Thursday, November 6, 2025
Have you ever planted a fruit tree? There’s lots of tending and watering, but any fruit lover will tell you, it’s so worth it!
To help cultivate thankfulness in your home, try a “Thankful Tree.” It’s not complicated or crafty, and it doesn’t take much time.
A “Thankful Tree” is a way of encouraging your family to slow down and say thanks for the gazillion things we have to be thankful for. You can get as creative as you want, but it can be as simple as:
- Snag some fall leaves or make your own!
- If you want to take it to the next level, have your kids gather their favorite freshly fallen leaves from outside. Dry them in the pages of a book for a day or two to help preserve them.
- Place the leaves in a basket with a pen and some clear tape.
- Have everyone take a leaf every day and write one thing they are thankful for on the leaf.
- Tape the leaves to a wall, or your fridge, and watch your thankful tree grow.
When the holiday has come and gone, and it’s time to put up the Christmas tree, we take our leaves and put them in a photo album. These albums of thankfulness sit stacked under coffee and end tables as a reminder of all we have to be thankful for. They mark times in our lives when God was faithful through comfort in pain, someone to repair a car, or simply the appreciation of a child’s smile.
Yes, God is good, but we never really know how good until we take the time to tell Him, “Thank You.” And thankfulness, well, it’s just one of those fruits that takes time and tending to grow.