Did I hear that you got off the hook for hosting the big Thanksgiving event?
You breathed a sigh of relief, but still desire to create something fun and special for the extended family during your gathering.
Why don’t you become an editor for the day? Or better yet, assign the kids to do it. They’ll love it, and they’ll make sure it happens!
Organize your own Thanksgiving (or Christmas) Gazette.
This tradition involves turning your family into a news crew, and is especially fun with a large crowd.
Assign everyone in your family a “task” to be responsible for throughout the day. The older children can serve as photographers and newspaper reporters while the adults can be the interviewees.
You could even buy fake microphones for the younger kids and they will have a blast hamming it up.
Make sure they ask the “Don’t you Dare” type questions, such as “what’s your most most embarrassing moment?, and “Who was your first kiss?” The kids can get away with those, much better than we can.
Then, every year, choose one of the eldest members of the family and make their life history the front page feature.
The youngest children can help by creating the “art” section of the gazette. Don’t forget to include the menu and some of your inside family jokes or “best quotes” of the day.
Someone in the family has got to be skilled on the computer (I found the above free template here), so it could put together by the end of the day and then passed out over late night coffee. In fact, during half time of the football games is a great time to do the first official reading.
Of course, no true editing allowed or it will feel like work.
Let the children’s sentence structure stay “as is” – it makes it that much more memorable.
Be sure and send extra copies to those family members that weren’t able to make it.
For minimal effort in organizing this Family Newspaper, your family will be rewarded with times of laughter and comradery.
Remember, the zanier the better….
