Turkey On The Table Is A Fun Way To Make This Thanksgiving All About Gratitude

Scooch over, sweet potatoes and stuffing. Although the centerpiece of almost any Thanksgiving table is a golden turkey, you might want to replace that perfectly cooked bird with Turkey on the Table — a toy that teaches you and your kiddos how to have an attitude of gratitude every day.

Created by mompreneurs Kerry Maunus and April George, Turkey on the Table ($40, TurkeyOnTheTable.com) is a toy and book set with the mission of making people more grateful for the good things in their lives. The knit turkey comes with 13 double-sided feathers and a marker to write down everything you and your fam are thankful for. It also includes a book that you can read to your kids at bedtime.

Here’s how it works: Keep your turkey somewhere you won’t forget about it (read: a closet or your kid’s toy bin). Once you’ve found a prominent place for it, you and your kids can write down something that you’re grateful for every day on the turkey’s Thankful Feathers. By Thanksgiving Day, your turkey should be big and plump — with appreciation, that is. You can take turns reading the Thankful Feathers to see what everyone has been grateful for. And be sure to leave an extra Thankful Feather for visiting guests and family to fill out.

And here’s what you as a parent can be thankful for: Every purchase of Turkey on the Table provides 10 meals to those less fortunate. Through Turkey on the Table’s partnership with Feeding America, over 1 million meals have been donated to date. So as your kids battle it out over who is going to get the wishbone, you can be thankful that you get to spend the holiday together as a family, realizing that all the chaos and craziness that goes into preparing a Thanksgiving meal is worth it at the end.

It’s always cute to see what your kids are thankful for. I know it’s the highlight of the meal for me. Every year, we go around the Thanksgiving table, sometimes getting deep responses, like, “I’m glad that we are able to spend another Thanksgiving together.” Other times, it’s something like: “Woohoo, I’m glad it’s a 4-day weekend!” Or, my personal fave: “I’m glad Mom didn’t make the stuffing mushy this year.” (Sigh.)

I don’t know about you guys, but I love keeping paper with my children’s handwriting on it. For me, it freezes a moment in time. And rather than saving a generic math assignment, what is sweeter than having your children’s happiness and gratitude preserved in their own handwriting? It’s like creating your own cute holiday time capsule.

When you think about it, Thanksgiving kind of gets passed over as far as cute holiday traditions go. After all, Christmas has The Elf on the Shelf, and there’s the Peep On A Perch for Easter, (heck, even Hanukkah has The Mensch on the Bench). So now you can create an entirely new holiday tradition that doesn’t involve any kind of tech or crazy gadgetry, just a cute little knitted turkey with paper feathers that will complement your holiday table. And it might, just might, keep the kids around the table a little extra longer as you reminisce about the good times.

Now that’s something to be grateful for.