Fun Facts About St. Patrick’s Day

Having learned in the last few years that I am of Irish extraction, I’ve found a renewed interest in St. Patrick’s Day. For this week’s blog post I did a little digging and discovered some things about St. Patrick’s Day that I hadn’t known.

***

The real Saint Patrick wasn’t Irish! He was British, born to an aristocratic family around the year 390. He didn’t even practice Christianity until, having been kidnapped and sent to Ireland to live as a shepherd, he experienced a religious conversion, escaped to return to Britain, and was told in a dream to return to Ireland.

***

The real Saint Patrick wasn’t even a saint! He was never canonized by a Pope.

***

It is said that St. Patrick taught people about the Holy Trinity by using the three leaves of the common clover (or shamrock) to represent the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

***

Your odds of finding a four-leaf clover are 1 in 10,000.

***

The first St. Patrick’s Day celebration in the United States was held in Boston in 1737.

***

On St. Patrick’s Day, there are over 13 million pints of Guinness sold around the world. Another fun fact: I don’t like Guinness.

***

There are 34.7 million Irish-Americans. This is more than seven times the population of Ireland.

***

The world’s shortest St. Patrick’s Day parade is held in the Irish village of Dripsey. It is only 100 yards long and stretches between the village’s two pubs.

Not Dripsey.

***

Legend has it that wearing green makes a person invisible to leprechauns.

***

There are no snakes slithering through the countryside of Ireland and there never were. When we hear that St. Patrick drove the snakes out of Ireland, perhaps this is what is meant:

From Shoeboxblog.com

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! How do you celebrate?

Until next time,

Amy

For My Friends in the United Kingdom and Ireland

Just in time for Christmas, Hanukkah, Boxing Day, and 2017, my first two books, Secrets of Hallstead House and The Ghosts of Peppernell Manor, are on sale through Kobo for just 90p/1,09€! Below are descriptions of each book and the links where you can find them. Thanks for your time and I wish you all the best as 2016 comes to a close and a new year begins!

Amy

 

 Macy Stoddard had hoped to ease the grief of losing her parents in a fiery car crash by accepting a job as a private nurse to the wealthy and widowed Alexandria Hallstead. But her first sight of Summerplace is of a dark and forbidding home. She quickly finds its winding halls and shadowy rooms filled with secrets and suspicions. Alex seems happy to have Macy’s help, but others on the island, including Alex’s sinister servants and hostile relatives, are far less welcoming. Watching eyes, veiled threats…slowly, surely, the menacing spirit of Hallstead Island closes in around Macy. And she can only wonder if her story will become just one of the many secrets of Hallstead House…

UK:

https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/secrets-of-hallstead-house-1

Ireland:

https://www.kobo.com/ie/en/ebook/secrets-of-hallstead-house-1

“Do you know what stories Sarah could tell you about the things that happened in these little cabins? They’d curl that pretty red hair of yours.”

Outside of Charleston, South Carolina, beyond hanging curtains of Spanish moss, at the end of a shaded tunnel of overarching oaks, stands the antebellum mansion of Peppernell Manor in all its faded grandeur. At the request of her friend Evie Peppernell, recently divorced Carleigh Warner and her young daughter Lucy have come to the plantation house to refurbish the interior. But the tall white columns and black shutters hide a dark history of slavery, violence, and greed. The ghost of a former slave is said to haunt the home, and Carleigh is told she disapproves of her restoration efforts. And beneath the polite hospitality of the Peppernell family lie simmering resentments and poisonous secrets that culminate in murder—and place Carleigh and her child in grave danger…

UK:

https://www.kobo.com/gb/en/ebook/the-ghosts-of-peppernell-manor

Ireland:

https://www.kobo.com/ie/en/ebook/the-ghosts-of-peppernell-manor

My Bucket List

One of my daughters is a consummate list-maker.  She has lists for everything you can imagine, from her favorite foods to her favorite Disney movies to places she wants to visit.  I’m taking my cue from her today and making a list.  My bucket list.  I’m going to stop myself at ten items because that’s a nice round number and because I don’t want to bore you to death.

When I thought about writing this post, I realized I don’t really have a bucket list.  But when I actually tried to decide what might be on it, I had a hard time narrowing it down to ten.  I imagine most people have that same problem.  

Here goes.

First, I’d like to travel to Greece.  I want to see the postcard places with the white buildings and cerulean ocean in the background.  I want to taste real Greek cuisine.  I want to see all the places I’ve only read about in history books.

Second, I want to take a class at the Culinary Institute of America.  It doesn’t have to be any particular kind of class, though I’m partial to desserts.  

Third, I would love to learn French.  I took French in high school, but I remember almost nothing and if I had to have a conversation, I would be limited to “please” and “thank you” and “shut your mouth” and “I love cheese.”

Fourth and Fifth, I’d like to take two kinds of vacations:  an eco-vacation and a volunteer vacation.  The eco-vacation doesn’t have to be anywhere specific, but it would be nice if it were in a warm place.  And I’d like to take a volunteer vacation in South America. 

Sixth, I want to see a performance at Carnegie Hall.  In all the years I lived in and near Manhattan, I never visited Carnegie Hall and it’s one of the few things I regret about that time. 

Seventh, I want to go to Scotland.  I want to see the mountains and the plaids and the lochs.

Eighth, I want to go to Ireland.  I want to taste honest-to-goodness Irish pub food and see lots of green and lots of sheep.   

Ninth, I’d love to go whitewater rafting on the Colorado River.  I don’t even know why.  It just looks so cool in pictures.

And last, but not least, I’d like to see the Northern Lights.  Preferably from Norway.  

So that’s my bucket list.  I hope it inspires you to come up with your own if you haven’t yet, and I hope it inspires you to let me know what’s on yours. 

Until next week,

Amy