Thanksgiving Entertainment Ideas for Kids of All Ages

Thanksgiving is the time to gather with your family and tell them what you are most thankful for in your life. A whole lot of preparation is needed to make sure that your family have a Thanksgiving they can remember. You have to cook the turkey, make the side dishes, fix the table, clean the house, and fifty other billion things for the big day. If you have little children, you have to do all those things with them screaming and running all around the house. Thanksgiving can be a hectic time for the little ones. They don't know the real meaning of Thanksgiving. All they know is that they are out of school to eat a whole bunch of good food. So its understandable that they want to have some fun. As long as they don't disturb you or the other adults joining in on the celebration. There are a number of activities that can preoccupy the little ones on Thanksgiving day. So your family can relax and you can prepare a perfect dinner. I found a number of Thanksgiving activities, games and arts and crafts online for kids. I choice eight fun activities for kids of all ages.

1. The first one called Thankerchief. All you need is a handkerchief. All you need to do is put all the children in a circle. Then pass around the handkerchief and make them recite this poem:

Thankerchief, thankerchief, around you go --

Where you'll stop, nobody knows.

But when you do, someone must say,

What they are thankful for this day.

Once they are done reciting the poem, the person holding the handkerchief have to say what they are thankful for. And then after they are finish, you pass around the handkerchief again until everybody have said what they are thankful.

2. The next game is called Turkey Hunt. The best way to play this game is to have the kids play in an empty room. Now with this game you will need twelve index cards. On each index card, have the kids draw a turkey. Then choose a leader or have your kids choose a leader for the game. Then make everybody leave the room except for the leader. The leader have to hide the index cards all over the room. After he or she is finish, he makes everybody hunt for the index cards. Whoever finds the most index cards wins the game and becomes the leader in the next games.

3. Now everybody have played Twenty Questions. But have you played the Thanksgiving version. This is how it is played. You have to choose anything that have to do with Thanksgiving. Then someone has to guess what it is by asking twenty questions. But you have to answer the questions with a yes, no, or I don't know. Its simple but the kids will have a ball.

4. Do you remember how fun it was playing Pin the Tail on a Donkey when you were a kid? Do you know how much fun your kids will have fun playing Pin the Tail on the Turkey? All you have to do is make a turkey out of construction paper and post it on the wall. Then blindfold the kids and make them pin the tail on the turkey. An easy game to play.

5. Where is Mr. Turkey? Is a game that we all have played in different forms. He know when you tell somebody they are getting warmer or cooler, well this is basically the same game. You will need a small toy turkey for this game. Gather all the children and designate a hunter. Now once you picked who will be the hunter, then the rest of the kids are the helpers. Have the helpers hide the turkey in a room. Then make the hunter hunt for the turkey. The helpers will give gobble like a turkey when the hunter is close in finding the toy. They will also gobble quietly when the hunter is not close to the toy. When the hunter is really close, the helpers will all gobble louder and louder until the hunter captures the turkey.

6. Another great activity that kids will enjoy is being your little helper. Give each of the kids a job. You can have one of them set the table. Make him or her place the placemats, glasses, plates, and silverware on the table. You can have someone put marshmallows in the yams, or put the rolls in the bread basket. You can even have someone to be the taste tester but I'm sure all of them will want to be one!

7. Now this one is for the pre-teens and the teenagers. You can teach your young adults how to cook. Thanksgiving is the perfect holiday for a cooking class. You can teach them how to make cornbread, marconi and cheese, collard greens, sweet potato soufflé, squash casserole, stuffing and even rice and gravy. You can show them how to stuff and cook a turkey. They will learn from the best. When they are all grown and have a family, they can share recipes they learned from you with their children.

8. There are a whole bunch of arts and crafts and worksheets your kid can do on Thanksgiving day. You can have them make a turkey with construction paper. Or you can buy paper placemats and have the kids draw Thanksgiving things on each of them. You can buy Thanksgiving coloring books from your local grocery store or online. You can even order Thanksgiving kits online. Here is one great website that is worth checking out: http://www.orientaltrading.com. They have a huge database of all sort of Thanksgiving arts and craft. They sell by the bulk so save whatever you have leftover for next year.