When St. Patrick’s Day falls on a weekday, everyone wants to celebrate, but no one wants to go out to do it. Instead, find out How To Celebrate St. Patrick’s Day At Home in this post.
To make this holiday the best, be sure to read our other St. Patrick’s Day posts.
St. Patrick’s Day often falls on a weekday, which means even though you can go out and celebrate, you don’t really want to.
Especially this year when the holiday is on a Tuesday.
I bet you’d rather kick back and have your own St. Patrick’s Day celebrations at home. You can still wear your “Kiss Me I’m Irish” pin — and hope that your spouse or pet obliges.
If you’re looking for great ways for the whole family to enjoy the holiday, we have great options to help you plan the perfect holiday.
If you do want to go out for a little while, my suggestion is to skip the bar and head out for these St. Patrick’s Day freebies and deals.
Fun Ways To Celebrate St. Patrick’s Day At Home
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Wear Green
If you’re going out to St Patrick’s Day parades to celebrate the holiday, you wear the color green to prevent a leprechaun from pinching you. Keep that “green for good luck” mentality at home too.
Grab a green shirt or leggings and get into the holiday spirit. Just because you’re not on display doesn’t mean you can’t dress the part.
Even something fun like earrings with four leaf clovers would be a subtle way to be festive.
And if you have kids, you definitely want to dress them in green for school so they’re not left out.
At home, have some plastic St. Patrick’s Day hats and glasses for them. Maybe temporary tattoos (or stickers or their hands since they don’t last as long).
If you head to stores the day after the holiday, you can score items for 50% off and save them for next year.
Because this stuff is cute and fun but definitely not worth paying full price for.
Put Up Green Decorations
When large cities host a St. Patrick’s Day parade, the city goes green. Yellow traffic lines are tinted green and, in the case of the Chicago River, the water along the parade route is dyed green.
You (hopefully) don’t have a river running through your living room, but you do (probably) have a mantle that’s looking for some love.
So decorate with a punch of green.
You can purchase St. Patrick’s Day kitchen towels and hang them off your stove (like we do every year).
Or, you can make your own St. Patrick’s Day décor. I made a “Lucky In Love” Shamrock Shiplap Sign that’s hanging in our living room, so you can make that and match us.
Cook Irish Foods
St. Patrick’s Day is the one day a year when I make Shepherd’s Pie. I absolutely love it, but it’s a lot of work.
Most people will make corned beef and cabbage on St. Patrick’s Day instead. Pete likes that, but I don’t. So if my parents are in town for St. Patrick’s Day, my mom will make that for the both of them. Or, if he really wants corned beef, I’ll make him a corned beef grilled cheese.
Fun fact: Corned beef and cabbage isn’t actually a traditional Irish meal. It’s Irish American.
If you’re looking for a side to serve with either of those main dishes, these authentic Pureed Carrots And Parsnips are a great go to.
And of course, your meal wouldn’t be complete without Irish Soda Bread.
Irish Soda Bread is a great breakfast too, so definitely make a loaf (or two) a couple days before St. Patrick’s Day to have it ready to serve that morning.
If you didn’t, but you still want something for an Irish breakfast, our Irish Potato Bread recipe is great.
Make Some Green Foods
Maybe you don’t want to eat anything Irish on St. Patrick’s Day, but you still want to get into the spirit of the holiday. If that’s the case, just go with some green foods.
Salad, avocado, asparagus, anything green is a good choice.
And, for dessert, make a sweet treat like our Shamrock Pretzels or our naturally green SunButter cookies, which are a really cute festive treat.
Or, you can make anything off our list of St. Patrick’s Day desserts.
And, if all else fails, just buy some green doughnuts from Krispy Kreme Doughnuts. The shop makes the original glazed green every year.
If you want some other ideas of what you can cook, check our our list of Irish and green food for St. Patrick’s Day.
You’re bound to find something to make on that list.
Have Some Green Drinks
If you just want to serve a regular, non-St. Patrick’s themed dinner, but you want to do something, go with green drinks.
Add a few drops of green food coloring into beverages to make green milk (like our Monster Milk) or green beer.
We have a great list of green and Irish drinks for St. Patrick’s Day with drinks like Irish coffee and Irish cocktails for anyone of legal drinking age.
Order St. Patrick’s Day Food
If you don’t feel like cooking a St. Patrick’s Day feast tonight, but you do want some Irish or green food to celebrate, you can just order with the following delivery services:
Don’t forget to add something festive like a Shamrock Shake from McDonald’s to your delivery order.
Make St. Patrick’s Day Crafts
You can go big and make a leprechaun trap with your little leprechauns, which is a really cute idea and a great way to kill a lot of time. You could make a leprechaun garden (like a fairy garden, but for leprechauns) too.
But if you don’t want to spend that much time of your craft, it’s okay.
Anything with a rainbow or clover can pass as a St. Patrick’s Day craft, so don’t overthink this.
To get your creative juices flowing, we have a nice list of St. Patrick’s Day crafts. Our favorite easy craft is the Rainbow In A Jar, which is gold chocolate coins on the bottom, sorted Skittles, and then mini marshmallows on top.
And then of course there’s our DIY Leprechaun Hats (pictured above).
Do Some Irish Dancing
Riverdance is so quintessentially Irish. So, if you haven’t sat to watch it with your kids yet, sit them down and stream it.
When my nephew was young, he used to dance along to it and made us all have a dance party with him.
If you don’t want to watch anything, just head to Spotify to stream an Irish playlist (or just some Flogging Molly). That will definitely get you in the Irish spirit.
Watch An Irish Movie
Pete absolutely loves The Departed, so there’s a 100% chance that we’ll be watching it on St. Patrick’s Day. He’ll use any excuse to watch it, honestly.
If you want to have a movie night at home, but you don’t want to watch all the blood and gore that is The Departed (I don’t blame you), pick something off Harper Bazaar’s list of the 22 Best Irish Movies to Watch on St. Patrick’s Day.
The only movie I’ve actually seen on that list, ironically, is The Departed. So I can’t exactly cosign it. But it was a lot easier to offer you that for suggestions rather than putting together my own list of Irish movies.
Read About Ireland
I’m Irish more than anything else, but I’ve never been to Ireland. Honestly, Japan is the only foreign country I’ve been to that doesn’t border the United States.
My parents went to Ireland a few years ago and my mom blogged all about their Ireland trip. You can read her posts about Irish culture and the country itself on Life Of 2 Snowbirds. And then you can feel like you’re virtually visiting.
Play Some St. Patrick’s Day Games
If you want a fun way to spend some family time together, play some games.
You can purchase games, like the St. Patrick’s Day Scavenger Hunt (above) as an instant download. Print it out and play with your family right away.
You can find plenty of St. Patrick’s Day printable games online, so you can play all night long.
Do you have any fun ideas to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day at home? Let us know in the comments.