now thank we all our God

This past week Passionate Homemaking linked to this sweet post on Simply Vintagegirl: the Thankful Tree. I'm makin' it. Did so today, in fact. Mine is not quite so polished (alas that I lack a circular paper stamp) but even with rectangular tags I think it will be wonderful.

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I love celebrations and the meaningful rituals that can accompany them. It saddens me to see how much hullaballoo our society makes over Christmas-- and I do love Christmas-- yet how little is done for Easter, Independence Day, Thanksgiving, and many other perfectly good holidays. They could be such great opportunities but what do we have? Jellybeans. So standing at the very beginning of married life, I'm always looking for thoughtful holiday traditions.

Mind ye, the food traditions stand front and center, many already firmly ensconced. (Is that redundant? I mean, can you be anything other than firmly ensconced?) My family in particular loves to eat and cheerfully invests time, money, and thought in doing it well. These investments have resulted in Irish cheddar and roast leg of lamb for Christmas, perfect cranberry compote and cornbread stuffing for Thanksgiving, ice cream cakes for summer birthdays . . . and an array of other options, occasionally repeated (who wants to eat the same thing all the time?) and always delicious.

Yes, our clan excels at feasting. We bear the burden with what grace we can muster.

Apart from the dinner table, though, I feel lacking in tradition when it comes to anything but Christmas.

This is where the Thankful Tree comes in. I would like to do this annually, and if I can accomplish it without too much clutter, save the tags from each year. How amazing it would be to look through ten years' worth of God's kindness to us! And how I want to ingrain gratitude into our family's life together. May Thanksgiving Day just be the climax of a year-round thanksgiving.

Once we have children I will go whole hog with the history lessons. Paper Mayflowers, here I come. :)

Now does anyone know of decent songs for this time of year? "For the Beauty of the Earth" and "Now Thank We All Our God" come to mind, but surely there's more than that. Do share.