St. Patrick's Day Handprint Shamrock and More

Since tomorrow is St. Patrick's Day, I know I won't have time to blog about everything we'll do between now and then, so I'll make a quick list of simple ideas for you to try with your kids! For breakfast, you can serve green scrambled eggs and shamrock-shaped toast! I have a shamrock cookie cutter but you can always just cut it yourself. Then, instead of plain cinnamon and sugar on your toast, use green sugar sprinkles (like you would put on cookies)! You can always make anything green with food coloring, too! Try banana bread, blueberry muffins, or pancakes for a lucky green breakfast!

One of my favorite treats to make for St. Patrick's Day, starting when I was in college even, is green mint-chocolate chip cookies! Make your traditional chocolate chip cookies like normal, but add green food coloring to your dough, as well as about a teaspoon of peppermint extract. Yum!

Finally, here are two fun and easy keepsake crafts you can make for St. Patrick's Day. If we do more I'll try to post them, but there's no guarantee you'll see it before it's too late!

Here's a cute handprint craft I've done with Molly (5) and Ben (2) each year - handprint shamrocks! I just use green finger paint to cover their whole hand and make three (or four, if you're feeling lucky!) handprints on the paper. I painted in the stems myself to complete the picture.

This year I also came up with the idea to just use their fingerprints to make shamrocks. Molly could make clusters of three or four on her own but I guided Ben's fingers to make his. We made just one shamrock each for a small picture to decorate a St. Patrick's Day card but it would also be neat to make a whole field of shamrocks with lots and lots of fingerprints!

**Remember! If you want to add GREEN glitter, just sprinkle it on before your paint is wet and it will stick as it dries. :O)