How to Make a Handprint St. Patrick's Day Craft

Inside: This leprechaun handprint craft is perfect for a St. Patrick’s Day craft for your littles.

I love celebrating St. Patrick’s Day with my kids.

Maybe it’s the leprechaun traps or all the green, but this holiday always makes me feel extra lucky.

And I take the time to slow down and think about why I’m lucky. And the top of the list is always my three kiddos.

It’s not always sunshine and rainbows around here and some days I’m counting down until bedtime, but most days I want to slow down time with my kids.

They’re growing up too fast.

And one way I can do that is to take a snapshot of how little they are. Because tomorrow they’re going to be a little bit bigger.

And next year they’re going to be 365 days bigger.

So I love handprint art so that I have a sweet little snapshot of just how little their hand is today.

And when we use handprint art as a St. Patrick’s Day craft, it’s the perfect combination.

Supplies Needed for this Handprint St. Patrick’s Day Craft:

1. Black and green construction paper

2. White cardstock paper

3. Orange and skin color tempera washable paint. If you don’t have skin color paint, you can mix white with a little bit of orange for peach or white with a little bit of brown for darker skin tones.

4. Paintbrushes

5. Paper plate to mix the paint

6. Scissors, pencils, sharpie

7. Glue

How to Make the Leprechaun Handprint St. Patrick’s Day Craft:

Follow these steps to make the handprint crafts for your little leprechauns.

If you have one kiddo, make one leprechaun.

Or if you have more kiddos, you can make a leprechaun for each kid on one paper.

1. Paint your kids’ 4 fingers orange (skip their thumb).

2. Use skin color to paint their palm. If they have light colored skin, you can add some orange to white paint to get a peachy color. Or you can add white to brown paint to match your kids’ skin tone.

We also love using these skin color paints.

3. Paint the top of their palm orange to represent the leprechaun’s hair.

4. Press their hand down on the white cardstock paper.

5. Wash their hand and the paint brushes while their handprint dries.

6. Cut out a top hat shape from the black paper.

7. Cut out a shamrock shape from the green paper. To draw a shamrock, draw three hearts without points.

8. Glue the hat to the top of the leprechaun head and glue the shamrock to the hat.

9. When the paint is really dry, draw a face on the leprechaun.

10. Write, or have your child write: “Lucky Little Leprechaun” or “Lucky Little Leprechauns.”

11. Add their name to the leprechaun and the year like I did to this “old school” St. Patrick’s Day craft we did years ago that I just hung up to decorate for St. Patrick’s Day.

It’s one of my most treasured St. Patty’s Day decorations…