Easy Thankful Books to Make With Your Kids

A Thanksgiving tradition for many people, is expressing something you are thankful for over the past year. Sometimes it's done silently, sometimes written and sometimes spoken around the Thanksgiving table. I've done many of these with my own family, and a favorite for kids, especially toddlers and pre-schoolers, is a Thankful Book.

If you have older kids (or are a TV junkie), you may remember Blues Clues. . .my boys loved that show, and we spent countless hours drawing "clues" in our pawprint notebook. One year, they did a Thanksgiving episode, and Steve and Blue had a Thankful Book that they wrote what everyone was thankful for in it.

This episode inspired me to make my own Thankful Books for my own kids. But I wanted something they could do on their own to keep them entertained. We created handprint books, and my oldest went around and asked everyone what they were thankful for that year, and my youngest who was probably 2 at the time, just colored in it and carried it around all day. How you use it is up to you, but it's an easy way to get kids thinking about gratitude.

Here's all you need:

• 1 sheet of colored card stock
• Multiple sheets of white cardstock or drawing paper
• An adult sized hand 
• Scissors
• Hole Punch
• Jump Rings and/or Ribbon
• Alphabet Stickers or a Marker

Here's what you do:

• Trace your hand twice on the colored cardstock. (I traced bigger than my hand)
• Trace your hand on the white paper or cardstock as many times as pages that you want for your book.
• Cut out the hands.
• Stack the white hands between the colored cardstock hands and punch 2 holes.
• Attach with jump rings or ribbon.
• Use alphabet stickers or a marker to label your Thankful Book.
• Fill it with gratitudes, doodles, or anything your child's heart desires.

And there you have it - an easy and fun book for your child to have on Thanksgiving. I still keep mine in my gratitude box. (updated post and instructions coming soon)

How do you help your kids express gratitude?

catch you soon -