St. Patty's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  So does anyone really know why we celebrate St. Patrick's Day?  Well as sad as this sounds, I didn't so I looked it up.  According to the Internet (which of course is never wrong *sarcasm*) and Wikipedia (even more reliable!), St. Patrick's Day celebrates the patron saint of Ireland, St. Patrick, and the arrival of Christianity into Ireland as well as celebrating Irish heritage and culture in general.  The shamrock is the symbol of St. Patrick's Day because St. Patrick used the three-leaved plant to explain the Trinity.  We wear green to remember the Emerald Isle and the Shamrock.  And, we celebrate this day on March 17 because that is the day St. Patrick died in 461 AD.  OK enough of the history lesson but I learned something new.  Anyway it is always fun to have a holiday and a reason to celebrate, right?  My ancestors are from Ireland and Scotland so I am part Irish so why not celebrate! 

This year was fun.  We began our St. Patty's Day festivities on Saturday the 16th.  First, the kids and I travelled up to Springdale with my parents and the Hughes'.  We participated in the Intermountian Health Care's LIVE walk.  It was fun to walk with so many people for the great cause of promoting healthy living.  We walked down the main road in Springdale then along the river and back to the start.  We walked about 2.3 miles I believe.  During the walk, I saw Brady White, a guy from our ward and our friend and said "Hi" to him.  He is over the publicity and marketing for the hospital so he was there taking video and pictures of the walkers.  My mom had him video Emily and Tyrel skipping down the road.  Then he asked me if he could interview me after the walk.  I very hesitantly said sure.  If I would have know he was going to interview me I never would have said hi to him!  So I got interviewed and talked about my experience on the walk for his video.  Brady said they were going to submit the footage to KSL so we might be on the news.  We will have to see! 

After the walk and the interview, we drove to the park in Springdale and had a picnic.  The weather was so nice, in fact we were wishing we wore shorts!  After we ate lunch, my dad and the Hughes' headed home while I took my mom into town in Springdale to get some shoes.  Emily heard there was a St. Patrick's Day Parade starting at 2:00 and she wanted to see it.  We were just going to head home but she and Colby  insisted we watch the parade and OK I wanted to see it too.  So we fought the crowds and found a parking spot and even a seat in the shade to watch the parade.

This parade was quite interesting but what did I expect from Springdale.  There were the Green Jello Queens, Belly Dancers (my eyes will never be the same), Leprechauns, Hippies and Homosexuals, green beads, and lots of candy. Oh and I can't forget the invitations to beer parties afterward!  Like I said it was very interesting.  Also my mom and I were feeling quite left out because we didn't have any tattoos or body piercings.  How could we forget that...  Anyway, Emily and Colby loved the parade because of all of the candy that was thrown so that made it worth watching.  After the parade we finally got on our way home after wading through the millions of people there to celebrate St Patrick's Day.

On March 17, we had our own St. Patrick's Day celebrations.  We started the day out with green shamrock pancakes and green eggs and ham:

The food might look a little strange but it was quite good.  The kids loved it.  OK Emily wasn't quite sure about the green eggs and ham but she finally did taste a little bite and said it was good.

After church, I made a traditional Irish dish of Corned Beef and Cabbage.  Now this dish was a first for me.  I have never made Corned Beef and Cabbage mostly because when I was growing up, whenever my mom made this, I had to gag down the Corned Beef.  Don't get me wrong my mom is an awesome cook and I can only dream of being as good as she is but there was something about Corned Beef.  I decided this year I was going to overcome my fear of the Corned Beef and give it a try again.  So I bought a package of Corned Beef and a head of cabbage at Lin's and started looking up different ways to cook it.  I finally just followed the instructions on the Corned Beef package and boiled it with the seasoning package it came with.  While the meat was cooking, I added potatoes and carrots and finally the cabbage.  When it was time to eat, I was really worried it would be bad and I didn't want to have to pretend to like it so Emily would eat (she will only eat something if she sees me eat it).  But to my surprise, the meal was actually quite good!!!  I was so glad!  I don't know what I did differently from when I was growing up (maybe my taste buds have just evolved) but I actually liked it and had seconds.  The even better part is that Emily ate all of her plate without complaining and Colby even ate the meat and he is a vegetarian.  So we just might have to have this meal again. 

After dinner here we are in our green treating ourselves to a homemade Shamrock Shake:

These shakes were sooooo good!  It tasted just like Mint Chocolate Chip ice cream (without the chocolate chips).  We all loved them and as you can see Russell even licked the last drops out of the blender. 

We had a great St. Patrick's Day.