Simple St. Patrick's Day Ideas

2 Days and my world goes GREEN. The excitement is growing in our house as we begin the building of our very own Leprechaun trap. (thanks to the ideas I found in the Family Fun magazine).

What about in your house? Has St.Patrick's day gone from your childhood memory of making sure you wore green to the latest trend of creating full blown celebrations for your own children?

Realizing this trend is only growing with each year, I went searching for a few SIMPLE ideas to help us moms to create St. Patrick's day fun. I asked our Facebook moms, Twitter moms and even searched some of my favorite blogs to put together a list of ideas to help us GO GREEN this St.Patrick's day.


Idea #1 - Going Green Popcorn

Make a yummy green treat - I found this St. Patrick's day treat over at Bright Ideas

• Prep Time: 20 min.
• Cook Time: 20 min.
• Difficulty: Challenging
• Yield: Makes 12 3-inch balls.

• 1 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup light corn syrup
• 1/3 cup unsalted butter, plus extra for coating bowl and hands
• 1 tablespoon water
• Pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon green food coloring, optional
• 9 cups prepared popcorn
• 2 cups green M&M’S® Brand Milk Chocolate or Peanut Chocolate Candies
• 1 cup mini marshmallows
• Candy thermometer
• 2 quarts heavy bottom pot
• Wooden spoon or spatula
• Large pot
• Waxed or parchment paper
• Cookie sheet
• Cellophane (optional)

• 1. In a saucepan over medium heat, combine sugar, corn syrup, butter, water and salt. Stir constantly until mixture comes to a boil. Continue cooking without stirring for another 10 minutes, or until the syrup reaches the hard-crack stage—300ºF on a candy thermometer. Immediately remove from heat, add vanilla extract and food coloring and mix well.
• 2. In a large greased pot, combine popped popcorn with syrup, stirring constantly with a spatula or wooden spoon until completely coated. Stir in M&M’S® Brand Chocolate Candies and marshmallows. Once mixture is cool enough to handle, coat hands with butter and form 3-inch balls. Place on tray lined with either wax or parchment paper until ready to serve, or, wrap in cellophane.

Idea #2 I'm Lucky to have you in my life because____________!


Each year I cut out Green shamrocks from construction paper then write on them - ”I am lucky to have you because….” .

Each family member is given 6 shamrocks so that they can personalize one for each member of our family ( we have 7 in our family). They write two reasons they feel lucky to have that family member in their life. During our on St Patrick’s day dinner we read them aloud. As the mom I love watching each of their faces light up as their sibling or parent reminds them of why we are lucky to have them in our lives.



Idea #3 - Treasure hunt

Several years ago I picked up small unpainted wooden boxes at my local dollar store, in which I then spray painted gold. These inexpensive boxes have become our annual tradition. We have used them in several ways

1. As table decorations/ favors- fill each box with small gifts ( candy, gift cards, trinkets etc.) then place them at each child's seat, to be opened during the St. Patrick's day meal.

2. Treasure hunt - Hide the boxes and create a fun treasure hunt.

3. The Leprechaun trick - On St. Patrick's night we fill the boxes with goodies then place them in our sleeping children's rooms, when they awake in the morning they find their boxes along with a note from the Leprechaun. The note instructs them to leave the boxes the following night filled with chocolate for the Leprechaun ( ME), or he might play a few tricks on them. Idea #4 - Leprechaun Pudding
By: Mandy from Gourmet Mom on the Go Blog

Here is a SIMPLE treat I found over at the Gourmet Mom on the Go blog.

Leprechaun Pudding

We're busy today but we needed a quick GREEN snack. I rummaged through the cupboards, and voila!, Leprechaun Pudding was born.

Ingredients:

Instant Vanilla pudding mix (or pistachio of you have it, then you don't need food coloring)
Green Food coloring
Milk
Ziploc Baggies, sandwich size
Whipped Cream (optional, for garnish)


Directions:
Place 2 heaping Tbs. of pudding mix and 1/2 c. milk in a ziploc baggie. Add a few drops of green food coloring. Let the kids squish, squash, mash, and mix for about two minutes. Spoon into cups and garnish with whipped cream (or just eat out of the bag for a really easy snack).






Idea #5 - Green Story Telling

Use St. Patrick's day as another opportunity to read to your kids, no matter how old they are. Don't we all love to hear stories?

You can find a great selection of St. Patrick's day themed books at your local library.
A few fun books :
`S is for Shamrock : An Ireland Alphabet" by Eve Bunting is a book full of possibilities. The text is long, but you can easily shorten it for young children to only be each alphabetical item such as L for leprechaun , V for vikings and Z for zed . Older children will enjoy the detailed information on each page and even the youngest babies will love the illustrations.

Reviewed by Allie from No Time for Flashcards blog.

It's St. Patrick's Day by: Rebecca Gomez and Mary Morgan.







Jack and the Leprechaun by: Ivan Robertson and Katy Bratun.






That's what Leprechauns do by: Eve Bunting and Emily Arnold McCully.





Idea #6 GO GREEN meals
We Tweeted to our Twitter followers asking for their creative Green food ideas, here are their tweets back:
@poetmom Used to make green mashed potatoes...and if you add blue food coloring to scrambled eggs, they are green

@designhergal green lemonade (actually a lime-aid) and fun!- greensicles!

@LisGarrett green beans, peas, okra, fried green tomatoes (yum!), pears, guacamole (double yum!), lettuce, cucumbers, artichokes, peppers

@ChoosingChange green eggs and ham, of course! Broccoli, spinach, green beans, edamame, gandules... I'm hungry

@BizMomMentor HOw bout Rice Krispie Sqs with a lil food color? I make Cmas 1s w/ corn flakes & red hots 2 look like wreaths, so do Gr 4 st. pat's

Come follow 24/7 MOMS and TWEET with us





Idea #7 REAL MOMS - REAL SIMPLE - REAL IDEAS

We asked our Facebook MOMS how they add fun and creativity to St. Patrick's Day:

Julie W says: : "We serve an all green meal. Kids love drinking green milk, too - thank you, food coloring! I used to make green bread for St. Pat's. We'd eat green sandwiches for lunch with green milk. Then, for dinner I'd make an all green meal, so dad could be in the green fun."

Susan Fox says: "I always make cupcakes and frost them with vanilla frosting. Then, I slice green gum drops and arrange them on top in the shape of shamrocks

Amy Unger Stern says: We do a treasure hunt, and the treasure is Lucky Charms cereal! Since we try not to eat much sugar cereal, they look forward to it all year."

Join the Facebook MOMVERSATION - click below to join the official 24/7 MOMS Facebook group.

Don't forget to WEAR green, have a Happy St. Patrick's day.