There are many websites devoted to printing out pre-made Saint Patrick's Day decorations. Printing out pre-made shamrocks and other St. Patrick's Day decorations may be fun, but do not forget printer cartridges are often very expensive and can be used up quickly. Rather than use my printer ink on simple things I would rather reserve it for important documents, and for printing out specialized cards for family and friends. Drawing my own shamrocks is creative, economical, and a fun activity for the entire family. Making your own St. Patrick's Day shamrocks is also much easier to make than you think. Basically all you have to draw is three heart shaped leafs stuck to a stem. Shamrocks are so easy to draw that once you make your own it will become addicting! So grab a pencil and come make some cute shamrocks for St. Patrick's Day! I made these shamrocks to tape to the windows as decorations, but these would also be cute on on cards and in scrapbooks.

 Drawing shamrocks is very easy and the materials I used for this project consisted of:

• A drawing pencil.
• Colored pencils.
• A black sharpie.
• Scissors to cut out the shamrocks.

The shamrock is easy to draw and is simply three interconnected heart shapes with a stem at the bottom. According to popular mythology it is believed that St. Patrick used the shamrock to describe the concept of the trinity, but today this clover is mostly just a fun symbol that stands for the holiday itself. However, the Irish government put a trademark on the symbol of the shamrock and harp as trademarks and official symbols of the Irish government and tourism. In Ireland Saint Patrick's Day is observed as an official holiday, and many Catholics in Ireland and around the world still observe the day in honor of Saint Patrick.

Saint Patrick's Day in the US is a commercial holiday that people do not get off of work, unless they requested this day off in advance. On St. Patrick's Day traditionally people like to wear green so they do not get "pinched", go to parades, and go to special Saint Patrick's Day themed parties. Many people love to go out to Irish style pubs in LA and drink green bear, but personally I do not drink and the idea of more people on the road drinking and driving on Saint Patrick's Day just makes me want to be careful when crossing streets.

So if you live in the United States and your kids tell you that St. Patrick's Day is a school holiday I would be a little suspicious. Also, if your employee or co-worker calls in sick on Saint Patrick's Day or the day after I would be a little incredulous as I have heard there are some fun events going on in Los Angeles and other major US cities. I just had to throw that out there because today I saw several high school students around Starbucks and Vons ditching class, so I know many will use any excuse for an extra day off from school. Before I digress any further let me get back to the steps involved in making our shamrock decorations, which are great and festive for the holiday.

There are many ways to decorate paper shamrocks, but I like to trace mine with a black marker to give these a bold and cartoonish effect.  I made these decorations with kids in mind, so this is something children would probably find enjoyable.  Of course you can go into more detail and add the veins in the leaves of the shamrock, but I decided to color mine.

Many people prefer to make their shamrocks out of green construction paper because this is easier, but since I only had white printer paper I had to improvise. Also, I love to color and using colored pencils on this project was fun. I loved it and I know kids will love doing this too. I also tried using markers to color in the shamrocks, but this did not work so well because the printer paper is thinner and cannot handle the saturation. If you decide to use markers choose a type of paper that is suitable for this medium.

Once the shamrock is colored in than use the scissor to cut out the large shamrock. Next we will be making some baby shamrocks to go with the large shamrocks.

Baby shamrocks are cute, fun, and just as easy to make as the larger variety.

I folded a piece of paper into three columns and then into three rows. Down the middle column I drew the baby shamrocks and used this pattern to trace onto the other rows and columns. Watch the video below to get more ideas on how to make these simple baby shamrocks.