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Learn » Design Ideas & Inspirations » 34 DIY Thanksgiving Decor Ideas to Make the Most of This Holiday Season

The yummy turkey season is here. The tempting aroma of the delicious feast you cook at home, preparations to host your people, grocery shopping, sending your A-team to get gifts and decor items, balancing food prep and decor and cleaning — a lot of work for you to make your place look like an uncomparable fine dining spot.

You’re ready to go the extra mile, but time constraints and the work involved are weighing you down. We understand how you feel, and that’s why this year, we bring you simple decor tips for Thanksgiving that can take a major worry off your mind, while effectively knitting your family together on this warm and lovely occasion.

Decide what style you want to adopt this year

While it’s still the fall season, there’s a stark difference between the early fall and late fall temperature, ambiance, and mood. Thanksgiving falls in the late half of the season, and it needs a cozy and inviting tone for your guests to relax, enjoy delightful company, good food, and laughter, and spend quality time basking in the warmth of love.

Before you finalize Thanksgiving decorating ideas, you will need to decide which approach you’re going to take.

With the group you’re inviting this year, choose whether you want to:

Simply create a good look
Create memories, or
Make the space purely functional

Once you decide which approach you want to take, next narrow down on the intention you want to set:

Do you want to complement the predominant color in your home or make the decor stand out?
How will your guests enter, and move across your home to get to the feast and relax after? Which areas of the home will they have access to?
Do you want to up the place’s energy levels and have a vibrant Thanksgiving party?
Do you want to mellow down, help people relax, and have a calm, cozy Thanksgiving?

When you make these two important choices, you can shortlist your decor and celebration ideas easily. Here are 34 tips to personalize your decor, and inject your personality into your home all while making your guests feel special.

34 DIY Thanksgiving Decoration Ideas & Tips

1. Fresh flowers do the trick

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Fresh-flowers Image credits: AI-generated image

The fall is a beautiful season for so many reasons and one of the first things has to be the bountiful flowers it brings. What better way to thank nature for its bounties than by ingesting the refreshing aesthetics and fragrance of fresh flowers?

2. Use natural elements from your yard

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Use-natural-elements-from-your-yard Image credits: AI-generated image

It’s the fall season, and you’re probably sweeping dry leaves, pine cones, and twigs from your yard every day. This week, retrieve some from your pile and bring them home. You can use them afresh or paint them and crank up your decor instantly.

3. Place settings with a loving note about the guest

Image credits: AI-generated image

If you’re inviting new friends, old friends who have now become family, and your own close kin, you’d have to decide on table decor ideas and plan seating arrangements ahead of time. It’s always a good idea to keep place cards on the Thanksgiving table. We suggest you insert a small, loving note about the person and what you’re grateful for for them in the card. When guests reach for the card and find their note, they will love the gesture you made. The Thanksgiving meal can turn out to be a heartwarming memory-sharing event as well.

4. Bring in deep, rich hues

Thanksgiving-Decoration-rich-hues Image credits: AI-generated image

Your guests can really savor the beauty of Thanksgiving when they can ingest the theme through all 5 senses. Sight being the primary sense, your choice of color is paramount. Go for rich, deep Thanksgiving colors like burgundy, and country greens resembling greenery with a mellow undertone, broody moody colors, mustard yellow, burnt orange, brown, aubergine, magenta, or paprika. If you want a feisty atmosphere, you can also go in for brighter colors – bright creams, oatmeal colors accented with mood tones and brass colors. These colors when paired with low lighting and a warm ambiance can make your guests not want to leave your place.

5. Play around with textures

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Play-around-with-textures Image credits: AI-generated image

Elevate the sense of touch by bringing in thoughtful, cozy textures. Wood is a brilliant choice, as works well for any color palette you choose, and also adds that natural touch to your place. Add twigs, sprigs, acorns, feathers, antlers, and other pieces that resemble fall. Spread a burlap table runner on the dining table. Satin also works great for Thanksgiving and late fall holiday decorations.

6. Mellow lighting works best to set a warm ambiance

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Mellow-lighting Image credits: AI-generated image

Place candles near the holiday table for a glorious Thanksgiving dinner. You can also light small, scented candles in the living room, and anywhere your guests are likely to spend time together. If you don’t want the mess of wax leaking from candles, or the risk of fire, you can use tall candlesticks on the dining tables and other areas, or buy flameless candles that stay still till you put them out.

7. Make your place smell lovely

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Make-your-place-smell-lovely Image credits: AI-generated image

With all the delicious cooking that’s going on during Thanksgiving, your place will have a great aroma in it. Add more flavor to the fragrance by placing apples, pears, cinnamon, and nutmeg in different forms and shapes.

8. A captivating rug

Image credits: AI-generated image

Think about the emotions you want to evoke in your guests during the Thanksgiving celebration. Pick a rug that evokes those very emotions in you. Go for area rugs with deep colors and place them in the kitchen, bathroom, entryway, and most importantly the dining room. If you have zones in your open-concept living room, get a unique rug for each zone.

9. Get a fun, whimsical welcome mat

Thanksgiving-Decoration-whimsical-welcome-mat Image credits: AI-generated image

One of the things we tend to forget while going full-on on interior decorations is the welcome mat. Get a fun mat that makes your guests smile even before they enter your place.

10. Introduce fluffy pillows

Thanksgiving-Decoration-fluffy-pillows Image credits: AI-generated image

Buy pillows of crochet, fur, or wool to elevate the coziness of the occasion. Place them on the loveseat, sofa, chairs, or bed – anywhere people lean in for comfort. If your porch has a daybed, make sure to disinfect the mattress, and get new warm pillows.

11. Don’t forget the front door/entry gate

Thanksgiving-Decoration-front-door Image credits: AI-generated image

Decorating the gate shows you are serious about your Thanksgiving decor and want your guests to bask in the festivity the moment after their arrival. Hang ribbons, garlands, or Thanksgiving wreaths at the front gate.

12. Pumpkins and cornucopia

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Pumpkins Image credits: AI-generated image

This is indeed the pumpkin season, so, why not include the highlight of seasonal decor? Carve smiley faces on pumpkins and add them generously to your Thanksgiving interior design – near the scarecrow (yes, we’ll come to it in a minute), in your entrance, on the compound walls, in your living room, kitchen – anywhere you deem fit.

13. Turkey-themed items

Image credits: AI-generated image

Turkey is the star of Thanksgiving dinners. Certainly an obvious choice, but turkey-themed items sure look wonderful as part of the occasion’s decor. Get a turkey-colored pillow, placeholder, kitchen counter, and a few turkey-shaped china. If you have a repeating turkey pattern around the house, pumpkins, gourds, and dried corn also make for good placeholders.

14. Multi-purpose garlands

Image credits: AI-generated image

If you swear by faux garlands, you’re going to love this. Buy 5-15 sets of the same colored garlands, preferably with aspen leaves, pinecones, or acorn garlands that you can use everywhere in your home. You can do the same with real garlands as well, but it’s going to cost you every year. You can spread the garland out on the dining table, stuff another on a flower vase, and place it in the bathroom. Hang a few on your entry door, to the backs of chairs, etc. So many places to have colorful and sweet-smelling garlands. You can also add beautiful white lights to the garlands to add a touch of charm to them.

15. Wreaths with a difference

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Wreaths Image credits: AI-generated image

They are an aesthetic item to add to your interior design and can be scaled up or down depending on the look you’re aiming for. You can add feathers, and cashmere birds in the wreaths to give a mystical look to them. Get custom wreaths made of grapevine, or think oak limbs or sunflowers, decorated with wooden beads, or miniature pumpkins.

16. Noteworthy napkins

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Noteworthy-napkins Image credits: AI-generated image

Cloth napkins on the dining table setting with apt napkin rings around them exude style and elegance. Your one-time investment in bright tableware will come in handy all year round. So swap your paper napkins for cloth napkins with beautiful napkin rings. They come in different styles and materials – spring three coil, irregular round, Q-shaped, and made of alloys, stainless steel, iron, and grid copper.

17. Plates with a personality

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Plates-with-a-personality Image credits: AI-generated image

Take time to bring down your fancy china from the attic, and pick out plates with beautiful Thanksgiving patterns, color schemes, and designs on them. Cranberry-colored square plates are a delight to see and feast on. If you have sufficient time on your hands, you can pick out colors that match your wall color.

18. Highlight your fireplace

Revamp-the-fireplace Image credits: AI-generated image

Decorate your fireplace mantle with garlands, wreaths, and pictures of loved ones. The fireplace is a great conversation spot, so, take your time to make it extra special.

19. Reignite that fire pit

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Reignite-that-fire-pit Image credits: AI-generated image

If you want to enjoy Thanksgiving by being one with nature, take the family outside to your yard, reignite your fire pit, and cook alongside them. Always be mindful of the open space around you, and keep the fire extinguisher ready, just in case.

20. Add some fun in the powder room

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Add-some-fun-in-the-powder-room Image credits: AI-generated image

When you spend time, money, and effort on making the entire house look amazing, don’t leave out small areas that go unnoticed. There’s a chance your guests may enter these spaces and feel like you haven’t put a lot of thought into them. Discard old items in the powder room and restock soaps, hand towels, and flowers. You can also place an old vase with a garland in it.

21. Make the porch look special

Thanksgiving-Decoration-Make-the-porch-look-special Image credits: AI-generated image

The porch is where your guests wait until the meal is done, the kids play, or people relax after the meal, before sundown. Dot the front porch with hay bales, scarecrows, and pumpkins. Pull up that unused bench in your yard, place it on the porch, add a few fresh pillows, and spread a nice, warm blanket on it.

22. Bring out the handmade DIY Thanksgiving crafts your family made over the years

Image credits: AI-generated image

If your family and kids have given you handmade toys or gifts over the years, now’s the best time to thank them for giving you heartwarming gifts and show off. Insert these artifacts on mirror charges, and add fairy lights to them. Nothing like watching them swoon over your love for their gifts and reminisce about beautiful times together on a warm Thanksgiving evening.

23. Thank-you notes on strings

Thanksgiving Decoration - Thank-you notes Image credits: AI-generated image

Get simple strings, write heartfelt thank you notes, or famous quotes on gratitude, and tie them to the garlands you’ve placed all over the house. Each time your guests pass by them, they will be tempted to read those cute little messages.

24. Matching wall with your home’s interior design

Thanksgiving Decoration - Matching wall Image credits: AI-generated image

Matching your decor color and design with the wall color is essential. To choose the color of china, towels, spread, dinnerware, and other dining items, start with the wall color. In the earlier section on choosing colors, if you have chosen a vibrant theme and you want to go with a feisty look, pick out items that go with the same predominant color in your home. If not, pick the color that’s the polar opposite of your predominant color on the color wheel.

For example, if you have a red dining room and you want a high-energy atmosphere, you can go for a deep red spread, red plates, and patterns with bright red spots on them. If you want a mellow look, go for deep green, saturated, darker jewel tones with a deep green or navy blue tablecloth and use red as accent pieces.

If you have an all-white, minimalist tablescape, you can stick to the same color by having white lights, a white tablecloth, and a few accents of black or brown. Similarly, if you want a contrast, for the same white Thanksgiving tablescape, you can have a black velvet tablecloth, black dishes, and matt gold decor with a few white flowers as accent pieces.

25. Photo wall with fall leaves

Thanksgiving Decoration - fall leaves Image credits: AI-generated image

Create a photo wall by making a beautiful collage with pictures of your friends and family attending the Thanksgiving feast that day. Pick up fall leaves and pinecones from your yard, wash them well, and spray paint them in rich autumnal colors to exude a rustic farmhouse look. You can then stick these silk fall leaves behind the photo frames. If there are extras lying around, you can certainly attach them to tabletops, and behind guest towel stands as well.

26. Layer up fabrics on windows and tables

Thanksgiving Decoration - fabrics on windows Image credits: AI-generated image

Take out textiles from your linen closet, and layer up fabrics on windows and table settings. Conceal light as much as possible, so that as the sun comes down and the candle lights glow, the home turns cozy, inviting, and heartwarming as ever.

27. Create mini-conversation spots

Thanksgiving Decoration - mini-conversation spots Image credits: AI-generated image

Bring furniture lying around the house to create conversation spots for your guests to get to know each other or have heart-to-heart conversations. Use the sofa on a diagonal, make use of the loveseat on the dining table, and put together two standalone sofas, with a small coffee table in between with a rich area rug underneath. Stack pillows on the sofas for the guests to grab a drink, find a nook, and a comfortable seat, and talk to each other.

28. Snack/breakfast table in the corners

Thanksgiving Decoration - Snack-breakfast table in the corners Image credits: AI-generated image

Grab a few baskets made of bamboo or any natural material, and stack them with apples and fruits. You can set up a small bistro table and leave the fruit basket on it, or leave them on the corner of the dining room on the top of the sideboard.

29. Tie fall ribbons to furniture

Thanksgiving Decoration - fall ribbons Image credits: AI-generated image

Tie fall ribbons to the back of dining chairs, added with pillows, and guest towels. This way, you make each person’s seating area special, which gives off a positive vibe and shows them you take them seriously.

30. Leave post-it notes with sweet messages on the bathroom mirror

Thanksgiving-Decoration-post-it-notes Image credits: AI-generated image

Short, sweet, and positive messages on the bathroom mirrors bring a smile to anyone using it. Even when everyone’s busy talking to each other or resting after the feast, anyone who happens to pass by the mirror will witness a warm interaction when they read the sweet notes you left in the bathroom mirror.

31. Bouquet of fresh veggies for the Thanksgiving centerpiece

Thanksgiving Decoration - Bouquet of fresh veggies Image credits: AI-generated image

If table centerpiece choices are turning out to be headscratchers, we have a solution for you – make a bouquet of fresh vegetables. Get a bunch of fresh nuts, and vegetables delivered to you fresh in the morning and stack them in the centerpiece on brass or silver bowls.

32. Make a DIY fodder shock

Image credits: AI-generated image

Collect a number of dried corn stalks, and tie them to the mid-section to make a tepee-shaped bunching and make your fodder shock. This can be a good project for those not involved in cooking to take up and have fun.

33. Make a scarecrow with your family

Thanksgiving Decoration - Make a scarecrow Image credits: AI-generated image

This is an absolute delight for you to make on your own before the occasion or to make one with family. Make a cross with two sticks, join them firmly, and dress the sticks. Add socks and a hat, and use an old pillowcase for the head. Fill the structure with papers or rags, draw on the face bind everything together to make a scarecrow, and leave it on the porch next to the hay bale.

34. Iconic heirloom pieces for conversation starters

Thanksgiving-Decoration-heirloom-pieces Image credits: AI-generated image

If you have an iconic heirloom piece, say a piano, an artifact, or a rare piece of clothing, keep it on display. It can be a great decor item and a conversation starter.

Choose which decor tips work best for your home by visualizing them on Foyr Neo

If you’re pretty serious about decorating your home with the best materials and only with those that resonate with your personality, you need top-notch visualization and design software that can show you how your preferences come together, and different possible combinations for you to make the right decision.

Here’s all you need to do:

Sign up for Foyr’s 14-day trial using your Google account. No credit card information is needed.
Open a new project, and select a basic floor plan.
Enter design mode, and pull up the material library. You will see 10,000+ design tips, which you can choose from.
Choose from 50,000+ 3D items, place, recolor, retexturize, or resize them to your heart’s content.
Finalize the ones you want, view your design from different angles, with different light settings, and decide if it’s right, or you can go back and change the ones that don’t really fit in.
Visualize the entire house in 3D, and if you want a cohesive view, create a walkthrough video and watch your home come to life.

That’s all it takes for you to visualize your Thanksgiving decor and make a shopping list for the ones you need. Sign up for the Foyr Neo 14-day trial today!

FAQs

What are some alternative decor ideas beyond traditional Thanksgiving motifs?

Consider incorporating cultural elements or themes from different regions to add diversity. For instance, using textiles or patterns inspired by Native American or international traditions can bring a unique touch.

Any tips for preserving the Thanksgiving decor throughout the holiday season?

Opt for dried or artificial elements that last longer, such as faux foliage or dried flowers. Store delicate items properly, and consider repurposing certain decor elements for other seasonal celebrations, like transitioning pumpkins into winter displays.

How can I transition the Thanksgiving decorations seamlessly into the winter holiday season?

Introduce subtle winter elements like evergreen accents, metallic touches, or versatile décor items that can complement both Thanksgiving and Christmas themes.

What considerations should I keep in mind for kid-friendly Thanksgiving decorations?

Opt for unbreakable décor items, incorporate playful elements like DIY paper crafts or themed table settings, and consider interactive activities like pumpkin decorating.

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