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Gratitude Gobbler for Thanksgiving 2016

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“Let us come before God with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song.” (Psalm 95:2 NIV)

For a Thanksgiving Day activity with family and friends, pass out the Gratitude Gobbler prayer page with some colored markers, pencils, or crayons. Invite people to list their thanksgivings in or around the turkey. I often start with a name for God in the middle, so it feels like a prayer rather than just a list. Using the coloring page can also create a solitary prayer time in the midst of a hectic day.

I was tired of the “hand” turkeys I had drawn for the past couple of years, so this year’s template is a little wilder and more abstract. If this gratitude gobbler is a little too goofy for you, trace around your hand to make your own template. Or check out last year’s gobbler coloring page: 2015  My finished prayer using this year’s template is below.

There are both .pdf and .jpg versions of the template available. Click on the version you want below. Download the page first, then print it. Feel free to make copies to share.

.PDF       or      .JPG

turkey-2016-collage-resized

Happy Thanksgiving and Gratitude Gobbler

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“For the Beauty of the Earth, Sing, Oh Sing Today
Of the Skies and of our birth, Sing, Oh Sing, always.
Nature, Human and Divine, all around us lies,
Lord of All to Thee we raise grateful hymns of praise.”

These simple and beautiful words are from the “Canticle of Brother Sun” from the Missa Gaia by Jim Scott and Paul Winter (Litchfield, CT, Living Music Records, 1982). This is one of my favorite thanksgiving songs.

This year’s turkey is a gratitude journal of all of the things I am grateful for from this unique year in Colorado. As I wrote, drew, and prayed, more and more things kept coming to me. It was as if gratitude was an exponential function. First I was grateful for one thing, then two more, then four more, then eight more, then sixteen more, then thirty-two more…. Lest you think I am a pious pollyanna who reeks of gratitude, be not deceived. I am a grateful person, but I am equally an ungrateful, cranky, and cynical person. Maybe I should do this visual gratitude list more often. I could think of so few things for which I was ungrateful. But I notice how much space and energy those few things can take up in my mind and life.

If you want to try your hand at filling in the blank Gratitude Gobbler, here are the two versions: .jpg  OR  .pdf.  Just remember to download first, then print.

Happy Thanksgiving and God’s Peace.

Gratitude Gobbler 2015

Gratitude Gobbler Template

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“Let us come before God with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song.” (Psalm 95:2 NIV)

Here is a template to use for a Thanksgiving prayer. In the spaces within the turkey and on the sides of the page, write your “gratitude list.” (Or if you are feeling grumpy, throw in your grievances as well)  In the center of the turkey I usually write my name for God: “Loving God, Gracious God, Holy One….” Sing or hum or recite the above Psalm as you write and color.

If this gratitude gobbler is a little too goofy for you, trace around your hand to make your own template. If I could have drawn a beautiful cornucopia of autumn vegetables as a template I would have. (not in my skill set)  A Blessed Thanksgiving to all.

Download first choosing the .pdf or.jpg version below the template. Then print. Feel free to make copies.

Turkey Template

.jpg  or .pdf

Below are two examples of gratitude turkeys from previous years.

Turkey Collage Resized.jpg

 

Gratitude Gobbler

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I love drawing/praying my yearly gratitude turkey. The turkey is a visual journal of my life in the past twelve months.

What I notice about my life in the past year is my tendency to be alone. This is not all bad. Keeping one’s own company and learning to cultivate the gifts of solitude is a skill, a skill I lacked as a young adult. Now I have the tendency to spend too much time alone. Reading, drawing, praying, studying, writing, playing Scrabble, hanging out on the computer keep me busy for hours.

Being alone is easier than being with other people. My opinions go unchallenged. I can be spiritual in my own way without the annoying trappings of a church and without people who bother me. I can eat what I want and do what I want. I’m the monarch of my self-contained little kingdom. On the down side: My opinions go unchallenged. I can eat what I want and do what I want. My entitlement grows and MY wants and needs become paramount. My solitude turns to isolation.

What I also notice about my life is my huge need for community–as messy and inconvenient as it sometimes is. This year my turkey is dressed with the groups in my life who make my life richer and who keep my thinking from running amok or growing more distorted. These communities remind me that I am both spiritual AND religious. Whether secular or sacred, these groups offer me “religious” frameworks for opening my eyes and staying in touch with reality. Lillian Daniel in a 2011 Huffington Post article says it well:
“Being privately spiritual but not religious just doesn’t interest me. There is nothing     challenging about having deep thoughts all by oneself. What is interesting is doing this work in community, where other people might call you on stuff, or heaven forbid, disagree with you. Where life with God gets rich and provocative is when you dig deeply into a tradition that you did not invent all for yourself.”

I invented none of the groups on my turkey, but I am immensely grateful to be part of them. Thanks be to God. Happy Thanksgiving.

Gratitude Gobbler 2

 

 

Gratitude List Revisited

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When I was sad or disgruntled as a kid, my mother used to say, “You sit down and write a list of all of the things you have to be grateful for.” It really irked me. I WAS a grateful kid but sometimes I wanted to just vent and be heard.

As an adult I have days when I dwell just a little too long in the land of disgruntledness. Fortunately, I still have friends who remind me to sit down and write a gratitude list. It irks me less than it used to. Yesterday someone suggested a manageable way to write the list. “Think of fifteen things in the last twenty-four hours for which you are thankful.” I like the idea of a set number in a short span of time because I don’t have to wax cosmic and list the most important things in my life. The thanksgivings are down-to-earth, specific and timely. I have been away from home for about ten days, so my gratitude list is like a thanksgiving diary entry of my trip.

Drawing the list helps me to spend time with each thanksgiving, to make it a prayer. (I opted for a dozen things because that’s how many fit into the zigzag grid on the paper.)

 Pray diligently. Stay alert, with your eyes wide open in gratitude.  (Colossians 4:2–The Message)

Thanksgiving Turkey Prayer

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Here is my 2011 Thanksgiving prayer. The turkey wasn’t large enough for all of my thanksgivings, so this is my Group Gratitude prayer. Most of the people I am grateful for fit into one of these groups. I’ve probably forgotten a few, so I’m imagining them on the other side of the turkey.

Yesterday a woman said, “I’m not just thankful for the things God has given me now; but I’m thankful for all of the future ways in which God will love me and care for me.”  Hallelujah!

Making hand-turkey prayers might be a good after Thanksgiving dinner activity for children and adults alike. Help a child trace around their hand or let them borrow yours.

“Praise God from whom all blessings flow…..”