St. Patty's Day 2012

That mischievous leprechaun struck our home again.  He almost didn't make it, thinking to just call it quits for the day and go to bed.  However, when he heard Mr. One saying he didn't think leprechauns were real, he knew he had to prove him wrong.

What did he do this time? 

He managed to sneak almost all of the green toys out of the boys' buckets and made a trail to the front room, where it appears he stayed a while and played. 

 

 

Then, I guess he must have felt a little guilty about the mess, so he left a little peace offering gift:  a bag of gold and green candy.

Mr. One was so excited about the evidence of our leprechaun's visit.  Maybe he's a believer again.  The second thing he did (after spying the mess and waking his parents up way too early) was to run and open the fridge.  I was so confused by this until he said, "Well, I guess that leprechaun forgot to turn our milk green this time!"  (The things kids remember!)

After everyone was up for the day, the boys were pretty cooperative and cleaned up the giant mess without too much complaining while I made green pancakes.  We made Dad's famous Cody pancakes, of course.  I also put out various toppings for our breakfast:  lemon curd, strawberries, peppermint whipped cream (plain may have been better, but I had this in the fridge already), butter, maple syrup and peanut butter.  The boys loved topping their pancakes with different combinations of toppings (some better than others...).  Yum!

We spent the rest of the day listening to U2, running errands, building with Legos, cooking, cleaning, playing on the Wii, playing with some of the St. Patrick's Day games I have made (more on that later) and had a great Irish dinner with extended family that night.  I'm not a fan of the corned beef and cabbage, but the red potatoes, Red Lobster biscuits and pistachio pudding salad (you know the one with cool whip, pineapple, mini marshmallows and dry pistachio pudding mix) were fantastic.  I could have eaten all the pistachio pudding stuff myself...  Then we had angel food cake with lemon curd, strawberries, chocolate sauce and whipped cream for dessert, with a little green cinnamon crumb cake on the side.

At the end of the evening, my family surprised me with a little informal baby shower, with gifts for soon-to-be Mr. Four, me, Mike and the boys.  It's nice to have some new things for this little guy (after three boys, much of my baby stuff was pretty worn out).  It was so very sweet of them to do, and we really appreciated it.  I can't wait to see this new little guy and kiss his tiny face!

I'm more than lucky to have such a wonderful family (both close by and far away), I'm blessed.

It was fun to spend time together and pretend to be Irish for a day.  I can only imagine what that leprechaun will think of next year...