Ideas for Hosting an Original St. Patrick's Day Party

Even if you have never attended a St. Patrick's Day party, you could easily guess that it often includes shamrock decor and green food coloring. While this is typical, traditional, and in the spirit of the holiday, I wanted to provide ideas that would spice up an ordinary St. Paddy's day party into a memorable success.

The first thing to consider when planning any party is invitations. While you could easily purchase a number of St. Paddy themed invitations at a number of stores, such as Wal-Mart and Target, or online sites, nothing screams originality better than getting creative and making your own invitations. Here are some ideas when making your own:

- Buy some green, gold, yellow, or white cardstock. These can be found at stores such as Staples, Office Max, Office Depot, and several online stores. Type your own text in Word, using a fancy or playful font, and print it on the card stock.

- Make your own limerick in the text, or present a theme. One idea would be to request that everyone must wear the most hideously, over-the-top St. Patrick's Day outfit they can think of. Another option could be to ask guests to wear the most original St. Patrick's Day t-shirt they can find. These options get your guests involved in the party, and are a variation from typically requesting that everyone wear green.

- Get creative! Go to craft stores, such as Michael's, and purchase stickers or scrapbooking materials to decorate and give the invitations a personal and interesting look. A less pricey and time-consuming option would be to download some free St. Patrick's Day clipart, cartoons, and photographs online, and use them to create your own template.

- Get your postage stamps personalized at sites like Zazzle.com, and order St. Patrick's Day Party Invitation postage stamps.

The next thing to think about is decorations. Green everything always works; green paper plates, cups, napkins, etc. Green, white, and yellow streamers and balloons are a popular option, but there are more original things you can add to your house to set the mood.

- Decorate with green bouquets or actual shamrocks. To get green flowers, buy white carnations and have them sit for a few days in a vase filled with water and green food coloring. The flowers will eventually turn green. You can also buy potted shamrocks at 1800Flowers.com. If you live in an area heavy in clover, considering collecting the clover and tying them with gold ribbon, and putting them in small vases. Even putting various white flowers in green vases make beautiful decorations. All these flowers and plants will look festive and smell wonderful.

- Make a Leprechaun hat chip bowl. Using construction paper and a round container, you can make this festive looking bowl. Follow the directions on how to make it on Kaboose.com.

- Places stacks and pots of gold in various corners of the house. To do this, you need chocolate gold coins and several pots and bowls. Fill large pots and bowls with balled up yellow tissue paper or construction paper, and cover the top layer with the gold coins.

- Fill jars and candy dishes with green M&Ms, green wrapped candy, and green jelly beans and place them around the house.

Which bring us to the next part of party planning: party food and drinks. Here are some alternatives besides the traditional corned beef hash.

- Corned Beef Pizza. It is both easy to make and delicious, while including the St. Patrick's Day tradition. Ingredients include shredded cabbage, thinly sliced corned beef, and mozzarella cheese. For the full recipe, check it out on Kaboose.com.

- Irish Soda Bread. The relatively easy recipe can also be found on many different sites, including Kaboose.com. The bread is moist and only takes about 20 minutes to bake.

- Cupcakes. They are always in high demand, but spice it up by making them actually shaped like shamrocks. After pouring in the batter, make clover shaped cupcakes by rolling three balls of foil and inserting them evenly around the perimeter between the cupcake liner and the pan. Apply green frosting, or green food coloring into the batter itself. You can add a stem by inserting a piece of green licorice. Check out the full recipe at FamilyFun.com.

- St. Paddy's Day Punch. Make a citrusy drink for your guests, by taking two cans of frozen limeade punch (from concentrate), two cans of frozen lemonade punch, and two 2 liter bottles of carbonated lemon-lime soda, such as Sprite or 7-Up, and mix together in a large punch bowl. If it's an adult party, add a 750 ml bottle of rum. After mixing in the alcohol, mix in two-quarts of lime sherbet. For more drink recipes, visit Essortment.com.

- A Keg of Green Beer. This is a little tricky to do, but if you fill the keg's nozzle with green food coloring before you tap the keg, it should mix with the beer as you pour. However, you must be carefully and tap the keg quickly, or you have a potential mess on your hands. In some cases you may be able to order a keg of green beer from your local brewery or liquor store. For a far more convenient method, put drops of food coloring at the bottom the cups and the beer will become green as it pours and mixes.

Finally, once the guests arrive you can start having some fun!

- Think of different party games, such a St. Patrick's Day scavenger hunt, in which the winner receives a pot of (chocolate) gold.

- If it is an adult party, play drinking games using green-colored beer and Guinness. There are many card games, such as Kings, that are a lot of fun when you have several people playing.

- Hold a silly limerick contest.

- Play some "Irish" music, and have an Irish jig competition. This can be even more fun after everyone has had a few drinks.

You may even want to arrange some party favors for the guests, such as little bags of chocolate coins, Leprechaun hats, flashing buttons, Kiss-Me-I'm-Irish paraphernalia, green Mardi-Gras beads, and so on. Remember, this is your party, so enjoy it!