Pilgrim's Feast for School Lunch: A More Authentic Menu

(This is my very favorite Thanksgiving decoration that we have.  It was entitled "Harvest Angel")

As my husband and I have contemplated how we can better celebrate, appreciate our history and bring a greater spirit of thanksgiving into our home, we have found so many wonderful new traditions.

Our Thankful Tree has been a total hit.  Our kids so enjoy writing something down each night.  It has not been uncommon to hear, "I'm thankful for ____" from our children throughout the day.  What a blessing to have started it.  We'd been struggling to work on gratitude in our home and a fun, family-bonding activity has helped.  It is definitely on the tradition list!

We also borrowed a stack of Thanksgiving books from the library.  They have been wonderful to read to and the kiddos love them!

We watched A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving for a bit of fun! (Not an affiliate link)

In school, we have been working on coloring this Pilgrim, Pilgrim coloring book.  It's a free printable, and my children have enjoyed coloring it and talking about it over several days.  This could be a fun activity to keep kiddos busy while you're cooking!  We'll be gluing the pages onto construction paper for school tomorrow, as well as one other special thing.  Our Pilgrim's Feast.

About a week ago, I got to wondering what the Pilgrims REALLY ate, and decided that we needed to have a lunch at school where we try eating, as best we can, what the Pilgrims really ate.  After googling around a bit, this is what we'll be having for our Pilgrim's Feast tomorrow:

Corn (we'll be eating heated up frozen corn)
Bread (they ate sour dough bread, according to one source, we'll just go ahead and make French Bread)
Craisins (they are believed to have had cranberries available at the time in the area)
Walnuts (we'll be eating a mix of nuts that contains walnuts)
Radishes and Onions (I'll be sauteing these (seasoned) from our winter garden, which I'll let them pick)
Carrots (from the grocery)
Pumpkin Muffins (We'll talk about the way that they served pumpkin, and that the Indians taught them to grow it)

They also had a LOT of meat and fish, from what it sounds like, and the celebration lasted 3 days, not just one.  We'll be talking about this, not doing it.  I don't think I can cook that much!  Ha!  Also, I'll just be cooking a whole chicken for Thanksgiving day, so I'm not going to prepare any meat for the kids today.

I know this will be a school tradition as well.  They are VERY excited about it!  While we home school, this could be done on a weekend, or some other time, if you're interested in making it part of your traditions.

It's been fun to make sure we don't fly through Thanksgiving without much thought or gratitude.  I'm hoping that it will transfer us into a more giving than getting Christmas.

What are your Thanksgiving traditions?  Did you try anything new this year?