OK, so I’m not Canadian, but when I lived there I loved their Thanksgiving tradition, and it’s one of the many things about Canadian culture that I took with me when I left.
With a family of my own now I felt it was important to instill a sense of gratitude in my children. Unfortunately, we are not grateful for things we have every single day of our life, so having a dedicated day, once a year, is not a bad thing is it!
We’ve been celebrating Canadian Thanksgiving for a few years now anyway. The kids are getting older and they are remembering it more and more, and best of all, they are able to take part in it (well, at least my 5-year old can…)
We started the day by going to the beach and spent the morning there. We made a picnic and just enjoyed being in the warm (but cold winded!) sunshine.
 In the afternoon, we were home and started preparing our Thanksgiving feast… I use the term “feast” very loosely here!
As Thanksgiving is traditionally a ‘winter’ celebration, it was hard to find the right ingredients in an Australian Spring/Summer, so we had to modify a few things!
We served a big roast chicken, instead of turkey, maple-syrup glazed carrots, potatoes roasted to perfection, and some other vegetables (like peas, which the kids like). Sadly, no pumpkin pie!
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| maple syrup glazed carrots! |
The best part was how my son understood the concept of giving thanks, and at the table he said thanks to the food that we made and for his family whom he loved (aaaaaaawwwwwwhhh!!!!!!)
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| image: http://www.good.is/posts/what-is-canadian-thanksgiving-anyway |