommend glue dots because they hold well and there is no clean up involved.)

Various fall colored construction paper.
Dark marker or markers to draw the shapes to cut out and to draw a couple features on the turkey.
Poster putty to attached the big pieces to a wall.

Instructions:

An adult or older child can draw the neck and head of a turkey on a piece of brown construction paper and cut it out.
An adult or older child can draw the body and legs of a turkey on another piece of brown construction paper and cut it out.
A mouth and eyes can be drawn on the head of the turkey. This can be as detailed as you would like or as simple as you would like.
On an empty space on a wall or on a refrigerator place the head, neck, body, legs appropriately in place. I use poster putty for this to prevent the wall from being damaged. This can all be done ahead of time if the children you will be doing the craft with are very young.

At this point each child involved in the craft takes a piece of orange, red, yellow, or brown construction paper and traces his or her hand. Then the child or an adult cuts out the shape. Each child then writes something he or she is thankful for on the cut out hand shape. If there are lots of children, each child can make one hand shape. If there are just a couple children then each can make a few hand shapes. You will need enough hand shapes to create plumage for the turkey.  After the hand shapes/feathers are complete they are placed on the back of the turkey. This creates the thankful turkey.

At Thanksgiving dinner we find it enjoyable to talk about what each of the hand shape has written on it. This craft can help us remember that Thanksgiving is not just about time off school or all the yummy food but truly about our blessings. We take a picture of our thankful turkey before we take it down to remember the good times we had creating it and discussing why we are thankful.

Learn more about this author, A. Y. Ford.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.