ALT-1 How to Include Children in Thanksgiving Preparations
Children love holidays and they enjoy “helping” with table decorations and food preparation. Your projects may get a little messy and require additional time and patience, but getting the kids involved in the Thanksgiving celebration is a worthwhile effort. It’s how family memories are made and it builds their self-confidence.
Crafts
Place Cards for the Thanksgiving table are simple to make with 3 by 5 index cards. Print the guest’s name in the center and decorate the card with colorful turkey and Pilgrim stickers or glue small pine cone clusters in one corner of the card. Make matching napkin rings by snipping cardboard paper towel tubes into 2-inch wide rings and cover them with the stickers and tiny pine cones.
A pine cone wreath with colorful autumn leaves adds color to the table. Children can glue artificial leaves to cover a circular foam ring and add a layer of pine cones. In the center of the ring, place a large candle within a tall glass cylinder for an easy centerpiece.
You can find age appropriate crafts online at many websites, includingKabooseandBetter Homes and Gardenmagazine.
Cooking
Even a 2-year-old can help with food. Let your child sit comfortably in a high chair or at a small play table as you prepare pies. With a ball of dough and a short wooden dowel about 2 inches in diameter as a rolling pin, your little chef can roll out the dough and cut it into circles with a donut or biscuit cutter or a plastic drinking tumbler. Sprinkle dough circles with sugar crystals or cinnamon and roll into a cylinder. Bake them on a cookie sheet at 325 degrees till lightly browned. (Never leave small children alone in the kitchen and keep them away from the stove area.)
Older kids can make larger circles of crust to bake in foil tart tins. Fill with any prepared pie filling or instant pudding and top with whipped cream for individual pies.
Children from 3 to 6 years of age can scrub vegetables such as potatoes and carrots or shuck corn. Even 3-year-olds can assemble the clean vegetables in a large roasting pan for cooking. Ten-year-olds can peel the vegetables or follow simple directions on a box of brownie mix to prepare the batter.
Let small hands fill condiment trays for pre-dinner nibbling with baby carrots, celery sticks, pickles, olives, cheese cubes, pepperoni slices, dried cranberries, or spiced nuts. (Any project involving finger food and small items is a good activity to teach number counting or to emphasize food sanitation.)
Kids seem to enjoy eating mashed potatoes or squash; ask them to help wield the potato masher or mix in herbs and spices, milk or soft butter. You might have to help smooth out a few lumps.
Most children will enjoy creating cookies, so let them go wild with choosing the shapes and applying the frosting decorations. They’ll be proud to show off their talent at the dessert table.
Cleaning
Children can also help to prepare for the Thanksgiving meal by polishing the silverware, washing non-breakables such as holiday serving pieces, or dusting the furniture. I can remember a time when it was my job to sweep the stairway with a small brush and dustpan before the relatives arrived for Sunday dinner. Of course, you should avoid toxic cleaning products or spray cans but there are many helpful chores they can do.
