Thanksgiving with turkeys

At this time of the year we have real difficulties preparing for all the festivals and celebrations we have:

• Thanksgiving (26th Nov)
• Daddy's birthday (28th Nov)
• the beginning of Advent (29th Nov)
• St. Nicolas Day (or Santa Day - 5th Dec)

Not to mention that illnesses were on and off all month, three in a row. There haven't been 3 consecutive days when everybody in the family was perfectly healthy.

Still, we managed to do a little bit of fun for Thanksgiving.
Of course, it was mainly about turkeys :)

I made this home-made salt dough: 

1 cup salt

1 cup hot water

2 cups flour

1 or 2 tbs cocoa powder (to make it brown)

Mix them all. I kneaded the dough with my hand but you can use a mixer. If you choose to knead it wait a little until the hot water cools down. Then I put it in a plastic container and next to the fridge for a short while (1-2 hours)

When ready, I prepared this for E.:

On the tray I prepared coloured feathers, orange foam triangles for the beak, googly eyes, red (water drop shaped) foam for the wattle (the red skin hanging down from the beak of the turkey along its neck - "bőrlebernyeg" in Hungarian). In the middle there was the brown salt dough.

We made balls out of the dough to make the body and the head. First, we kneaded the dough and then with rolling movement we formed them into balls. These movements are really useful to strengthen the muscles in a child's hand.

Googly eyes: a girl and a boy

Placing the wattle

Then E. made two turkeys and me too. We fixed the beak and eyes as well as the wattle, after all this she stuck the tail feathers in.

We practised saying the colours, the different parts of the turkey, like feather, beak, head and body or this new word (even for me): wattle. We used expressions like roll the dough, knead the dough, stick it in etc. We also talked a little bit about why we celebrate Thanksgiving, why we have a feast at this time of the year.

I found another great turkey activity online. Turkey feather counting mats. You can use these either as play dough mats (so you can use coloured play dough to make the feathers) or with real feathers. E. was so into these colourful feathers we used them again. 

Finally, we had a Thanksgiving feast (quite a moderate one). My Mum stayed for dinner too (also help with preparing some turkey breast roast and pumpkins) and we all said what we are thankful for in our lives.

And what is E. thankful for?

- I'm thankful for my parents, my Godparents and my toys and others... the good meats and my friends in the nursery.

I'm thankful for my wonderful daughter and my family.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

If you wish to listen to some Thanksgiving videos on youtube, or prepare a tree of gratitude, just click on the pic below:

If you haven't had enough of thanksgiving, here are some more crafts: