Some Songs and Poetry for Thanksgiving

I’ve shared some favorite Thanksgiving-themed picture books here, and movies over here. Now let’s talk about songs and poetry! If you want to cultivate a family where song, the spoken word and IRL conversation triumph over screens for entertainment, perhaps you could use these. I love that Nancy Campbell of aboverubies.org has speeches at her big holiday family dinners. Maybe that’s something I’ll institute as my grandchildren get older and I have more. I’ve read about that in some of her Above Rubies magazines These magazines are such a wealth of encouragement for homemaker mothers. (You can see the archives here.) It’s never too late to start a family tradition to help bind your family together in love. To celebrate my last birthday, I asked my family members to gather around the piano while I played and we sang some songs. It felt so good to be creating our own entertainment instead of just consuming it! I hope to make this happen more often. In my husband’s family of origin, they had a tradition of doing a family talent show on Christmas Eve. I have loved that! We’ve had poetry recitations, martial arts demonstrations, instrumental music rendering, picture book reading aloud, and much more. I’m wondering, if it’s great for Christmas Eve, how about we do it for every holiday gathering?

Poetry

Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers

Five Kernels of Corn

An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving by Edgar A. Guest

Summer Days Are Over by Louisa May Alcott

Harvest Song by Parley P. Pratt