Thanksgiving is an annual one-day holiday to give thanks, traditionally to God, for the things one has at the end of the harvest season. In the United States, Thanksgiving is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November. Certain kinds of food are traditionally served at Thanksgiving meals. First and foremost, turkey is usually the featured item on any Thanksgiving feast table (so much so that Thanksgiving is sometimes referred to as "Turkey Day"). Stuffing, mashed potatoes with gravy, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, Indian corn, other fall vegetables, and pumpkin pie are commonly associated with Thanksgiving dinner. All of these primary dishes are actually native to the Americas or were introduced as a new food source to the Europeans when they arrived.
In New York City, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is held annually every Thanksgiving Day on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Families and friends usually gather for a large meal or dinner, the result being that the Thanksgiving holiday weekend is one of the busiest travel periods of the year. Known as "Black Friday", the day after Thanksgiving, is one of the largest shopping days in the U.S. Although most stores actually start to stock for and promote the December holidays immediately after Halloween, and sometimes even before. American football is often a major part of Thanksgiving celebrations in the U.S. with the National Football League playing a series of Thanksgiving Day games since its founding.