My parents, who were both born of people
"from the old country", leaned over
backwards to be as
American as possible. As a result, they tossed out all the
wonderful
old traditions; so when my children were small, I decided to create
some traditions of my own.
The evening before St. Patrick’s Day, I would
casually make a bowl of red
gelatin dessert & put it in the
refrigerator. Then, after the children were in bed,
I’d run over to
a neighbor’s house, give her the dessert, race back and make
green
"Jello Jigglers". We called them Knox Blocks. (For those not
familiar
with them, it’s a special way to make a gelatin dessert
that you can pick up
and hold in your hand BUT if you drop it, the
thing bounces all over the house).
Early the next morning, I’d wake up the
children by hollering that I caught a
leprechaun. As soon as the first
child came running around the corner, I look
at him or her and -- of
course everybody knows that the only way a leprechaun
can escape is if you
look away --- that little Irish elf would immediately
disappear. So
even though I caught one every St. Patrick’s Day morning, my
children never saw him because it’s a mother’s natural instinct to
look at her
child when they come running and hooting and hollering
into a room.
Then we’d all go through the house together to
find out what the little mischief-making leprechaun did to us this
year. Sometimes he’d turn our milk green
(with food coloring). It
looked terrible on oatmeal, pretty cool on Rice Crispies
and tasted
just like regular milk.
Some years he’d set our places at the
breakfast table with pots and pans, and
put the dishes on the stove.
The pranks were always silly, always harmless but
EVERY SINGLE YEAR he
changed red regular gelatin into green bouncy
stuff.
Maybe this tradition doesn’t exist in Ireland,
but now my children are married
and have children of their own ... and
you’ll never guess what happened at
their houses last St. Patrick’s
Day.
