DLTK's Crafts for Kids
Feeling Thankful

The leaves are turning, temperatures are falling and it really feels like autumn here in southern Alberta. The Canadian Thanksgiving holiday is just around the corner and autumn is one of my favourite times of the year. Maybe it is because my birthday is in September or because of all the colourful foliage. It could be because I grew up in an agricultural community. Most likely it has more to do with fond Thanksgiving weekend family memories…great food, football and family time!

So be sure to take advantage of the long weekend and spend some time outdoors with your family. We used to go and collect fallen leaves with our daughters. We always made sure to collect leaves in a park that had a playground so that there was alternative entertainment when the excitement of the leaves had passed. When we returned home with our treasured leaves we would prepare some autumn art in the form of leaf rubbings or stained glass art. (See DLTK’s Leaf Prints.)

We have a soft spot for Girl Guides and Scouts in our household. The daughter of our family friends is in Girl Guides and we make a point of buying a case of Girl Guide cookies every time they are for sale. Our case of the mint cookies was delivered this weekend. (Thanks Paige and Kathy.) It is a worthy cause but I am not really sure what to do with all those cookies. Some boxes might go to ‘trick or treaters’ on Halloween but Leanne will have to hide them from me until then. (I love cookies! One box is already gone.) If you have an abundance of Girl Guide cookies you could use them to make a variation of the Oreo Turkey Snack.

The grocery store had received their first shipment of pumpkins last week and the produce department had them all lined up. We picked the best one we could find for carving. Leanne tells me she has a new pattern design in mind so stay tuned to our pumpkin carving patterns section for a new addition in the next few weeks.

Of course it is important to spend time thinking about what you have to be thankful for at this time of year. That is why I want to take this opportunity to thank all of our viewers for their support over the many years. It has been our pleasure to share activities and craft ideas with you. Thinking of our viewers and thanksgiving brings to mind one of our favourite viewer contributions. We had song lyrics for “A Turkey Sat on a Backyard Fence” but had never heard the song ourselves so could not answer viewers who wanted to know the tune. Then one of our viewer sent us his rendition of the song in video format. We really enjoyed his contribution and hope you might too!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Author: Darren Guenther

Read more about Darren and see his other blog posts here.