St. Patrick's Day 2013

I find reaffirmation in the strangest places lately. When Isaac was little we always did a leprechaun trap. I think the first one was for school, but I know a few were for fun. The last year or two we didn't do a trap and I didn't make the kids shirts and it occurred to me that Isaac might have grown out of a few traditions. It didn't worry me too much, but this year when I realized Roo was old enough to begin the Leprechaun trap tradition I was THRILLED!

I got a bunch of fun books on clearance recently and one that we've thoroughly enjoyed (and I highly recommend) is The Night Before St. Patrick's Day. After we'd read that one a few times Miss Roo understood the motivation to catch a leprechaun.

We started with a cardboard box. I let her paint it first, she chose green and purple paint. She wrote "messages" too (Welcome Leprechauns, Gold Inside). Mommy wrote "Not a Trap." (notice Isaac completely uninterested in the background).

While the paint dried I worked on shirts for the kids. Here's the first set I made:St. Patrick's Day shirts. The next year I made shirts for my kids they looked like: this. I took some time off from shirt making after that because they hadn't grown out of them by the following year. This year I touched up the crackled writing on Miss Roo's "Mommy's Little Leprechaun" shirt. She was thrilled! I broke out the puffy paint and made Isaac one at the last minute too. His says "Let the Shenanigans Begin!" They weren't my past paintshoped, printer transferred creations, but everyone was happy.

Once the trap was dry Mike gave Riley a gold dollar for bait. They built a ladder out of Construx (she just inherited these from her brother and she loves them) so the Leprechaun could get in, but not back out.

As you can see she was beaming with pride when her trap was done. In the morning the gold was missing, but there was no Leprechaun in the trap. It looked like he pushed the little car Riley had built out of Construx the night before over and used it to stand on so he could throw the ladder into the box before he went after the gold. Tricky, tricky! She was so bummed, but by naptime she was convinced she'd get one next year.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

Paper Shamrock Banner

Crafty time? Heck Yeah! This crazy timing with Easter right on St. Patrick's Day's heels has been inspiring me to make decor. I decided I wanted to do a simple banner for the infamous archway. Here's my Pinterest inspiration: Click.

Materials

• Green Cardstock
• Cutting Board/Scisors
• Stapler
• Gluestick
• Crop-a-dile/Hole Punch
• Green Yarn/Ribbon
• A little o'ye Irish Spirit

I chose a kelly green and an olive green card stock to make alternating colors of shamrocks. I highly recommend using double sided paper like I did to avoid all the white showing in the Pinterest example. I cut my strips approximately 1.5in wide. You need 4 strips for each Shamrock.

Now you fold your strips into heart shapes. Fold the paper in half (paper will form a V shape when un-folded). Then you fold the top ends in towards each other to form the top of the heart. The first picture was a test I did with patterned paper (you can see why double sided is best for this project). After you've folded your shape just staple once as indicated in the picture. The second pictures shows you all my finished hearts.

Now attach your hearts together in groups of four. Staples work best.

After I assembled the leaves of each shamrock I added a stem. I used patterned paper or green paper that I used a paper edging scissors on. I just folded the paper in half, put glue on both sides, and then slid it into place and squeezed the hearts together.

Next punch a hole in the "V" at the top of the heart, the wall the hearts share and the the "V" of the second heart. This hole configuration helps the shamrocks keep their shape. String them with whatever yarn or ribbon you choose. I liked my simple.