Thanksgiving Day is a time for celebrating abundance. The harvests have all come in. Livestock has been secured in the barns, and the surplus butchered for the fall and winter feasts. Families gather together in joy.

Consider focusing on traditional and local foods. The Three Sisters of corn, squash, and beans are the major agricultural crops commonly grown together by many farming tribes of Turtle Island/North America and thus traditionally featured in many feasts or harvest festivals. The Americas also gave rise to peppers, tomatoes, potatoes, sweet potatoes, wild rice, quinoa, sunflowers (including sunchokes), black walnuts, pecans, peanuts, American persimmon, cacao, vanilla, and maple syrup. Many classic dishes originated here, such as mashed potatoes, wild rice casserole, chili, cornbread, pumpkinpie, pecan pie, and chocolate cake. Three Sisters soup is delicious and filling. Put out birdseed or corn for All Our Relations so the animals can feast, too.

Cooking your feast as a family gives you time to bond. When you sit down to eat, give thanks for the food and the ancestral farmers who developed these crops for us to enjoy. Name other things you appreciate, whether magical or practical. Acknowledge deities of field and forest.