A Table Setting for Thanksgiving #tablescapes

Last updated on March 4th, 2024 at 08:40 pm

Tablescapes, what? Yes, I thought the very same thing until I came a crossed it on Pinterest looking for table setting inspiration for this year’s Thanksgiving feast. I absolutely love the word now. For the first time ever I have enjoyed going to the craft store and scoping out some ideas for this years table setting. I really want it to be a special holiday for us as a family, so I am going all out. 

Thanksgiving In The UK

For those that don’t know, it’s Thanksgiving tomorrow. The USA holiday is celebrated with family and friends gathering to feast and give thanks (no presents sorry folks). It’s a great time of the year to reflect on what you have been grateful for and really focus on your family and loved ones closed to you. 

I will fully admit I get a little emotional around Thanksgiving more than any other holidays because I am living abroad where it is not recognized while my entire family and country celebrate the festivities leading up to it, all month long. It’s hard to get excited and really feel the love of family when you are so far from them. 

So this year I REFUSE to get emotional in that sad-I-am-missing-out state. I am focusing on making the best Thanksgiving we have ever had with my family here in the UK. We have been reading our Thanksgiving stories all month long to the kids, see our Thanksgiving bookshelf here. I have been teaching them everything I can about giving thanks and showing the ones we cared about, their love. They are finally at that age where this is sinking in and making sense to them now. 

Not only have we been reading about Thanksgiving, I have been preparing for it all week long. This is the most known aspect of Thanksgiving all over the world that we bake and cook for a whole week in line up to the big day. So true! (I’ve got some amazing pumpkin recipes that are perfect for Thanksgiving!). With all that cooking I wanted to have a table setting that would be worthy of all my cooking and baking.

Setting The Table For Thanksgiving

Crockery

The first thing I think about when I go shopping for a table setting is what color, style, and shape are my dishes I am using. I have an everyday plain white set from ikea that does that job for ordinary days but I have a lovely deep purple Denby set I got for a wedding present for holidays. So I wanted to pair them with some Autumn colors. 

Thanksgiving Centrepiece

The next thing I look for is a Thanksgiving centerpeice. Sometimes I can find one all put together that is perfect for the occasion but other times like this I have to make it from scratch. It’s hard to find Thanksgiving items in the UK so I had to go with florals and Autumn pine cones to give it that same look. I would have absolutely loved to do something more like this one here. Painting pumpkins and gold leaves are right up my street and it looks so gorgeous put together. She did an amazing job.

Here I just turned two large, long stemmed fake flowers opposite of each other and through the bottom of the pine cone star tree that I bought at Asda in the potpourri section. Not only looks festive it makes the whole house smell delicious which is exactly what you want on Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving Table Accessories

I found these cute little salt and pepper shakers from Asda as well. They are perfect for my pine cone theme table setting. There is nothing more cozy than candles at the table to make it feel festive too. I also got a set of these from Asda all various sizes and I can’t wait to light them. (obvious away from my kids’ reach). I have purple and gold tealight holders to match my dinner plates that I purchased from Dunelm Mill along with the napkins, placemats, and napkin holders. The gold dotted glasses are more like a plastic kind of cup so they are perfect for the kids to use and still look chic. They were only two fifty each from Asda as well. I like letting the kids use the nice dinnerware on the holidays. I remember as a child never being allowed to touch the china! It’s part of the holiday dinner memories using the good dinnerware.

I just love these napkin holders and they are great to add whatever festive accessories you want to them depending on what you are celebrating. For Christmas I like to put little snowflakes in between, and you can see I used pine cones for my Thanksgiving table setting here. Easter, they always have a little mini plastic egg in between. You can use them in so many different ways.

I hope you love how I have decorated our Thanksgiving table this year. Are you inspired to start decorating your next tablescape for the holidays? Why not, pin some of these for later reference? Would love to spread the love of tablescapes!

If you liked this then check out the table settings I did for Christmas, Easter and the 4th of July too!

Most importantly… HAPPY THANKSGIVING!