Happy St. Patrick's Day

Normally we aren't too into the St. Patrick's Day festivities...meaning I usually make the traditional dinner and a certain leprechaun comes during the night to turn the milk in the fridge and toilet water green, but that's the extent of it.

This year we did a little bit more.

I owe this to Pinterest, an idea I got from Mel Larson's "Elf on the Shelf," as well as Connor's seeing all the older kids' Leprechaun Traps at school.

So we'll start with what the kids found when they woke up....mainly Connor...he had the most fun with it...

The Leprechaun had come during the night, did his usual milk-turning-green-trick, and ate the candy in Connor's little house he built for him (out of a tea box.) (Connor decided he wanted to be "nice" and build a house instead of a trap.)

Not only that, but this year "he" took a dry erase marker and marked up some of our framed photos on the walls with silly faces. 

Then Connor noticed the cupcakes...

The night before, I had started making some Irish Car Bomb cupcakes. I put them in the oven and then we put Connor to bed. He did not see that when I had pulled them out, they had sunken and I had a hard time getting them out of the pan.

So they looked like this in the morning sitting on the counter...

Connor thought the leprechaun had done something...

to which I replied, "Oh My! He nibbled on all the edges!"

He thought that was hilarious!

(So did I.)

We then made some green pancakes...everything has to be green on ST. Patrick's Day right?!?!

Connor decided to flaunt his 10's hat he made at school...

And I decided to make another go of the cupcakes.

And was I glad I did! I have NEVER sunk my teeth into a better tasting cupcake!

It seriously...was the highlight of my day! I know...pathetic!

I got the recipe here.

They were a little labor intensive for me...but so worth it!

And for the kiddos we tried a Cake Batter Cookie Recipe I found on Pinterest that you can find here:

http://cookincowgirl.blogspot.com/2011/10/funfetti-cake-batter-cookies.html

(I couldn't get this darn thing to link right, so there it is!)

Those cookies are pretty amazing also...of course we made them green as well.

After spending all day cooking and baking, my hubby came home from work and my parents came over for dinner.

They stayed late and told stories of when they were younger and dating.

Connor even stayed up till 10:00!

This part of the day was my second highlight.

We are so blessed to have our parents live close and to see them often. The drawback is that we get so caught up in the day-to-day stuff, that we rarely hear fun old stories about them and our family.

Even Dom stuck around and listened.

We also had fun teasing my mom about how naive she used to be;)

...And I think we convinced my dad to get all of his old films of our family when Scott and I were little...I mean...films...like on reels that you play on an old projector kinda films...and put them on DVD so that we can enjoy them!

Can't wait to see that stuff!

Hope the leprechaun came to visit you too;)