12 Fun Ideas for an Irish Leprechaun Party
To get things started, the kids spent time decorating bags to take home all their treats and prized. You can download this FREE printable template from my home website right now and let the kids have fun embellishing their own bags with crafting supplies you have on hand.
Next, time was spent preparing a leprechaun poster the kids could hang and color before the party games commenced. 2 sheets of white butcher paper were taped together and I drew a character without ears or a nose for them to fill in. The nose and ears were then cut from cardstock and a square of double sided adhesive was attached to the back of the pieces to stick on the leprechaun during the game. "Uncle Rory" helped keep the kids busy coloring while I made Lucky Leprechaun treat bag headers, tags and character pokes. You can download these printable project pages for FREE from my home website!
No Leprechaun Festival would be complete without a Leprechaun Trap! I gathered craft supplies, trinkets purchased from the Dollar Store and some snacks, put everything on the table and let their creativity shine as they plotted and assembled their traps. I was fortunate enough to find 2 mini plastic action figures that I painted up with orange beards and green "Leprechaun" suits to add to the traps after the kids were asleep. After all, a trap wouldn't be lucky if you can't catch a leprechaun in it!
Our Leprechaun Festival was filled with LOTS of fun, games and dancing! Along with the crafting activities, we played "Pin the Nose and Ears on the Leprechaun", they caught flying shamrocks in buckets, they danced Irish jigs ("Rocky Road to Dublin" by the Young Dubliners was a hit!), caught dropping balloons in green derby hats, they hopped among the shamrocks, bowled down cups with a potato, swatted balloons with shamrock covered flyswatters, pulled jokes out of a hat, played "The Leprechaun Says", and then had a Shamrock table race with straws and shamrock shapes from tissue.
An oversized DIY Lucky Day board game was creatively drawn up by made by our more accomplished Leprechauns using markers, a pair of dice and a plastic tablecloth. She cleverly designed the game similar to chutes and ladders with an Irish theme! Once the games were over, dinner and treats they had made together earlier in the day were served. The rainbow cake was especially fun and easy. A white box cake mix was used, divided into 4 bowl and then red, yellow, blue and green were added to the batter. The mix was then poured one color at a time into a Bundt pan and baked according to the package directions. A simple icing was used to glaze the finished cake.
To make their own Shamrock Shakes from scratch, we used the Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker and added green food coloring to the ice cream mix. They didn't want peppermint flavoring so we stayed with the vanilla suggested in the original recipe. Once the ice cream was soft set, we blended it with a bit more milk and served! Here's the original Cuisinart recipe we used before adding green food coloring.
The girls also wanted their "friends" to join the celebration so they planned and hosted their own Irish Tea Party. They served lemonade tea they made from scratch along with enough snacks for their more than a dozen guests to enjoy! When the day finally came to an end, the girls had a "Magic Bath" with a tub filled with bubbles and balloons surrounded by bright green lights. They watched an enchanting movie and then turned in for the night. In the morning, they discovered their trapped Leprechauns and treat bags before enjoying Grandpa's shamrock pancakes. What a Lucky Leprechaun Festival Day it was and there's no better way I know of than to spend time enjoying the enchanted world of your very own real life Leprechauns... Lucky US!
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