Everyone is Irish on March 17!

So last Monday, it was Saint Patrick's Day! 

Usually, my husband and I do not do much on this particular holiday, being that neither one of us is Irish... 

But since our beautiful son was born, most holidays are always an opportunity to have fun and celebrate! Our son is now 21 months old and old enough to partake; so I really wanted to celebrate St. Paddy's Day, this year. We sure had a very fun and very green holiday!

I was set on baking something green and I found a wonderful recipe for Green Velvet Cupcakes (HERE).
I made the frosting with Irish butter and cream cheese, using a Martha Stewart recipe (HERE).
They turned out great! at first, the green food coloring scared me a little bit because, even though we are familiar with red velvet, which has the same amount of coloring if not more, the green is quite intense and unusual. But once finished, the fear went away and we had no problem eating them, they were delicious!
I got almost two dozens out of this recipe, so I delivered a lot of them to my husband's office. His employees were delighted!

To make it really festive, I decorated our home with banners, shamrock cutouts, green lanterns, green fabric flowers and a shamrock front door wreath.

We used green paper napkins and plates and we did not forget to wear green! I think I actually got a little obsessed with the color, I even got my toes painted green!

I also downloaded a Saint Patrick's Day "Essentials" collection from iTunes. We sure listened to a lot of Irish music and we certainly danced and Irish jig!

For breakfast, I wanted to make something green, but healthy. I did not want to use any more food coloring! On the menu was, shamrock buttermilk pancakes with spinach scrambled eggs and sliced kiwi fruits. I used the Whole Foods Market 365 brand organic pancake and waffle mix and a shamrock cookie cutter, once cooked.
For the spinach scrambled eggs, I simply steamed and blended some spinach and added a little bit of the purée to the egg mixture, until it appeared green enough.
It was a real success! Hubby and baby loved it!

For lunch, we met daddy at the Cat & Fiddle, which is our favorite local English pub and restaurant, here in LA. It was lovely! I had corned beef & cabbage for the first time and thoroughly enjoyed it. I found this interesting paragraph about this dish and thought I would share it with you. 

"In the United States and Canada, consumption of corned beef is often associated with Saint Patrick's Day. Corned beef is not considered an Irish national dish, and the connection with Saint Patrick's Day specifically originates as part of Irish-American culture, and is often part of their celebrations in North America.  

Corned beef was used as a substitute for bacon by Irish-American immigrants in the late 19th century. Corned beef and cabbage is the Irish-American variant of the genuinely Irish dish of bacon and cabbage. A similar dish is the New England boiled dinner, consisting of corned beef, cabbage, and root vegetables such as carrots, turnips, and potatoes, which is popular in New England and parts of Atlantic Canada."

The Bud Light also wore the Irish color!

After the afternoon nap, baby had his Saint Paddy's Day quarter of a green cupcake. I did not want to overdo it, because of the coloring.... He liked it and then we headed out to the park, as we do everyday.

I had also purchased a cute board book for our son, which we read multiple times throughout the three-day weekend. I found "Happy St. Patrick's Day, Curious George", which was great to introduce baby to the Irish holiday. Wearing green, leprechaun, pot of gold, fiddlers, four-leaf clover, dancing, irish food, parade, it is all part of the book.
Which makes me think that we did consider going and seeing a parade, but decided not to. We though our son was a tad too young to really appreciate it and it might have been a little bit too hectic. But it will definitely be in our next year calendar, for sure!

A couple of fun toddler activities that we did were, drawing shamrocks using stencils and discovering Play-Doh for the first time -- green, of course! --
I had forgotten how amazing that stuff smells! It was so cute watching our son sniffing at it!

We had a wonderful time this Saint Patrick's Day! Having a child makes the holidays so much more special and memorable.

Next holiday is Easter and we sure are looking forward to it!

It will take place, either at our family home in Santa Barbara or in our new house -- we just bought a house and will be getting the keys on April 1st! -- and this is no joke! 

Thanks for stopping by!

Alexandra

Saint Patrick's DaySaint Patrick's Day