We are all looking forward to some family time this week, whether physically in person or some other creative way. As we continue to remember best practices for keeping us all safe, here are some thoughts around creative measures to consider this holiday season:
- Go all out for your immediate family and make the most of a small but special day together (make everyone’s favorite dish)
- Find an oldie but goodie movie and circle up the troops for a family movie experience (even on an iPad, family can still watch with you)
- Set up a table in your front yard, dress up in your finest thanksgiving garb and show that Thanksgiving spirit to your neighbors, better yet, invite them to do the same and you’ll have a neighborhood outdoor celebration with perfect social distancing in place
- For those of you with kids (or just feeling like a kid yourself), draw giant turkeys and Thanksgiving sayings on the sidewalk with sidewalk chalk, send some well wishes to those serving on the front lines
- Decorate a tree in your front yard with pictures or sayings of things you are most thankful for
- Donate to a local food pantry or drive as there are SO many in need this Thanksgiving (make that a family tradition going forward)
- Write thank you notes to those on the front lines and deliver them to a local facility so those working feel the Thanksgiving love
- Create a Thanksgiving Mad Lib and do it over the phone with relatives that you aren’t able to spend the day with and prepare to laugh out loud
- Do a “food exchange” where you make extras of your classic dishes that you usually share together to swap off in a distanced masked quick exchange. Then set up a zoom dinner pajama party!!
- Speaking of Zoom, for Thanksgiving Day, try a Zoom family meeting to check in with each other, Zoom is offering all accounts free unlimited meetings on Thanksgiving Day! You can play games such as Thanksgiving Trivia or Bingo.
This season is about recognizing and focusing on those things that stand out to us as special and meaningful. Of course this year has forced us all to really re-evaluate what is important in our lives. It’s 2020, and although you still have to wear your masks, social distance and wash your hands, your Thanksgiving day can be as crazy or as simple as you want because you can say “Well it’s 2020, what else did you expect!”
Written by Cathy Dancy, Vice President of Human Resources for Care Advantage, Inc.
