Thanksgiving Theme Ideas

When you are having family and perhaps friends over for this Thanksgiving, why not celebrate around a theme? Here are a few ideas that would be really fun.

Be A Pilgrim
Decorate your dining room like the pilgrims might have done on the first Thanksgiving. Your invitations can be cornucopia cards. Foods you would have eaten, if you were a pilgrim would have been duck, venison, cabbage, corn, onions, squash and perhaps fish. I don't know if the pilgrims did this, but you can have everyone go around the table and say what they are thankful for this year.

No Turkey Day!
Have festive turkey decorations, and send out turkey invitations. For those that are vegan or vegetarian, you can perhaps 'invite' a turkey to spend a day with you. If you have children, they will get a kick out of that! Having a vegan/vegetarian theme , you can encourage eating a meatless gravy and stuffing with fake turkeys. You can buy a Tofurky or Unturkey. You can find them in almost any grocery or health food store. Many of you probably don't know that some turkeys are killed inhumanely and some places it's still quite legal. Support turkeys by going for this meatless theme!

Give Thanks
If you've had a great year and can spread some of your happiness around, have each of your dinner guests bring something to give away so you can prepare gift baskets before you eat and distribute them to those less fortunate in your area. You can decorate your eating area with pictures of places you've been, people, or objects that show what you are thankful for this season.

To really get into these themes, you can play the games they played during this time, or dress like they did, if you're up to it, after all that eating! Pilgrim children played a game called Knicker Box. To play the game, you have to get the marbles through the arches inside the box without them bouncing back. Native Americans played the Pin Game. You have a stick with a ring attached to it. To play you have to flip the ring over the stick or pin.

Forget about dressing like the pilgrims-I mean come-on! There was just way too much stuff to put on. The girls had a petticoats, garters, stockings, a waistcoat, an apron and a coif. Oh, the pocket was on the outside of the clothes-not sewn in. Boys had it bad also. Boys had to wear dresses like the girls until they were six or seven years of age. After that they wore stockings, knee-length pants, garters and a doublet. Enjoy your Thanksgiving this year with family and friends with having a theme celebration.