Blarney Blast

I am always looking for a reason to party, give me a holiday and I'll make it happen.  This year for St. Patrick's Day, my friends and I decided to host Blarney Blast.  I was a simple dinner/get-together, but can I just tell you, it was a blast!!!

 

I spent close to 9 hours cooking a traditional Irish Dinner: Corned Beef, Guinness Stew, Irish Soda Bread, Chocolate Stout Cupcakes, and Irish Cream & Mint Chocolate Trifles {click titles for the recipes}.  Since none of us drink alcohol, we played Beer Pong with green Gatorade, listened to Irish music {and by Irish music, I mean Mumford & Sons and Flogging Molly}, and even played some Rock Band. 

 

Since mucley arms was such a great nurse this past week, I decided to let him know how lucky I am to have him.  Growing up, my mom always did something special for each of us on every holiday, and I have really embraced that tradition.  I purchased some inexpensive Irish and green themed things {a St. Patrick's Day t-shirt, A green baseball cap, some green boxers with clovers on them, gold coin and gold nugget candy, a green self adhesive handle bar mustache, and some other small things} and placed them in a black gift bag with yellow tissue paper. 

I then purchased some inexpensive construction paper and created paper chains in red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple,  {making a rainbow} which I taped to a door frame.  I then placed the gift bag under the rainbow {the little pot of gold} and created a scavenger hunt which led to the rainbow using green die cut clovers with clues on the back. At our party, the most of the guests figured the clovers and rainbow were just part of the decor!  It was a quick and inexpensive gift, and he loved it!