With November well underway, we are sharing lots of simple, yet striking Thanksgiving crafts to help you create a celebration to remember. Our DIY Thankful Tree is a great project to prepare before the big day and will give your friends and family something lovely to do once the feast has been devoured! A Thankful Tree is a beautiful way to celebrate Fall and to teach your children the art of being thankful (it’s a great reminder to ourselves as well!). Our Thankful Tree template includes various pretty leaf patterns and a printable sign for the center of your tree which reads “I am thankful for…”. Print the leaf templates onto various papers in shades of gold, purple, orange and pink. If you have a cutting machine, simply click on the SVG file below. If you are cutting by hand then print the PDF onto your chosen papers and trim the leaves to size. Print the center sign onto regular printer paper and glue it to the paper.
We drew our bare tree onto a roll of kraft gift wrap that we then hung with putty. After placing the “I am thankful for..” sign in the center you can then set a pot of metallic ink pens and a tray filled with your colored leaves to one side. Invite your family and friends to take turns and write the things that they are thankful for on the leaves. Attach them to the tree using putty then stand back and admire what you have all created together – beautiful! For more Thanksgiving DIY inspiration, printables and patterns take a peek over here. Enjoy! ~ Lia
Tools
- Cutting Machine (recommended)
- Craft Scissors
- Adhesive Dot Roller
Materials
- Lia Griffith Frosted Craft Paper – Berry Pack
- Lia Griffith’s Favorite Frosted Gold Paper Pack
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12 Comments
Hi Lia – First of all thank you so much! I am a huge fan of all your crafts. I am trying to put together a Thanksgiving craft for my daughter’s class – and I was thinking combining this with maybe a potted tree version so the kids can take the tree home . What do you think? Would you change any of the leaf material? Thanks again!
This is a fun idea for all ages, and there are so many variations. I love the potted tree idea. If you are having the kids write on the leaves, I would just suggest it is easy for them to write on with their pencils or crayons. 🙂
I’ve downloaded and printed some of the felt studies Christmas ornaments and not all of the pattern pieces print out. For example; the little deer ornament’s bow is not included or visible? The little bear’s scarf was missing. So I just drew what I needed and then drew anything else I saw and liked. I was hoping a monthly subscription would save me time. Disappointed.
Hi Rebecca, sorry for the trouble! It sounds like an issue with your printer, not our pattern.
It would be so cute with the kids using their handprints along with the leaves! Such a great idea.
I want to use for this spring at our church! Thank you
Oh yes, adorable idea!
Love the idea & using at Thanksgiving for a special memorable touch. How can I make the template larger so that my leaves are larger? I printed on cardstock so I can cut them out but should I should use colored paper so I cut out a step. Sorry for novice question & I’ll figure it out if I think about it but 🙂
Thanks, laraine
this idea was in our local paper yesterday
Hi! The easiest way would be to enlarge the print in your print dialog box 🙂
Lia, we used this with the kids at church. They really enjoyed using metallic sharpies to write with, something I would not have thought of. Thanks for such a wonderful idea!
Thank you so much, that warms my heart to hear!
I have tried to download several projects and have not been able to. I joined in early October. Thanks tt
We were previously experiencing some technical difficulties as we were switching hosting sites, but we just got the word that everything should be running smoothly again! Please let me know if you have trouble with anything else 🙂 Happy crafting!