Thanksgiving in the United States (Part 1)

Hi readers!

It's been a while since my last post, hope you're all well.

This year will be my first ever Thanksgiving living in the United States.

With that said, I have spent Thanksgiving in the US before but that was when I was only visiting and didn't know many people here. Now that I live here, have gotten to know many Americans, and have experienced the build-up to Thanksgiving, I thought I'd share what it's like.

Disclaimer: Obviously, I'm not American and I am only writing about things I have heard from others as well as my own personal experience. Also, I understand that Thanksgiving has a dark history and that many people wish to not celebrate it.

Long story short, Thanksgiving in the United States feels like Christmas in the United Kingdom..without presents. The overall vibe of the day has a magical, family feel to it...at least in my opinion.

When I woke up in the morning during Thanksgiving 2017, the first things I could hear were families playing (American) football outside and my own family downstairs rustling around; similar sounds to Christmas morning with my family back home in the UK.

It's a time of year when many people travel to other states to visit their families and have a big family dinner together! Although I'm not sure what will happen this year, it's likely Covid cases will go up if people decide to travel to other states.

TURKEY DINNER

You might assume that everyone in the US has turkey for Thanksgiving dinner, this is not always true. Although Turkey is the traditional food to eat during Thanksgiving, it's not what everyone eats. The United States is made up of people from all kinds of cultures and ethnicities and so, a lot of them incorporate their traditional foods into Thanksgiving. For example, an American family whose origins are from Mexico might have a Mexican meal during Thanksgiving, a family with origins from the middle east might have middle eastern food. I really love this about America, how many people have roots from other countries but incorporate their identities into one; American.

When I stayed for Thanksgiving in 2017, my Husband's family (who are of Asian ethnicity) had a Chinese Hotpot. Basically speaking, you can eat whatever you like during Thanksgiving but the feast is always HUGE!

Pumpkin pie is also sold in stores during this time of year and it is DELICIOUS! If you ever get to try it, put whipped cream on top!

SCHOOLS

As Thanksgiving is a well-celebrated national holiday for many Americans, you get the day off! Which means school is out! Some schools give their students the entire Thanksgiving week off. For the school I work in, we get Thursday and Friday off next week. Although I can't speak for all schools, I know that many schools incorporate the holiday into their curriculums. I work in a private early childhood development school (with a curriculum) and all of this month my Preschoolers have been learning about cultural celebrations and how to show gratitude to others. We even created a Thanksgiving display board; the feathers on the Turkey all have messages from the Preschoolers about what they are thankful for.

Most of them just say they are thankful for their Mommy's and Daddy's...

Finnigan however, had other ideas...

"I'm thankful for my Mommy, my Daddy, and my orange chicken"

FOOTBALL

According to my colleague, a great many people watch (American) Football during Thanksgiving. There must be some Thanksgiving game on tv but I wouldn't know because my in-laws are not Football fans.

However, from what I've witnessed (American) Football is huge, as you would imagine.

There is a field outside our house where a lot of Highschool Football teams practice. It's somewhat surreal to see them in their Football gear and helmets as I've only ever seen this in movies.

We even have 'Jersey day' at the school where I work, all my preschoolers come to school in their Football jerseys. Or sometimes you will notice all the kids come into school wearing their Football jerseys when their team is playing. I have yet to buy a Bronco's shirt (Colorado's Football team) but they are sold EVERYWHERE which makes me want one, maybe one day I will feel some sense of Colorado pride. I might try to watch the football game on Thanksgiving however, I do find American football to be very very very very boring. No offense...but they seem to blow the whistle after a few seconds and it drives me crazy. It's very 'stop and start'.

Fun fact: South Park is a real place in Colorado (it's a small mountain town, nothing is there), and the above South Park GIF is portraying the actual Colorado Football team.

PARADE

One thing that is really exciting to watch on tv during Thanksgiving, is the Thanksgiving day parade in New York City. My favourite Christmas movie is 'Miracle of 34th Street (1994)' and anyone who has seen this movie knows that the beginning of the story is set on Thanksgiving; when Susan first sees Santa in the parade. I never understood as a child what Thanksgiving was so, I assumed this was all how Christmas was celebrated in the US. However, it is very cool for me to see the real Thanksgiving parade.

DECORATIONS Holidays in general in the US are huge! Stores sell lots of decorations for all holidays and it's much more extravagant than in the UK. A lot of people decorate the outside of their porch, even during Thanksgiving. In general, during Autumn (Fall) you will see pumpkins (even after Halloween) and wreaths with Autumn leaves/designs hanging on people's doors. I think it's lovely and really adds to the Autumn aesthetic. I will definitely be decorating my porch during Autumn when we move into our new home!

BLACK FRIDAY In the last 5 years or so, the UK has started to celebrate Black Friday. Many people don't know where or how it originated so if you didn't know already, Black Friday is the American equivalent of the Boxing Day sales...but bigger. Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving and people apparently go crazy. My In-laws even go as far as to say that it can be dangerous but personally, I hate going into stores to shop, the better deals are always online anyway. However, as my husband and I will be moving into our new home soon, it's the perfect time to shop for things we may need! We have gotten some pretty good deals so far!

So, there you have it...Thanksgiving in the United States.

This is part 1 of my Thanksgiving blog.

My next post will be more personal and about what my family did this Thanksgiving, with pictures of food and family fun!

Until then...

Happy Thanksgiving!

- Kerry