A New St. Patrick's Day Tradition

On St. Patrick's Day morning my family just barely remembered to wear green to show our Irish-American pride before heading out the door to work, preschool, and music class. I say Irish-American pride because the actual Irish don't celebrate the holiday.

We did all managed to scrounge up a green shirt, or pants in Lil Sis' case, to celebrate. The highlight of our St. Paddy's Day celebration was the S.D. Ireland truck parade. This is a tradition that has been going on for as long as I can remember. S.D. Ireland is a local cement company with shamrocks painted on its trucks as its official logo. Every March 17th the trucks drive throughout the region with a police escort honking their horns to spread Irish cheer and pride.

We learned from a friend that the best place to watch the parade is from the center of the biggest local traffic circle at 3 pm. So we went, 3 moms with 8 kids between us, to watch it in all its noisy splendor. The trucks do a few laps around the circle so you really get the full effect. The picture below is a screenshot from a video taken by MWG. You can see all us moms and kids if you look carefully in the upper right corner of the traffic circle.

And here is a video someone posted on YouTube of the parade:

The sun was warm and the temperature wasn't far below freezing so we were comfortable for the 15 or 20 minutes we were out. We followed the parade up with hot cocoa topped with green whipped cream, and pumpkin bread at a nearby coffee shop. The kids were so good, and other customers doted on us as we juggled getting chairs, drinks and bread from the counter to our table. One even remarked that our preschool party was more fun than the party at the bar down the block!

The kids had so much fun eating their treats and playing with colorful green beaded necklaces one of the moms brought. 

I think we have found a new St. Patrick's Day tradition that is more enjoyable (in my humble opinion) than the newest trend of being visited by naughty leprechauns who mess up the house or classroom leaving green food coloring, glitter and chocolate coins in their wake. Since when are leprechauns a messy version of the Easter Bunny?

The day was complete with a traditional Irish-American boiled dinner at Grandma and Grandpa's house. Grandma had lots of green accessories for the kids to enjoy. All in all a great day.