Easy Thanksgiving Crafts for Kids

As we seek to redeem every holiday with our children by pointing them to God and all He has done for us, Thanksgiving is a terrific holiday for making crafts which teach gratitude, while some are just fun for fall! Here are some of our favorite easy Thanksgiving crafts for kids!

Fun Crafts for Thanksgiving

1. Thanksgiving Turkey Headband

Our kids love to dress up, so we have a pilgrim hat, a native costume, and for super cute pictures, each child has a Thanksgiving Turkey Headband. Get the pattern here.

2. Turkey Placemats

We often make crafts as decorations for Thanksgiving too. One of our favorite decorations are turkey placemats that we made from some of the colorful changing leaves we collected on a fall walk. (Fall walks are a fantastic time to enjoy God’s creation and to learn to identify trees. Check out our book recommendations later on in this post.: We’re Going on a Leaf Hunt, Leaf Man, Why Do Leaves Change Color?, What Tree is That?) We ironed the leaves between two layers of wax paper to preserve them, cut a turkey body from construction paper, then lay the leaves in a pattern to create fanned tail feathers. We place all of this between two layers of clear contact paper for a placemat that can endure spills and resist stains!

3. Toilet Paper Roll Crafts

We have crafted terrific turkeys or Pilgrims and Natives from toilet paper rolls!

4. Pumpkin Turkey

You can paint a pumpkin as a turkey, or we got wooden decorations which have rods that attach to the pumpkin to create a turkey face and tail feathers. We got ours at Hobby Lobby or you can get a set from Amazon here.

Activities and Crafts for Focusing on Giving Thanks

1. Thanksgiving Hand Turkey

Our favorite toddler and preschool giving thanks activity was making a handprint by tracing our hands or by painting our hands (each finger and the palm are a different color) and creating a handprint. This becomes the turkey, so we draw a face on it. Then we write on the paper: “Thanksgiving 20__ (year)” “I am thankful for:” The children list all the things they are thankful for, and if they are too young to write, we write their ideas for them.

2. Thanksgiving Tree

We cut out hand, feet or leaf shapes in various colors from construction paper. On each, we write something we are thankful for. We hang these on a large flat “trunk” created from brown construction paper on a wall or we get a leafless branch from the backyard to hang the “leaves of thanks” off of like ornaments.

3. Thanksgiving Chain Garland

We cut strips of colored paper and write something we’re thankful for on each strip. Then we create a chain that we can hang for a Thanksgiving decoration. Later, we transfer this to the Christmas tree.

4. Thanksgiving Journal

When our children were old enough to read the Bible on their own daily, we gave them a notebook in which to write five things they are thankful for. We also sell a Thanksgiving journal if you want to print out one with ideas to help you and your children learn the habit of gratitude. Get your Thanksgiving Journal here!

5. Thank You Notes

Thanksgiving is a perfect time to learn to write thank you notes. This is becoming a lost art, but what a way to bless other people! It is proper etiquette to send thank you notes for gifts, but why not bless those in our children’s lives with thank you notes for being a teacher or pastor or to dad for working hard for our family…?

There are many ways to make Thanksgiving fun and to teach gratitude on this important but often overlooked holiday with our easy Thanksgiving crafts. Take time to be thankful and enjoy the simplicity of this holiday!

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