Be Thankful... For Awesome Ideas for Your Thanksgiving Party!

Happy Thursday to my fellow Creative Cabana readers! Can you believe it? We just had Halloween a week ago, and now we have 3 weeks left to prepare for Thanksgiving! Well thankfully, and I mean this literally, unlike Halloween and Christmas, Thanksgiving is more laid-back and doesn't involve as much fluff and planning. Sure there's the cooking, shopping for food, and kitchen preparations of course. However, Thanksgiving isn't meant to be as commercialized as other holidays which means you can take more time for yourself. It also means you can take some extra time to detail items for your home decor. In my previous post, "Having a Candy Hangover?", I mentioned some easy shortcuts for reusing generic Halloween decorations for Thanksgiving. If you're in the mood though for some fresh decorative settings, then here are some suggestions for you and the little hands in your family to try:

1. "Handmade" Turkey

For this craft, take your hands and trace the outline onto pieces of construction paper (brown, yellow, green, orange, red). Then cut each of the traces out, these will later be the feathers of your turkey. For the body part, simply cut out the head, beak, wattle, feet and stomach out of additional cardboard or foam pieces to create the rest of the turkey body. Glue each of the pieces together with the feathers going behind the bigger stomach piece. Once your turkey has dried, simply place it in a frame with some festive card stock for a beautiful display. You can also add your own touch by adding keywords such as: Thankful, Blessed, Give Thanks, etc. around the frame. This simple and easy craft is a great way to bring the family together for Thanksgiving and admire each other's amazing crafting skills!
*Oh, I just wanted to mention that I got this idea from Pinterest, but the website on this picture is pretty cool too! So check out pounds4pennies.com for some awesome money saving tips and projects.

2. Pilgrim Placards

I saw the picture of this idea on my Pinterest feed and thought this was just the most adorable idea for your table settings- especially if you have a big family or lots of kids. You'll need construction paper, paper towel or toilet paper brown rolls and a list of who will be at your dinner. Once you have your guest list finalized of who will be at your Thanksgiving dinner, print out pictures of their faces from your computer. Nothing too big, or small. If you'd like a comparison on size, try to make the heads about the same size as the base of the toilet/paper towel rolls you'll be using. Next you'll be cutting your rolls into smaller pieces either cut in half or thirds depending on how long the roll is. Now cover the rolls with brown construction paper and place your heads on top of the rolls. Next cut out little collar designs to place at the top of the brown roll, just under the face. Next you can make little hats and bonnets to place on the heads. Either cut little black pilgrim hats for the boys or little white bonnets for the girls. Likewise, you can also do this to dress up the pictures as Indians with different color construction paper, and feathers. Place each of the placards where you'd like the guests to sit. During the meal they can admire your designs and it also makes a cute favor for them to take home along with the yummy leftovers.

These are just a few of the many ideas I'd like to share with you my readers. Of course you can always stay up-to-date on different activities and decor ideas by following The Creative Cabana on Pinterest, just CLICK HERE. I've got those creative juices following, so be sure to check back for more great ideas coming up soon. I know in a future post I'll be showing you tricks for creating your own Thanksgiving cards to send to distant friends and family. Plus I'll be discussing the opportunity for Fall Photography ideas! This and much more coming soon to The Creative Cabana!

*Images and Craft ideas used in this post were originated from ideas found on Pinterest using the keyword "Thanksgiving". All images and craft content belong to their respective owners. I am in no relation connected to pounds4pennies.com. No Copyright Infringement Intended.