Thanksgiving Basket

Our thanksgiving basket begins today. I set out an empty basket in our dining room with a stack of colored paper squares and a pen next to it. Everyone in our family and any guests we have over is encouraged to write down blessings which we are thankful to the Lord for. We make a particular effort to write down one or more items for each person when we eat our breakfast together (since that is when our family is always gathered together). Yet the basket stays out all the time and everyone is encouraged to add additional blessings throughout the day. Our goal is to fill it to overflowing between now and Thanksgiving.
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Pictures are just as welcome as words. For younger children still learning to read, spelling should not stop them from giving thanks. Last year everyone told me at the breakfast table what they were thankful for at that time and I wrote them down on individual squares. But when the girls added more squares later in the day they mostly drew pictures on them. This year I expect they'll try to spell blessings out more, but we'll still get a lot of pictures also.
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Individual thanksgivings are not allowed to be repeated more than once a day. If one person at the table is thankful for bananas (because, well, that's what they're eating at the moment...), no one is allowed to also repeat bananas until tomorrow. They have to come up with something different (like, well, oatmeal).
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The purpose of the basket is to 1) Remind us of the numerous blessings we have received from the Lord; 2) Actively thank Him for those blessings; 3) Orient our hearts and minds toward the best reasons to celebrate Thanksgiving later this month; 4) Begin the Advent/Christmas season with an attitude of gratitude.
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Last year's basket was wildly successful. I'm looking forward to continuing this tradition and seeing even more blessings fill our basket this year.
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Linked with Fellowship Fridays, Modest Monday, Works for Me Wednesday