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My mom saved many of our papers from our school years. After mom died and I was going through things, I remember finding a mimeograph coloring page of cute little Indians and Pilgrims celebrating Thanksgiving that I had colored in first grade. I swear you could still smell the duplicating fluid used in those machines that made copies back in those days.

In school all those years ago, we learned that the first Thanksgiving celebration was held in 1621 in Plymouth with the Pilgrims and Indians as a special harvest feast because the Indians (the Wampanoag people) had helped the Pilgrims to survive in a new land. In those lower grade levels, we didn’t learn about the complicated history and often violent conflicts between the Native Americans and the colonists.

We made turkeys out of handprints (which I still like to do with my grandkids) and made headbands that had construction paper feathers or a black rectangle with a buckle glued to them to wear as we reenacted the first Thanksgiving in our classroom.

I don’t know if schools today allow such activities to teach about holidays. I think it’s a little sad that maybe they don’t. I remember volunteering in my children’s classrooms and helping with these activities and parties. If you’ve never made and ate turkey kabobs with a room full of kindergarten students for a Thanksgiving classroom feast, you haven’t truly dined. Nothing says Thanksgiving like chunked turkey, cheese cubes, cranberries and marshmallows on a stick!

I’ve read that George Washington declared Thanksgiving observances, as did other American presidents, to remind the nation to be thankful and to draw the people together. Abraham Lincoln issued the first national proclamation of Thanksgiving in the United States in 1863 in a time of great division and war declaring the last Thursday of November as a day of national gratitude unto God. Because even in all the atrocities of that time, there were still blessings to be thankful for.

Today, Thanksgiving is marked with religious and secular observances.

It’s one day for reflection and gratitude, a time for community, family, charitable acts and traditions.

It’s also one day for parade watching (who doesn’t love a giant Snoopy ballon bouncing off high rise buildings and marching bands), football games and consuming almost 4,000 calories in one meal and that’s probably if you don’t eat dessert.

If I could make a declaration, it would be required watching of the 1973 “A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving� every year. There are quite a few lessons, memorable quotes and dialogue that remind us how important one day and the things and people in our lives truly are.

Because if we aren’t careful, that one day can seem like the day we have to hurry through and move on to what comes next…the hustle and bustle of the Christmas season. And of that, I’m guilty. Why do we forget that living in the moment is so precious?

I was listening to someone on the radio and they asked, “Are you a thanks giver or a thanks taker?� The question made me pause.

A “thanks giver� is usually focused on others and contributes generously to life experiences without expectations of immediate returns and expresses gratitude for the simplest of things. A “thanks taker� might be described as one who is generally self-focused and receives as much as possible with minimal contribution to life experiences, and maybe occasionally they remember to offer up thanks.

If I had to raise my hand to which of these terms I am, I’d have to raise my hand for each of them because I’ve been both. And not to preach, but Proverbs 11:24-25 has a lot to say about both. I really want to always be a “thanks giver.�

So, my thought for you is this…ONE day doesn’t seem to be enough to have an attitude of gratitude. If you’ve read this story this far, I hope and pray you have a blessed and grateful day this Thursday, Nov. 27 and each day before and after.

I’ll also leave you with some questions to wrestle with.

• What if Thanksgiving wasn’t just one day in your life that you went through the motions because it’s a national holiday on your calendar?

• What if you woke up one morning and the only things you had in your life were the things you were grateful for the night before?

• Can you be thankful in the difficult times of life as well as the happy and joyful times?

• What if “thanks giving� was your way of life each and every day?