Ere Long Leprechaun Luncheon

Today I hosted my Ere Long Leprechaun Lunch. My husband had to work today. So I figured this would be the perfect time to have the girls over for some fun and food. This way tomorrow the husband can relax and enjoy his day off/St. Patrick's Day. Luckily a couple of my friends were free to come celebrate with me.

Guests were greeted first by the rainbow on the stoop railing. This was featured previously on my blog post.

I guess my friends enjoy playing games and having fun too at my parties. I recently had two parties where I didn't go quite as grandiose. Guess my friends noticed and as our apartment steps echo I heard their comments coming up the stairs. I have overheard, "There aren't any decorations downstairs," "I was looking to see if you hid stuff on the steps and outside," and "What no games!"Some would think my friends at our age would be bored/over/vexed by my ideas for games. Apparently not. Yay! I enjoy spending a few hours having fun and acting immature. All work and no play makes Neene a dull lady, right?

So here is a brief recap of today's fun:

Fete Avec Moi

 Food is always a focus. I provided a buffet including:

• crock pot corned beef and cabbage [beer, chicken broth, cinnamon, a sprig of thyme]
• salad [red cabbage and brussel sprouts]
• Golden potato salad [store bought potato and egg salad]
• Greened potatoes [microwaveable mashed potatoes, steamed spinach, cheddar cheese, ranch dressing, and scallions]
• "Pesto" pasta [spinach, agave nectar, olive oil, egg noodles]

Desserts:

I love creative desserts. Since the theme was Leprechauns and pots of gold I found a great lemon bar mix.

Sounded so good in theory. The crust cooked up nice and golden brown. The lemon filling didn't bleeping cook through. Not serving those.

Darn it! So I ran out this morning to Stop and Shop. They had a heart shaped cake that they decorated like a leprechaun face. That will work! Sadly, I didn't think to photograph it before we dissected him.

I had found green sweet things: green blowpop lollipops, green and white starlight mints, green M&Ms, green wrapped rolo chocolates. So martini glasses were filled with each item to display them for the guests to enjoy. I had seen online a very creative blogger that dipped oreos in yellow icing and then rolled them in yellow sprinkles. Very cute pots of gold. This gave me an idea. What if I cut off the top of a chocolate donut 

hole and dipped them in sprinkles. I rushed off mid-week to our local Stop and Shop for supplies. They actually had gold (not yellow but gold) sprinkles. I sliced a donut hole. I dipped it in the sugar crystals. They didn't stick that well. So friday when I went food shopping I scooped up a can of spritzable yellow icing. Now the came out quite adorably. 

Games:

Fun 1: I found an ever so cute leprechaun printable puzzle online.

http://spoonful.com/printables/leapin-leprechaun-puzzle-st-patricks-day). I printed one for each guest. I placed all the pieces from each one into an

envelope. Each friend received an envelope. If they were able to complete the puzzle they earned a prize. The squeals of laughter were well worth it. The prize was a rubiks cube typed toy with St. Patrick's Day themes. Reminiscing about playing with these in the past was a ton of fun.

Fun 2: Have you heard of building a leprechaun trap? This is one tradition that I have never participated in before. But I found this online. How cute! Apparently  people create traps to catch a visiting leprechaun. The attract them with green, gold, and shiny things. So I placed a basket with grass and gold under a box and set the

trap. I tied 1 cauldron (like a little pot of gold) to the trap stand bar. All the rest were simply taped to the bar. I had my friends pull a number out of a hat. Then they each picked up the corresponding numbered cauldron. We all pulled and followed the strings until only one remained tied. This would be our lucky winner. The winner received a gold nugget candy, a leprechaun teddy bear, and a green lunch container.

Everyone received a pot of gold (gold chocolate coins) as a favor.

Now to recap the decorations:

I found a fabulous beer mug shaped stuffed thing. I think it was meant to be a hat. I stuffed it with green roses that I made from a roll of crepe paper. I saw this idea online while looking for St. Valentine's Day ideas.

I found a $.99 plastic green St. Patrick's Day hat. I filled it with 2 single

serve containers of Lucky Charms. And mixed this with a bag of popcorn and green sprinkles. A perfect combo of salt and sweet. Just the right amount of crunch.

Yes, I even decorated the cups. I found shamrock stickers that started it. I placed a sticker on each cup for the coffee. Then I realized hey I could draw shamrocks too. So on the second set I drew shamrocks with a green permanent marker. 

I covered all my tables with blue tablecloths to let the green accessories stand out in contrast. At the Christmas Tree Shop, I found sparkly shamrock cut outs. At ShopRite, I found a small potted clover plant. This rounded out the table decorations.

At this party as my friends came up the stairs I heard, "Oh my goodness would you look at this!" "How does she come up with this stuff?!" and "Oh I hate you how do you do all this". I just loved hearing these comments as I opened my door to guests. Thanks for joing me ladies. Thanks for embracing the fun. Looking forward to the next party. Now to dream up the next party idea.