As a young (and naive) teacher, I assigned the leprechaun trap project. I didn’t know any better. I’m sorry. Now, as a mom of three, I dread this project every year. I swear that I will NEVER subject parents to this torture ever again. I’ve written about it several times over the years. In 2023 we didn’t have any school traps but my kids demanded to make them anyway. In 2022, one of my kids had a trap she needed to bring to school. This is when I realized my mistake and I apologized to all the parents of all the kids I ever taught.
Since McKenna is getting a little long in the tooth for such things and George’s teacher is old school and close to retirement, I thought FOR SURE we would get to skip this year. I mean—I was certain that she wasn’t going to do traps having gone through all this crap with her own kids.
NOPE. On Friday, George came home with THE LETTER. You know the one…green paper copied out of Mailbox Magazine. The trap needed to be sent to school on Monday—if you wanted to participate. Do you think I was talking him out of this one? Luckily, I had mentally prepared for this by purchasing a leprechaun trap kit from Amazon.
Did you even know this existed? My SIL introduced me to them a couple of years ago.
Anyway, George taped and glued and constructed until his heart was content. It was a little wobbly but nothing some gorilla tape couldn’t fix. I will forever be doing Leprechaun traps this way. Plug and chug…not glitter necessary.
Unfortunately, Theo wanted to do the same thing. One kit. Two kids.
Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on how you look at it, Theo is pretty resourceful. He found a box in the recycling and a ton of stickers. The boys worked on it together. They had a blast. Although I now have stickers all over my dining room table and floor, at least it isn’t glitter.
I am writing for the 18th annual Slice of Life challenge presented by Two Writing Teachers.
Karyn In The Kitchen 
Ha Ha, I just love the UN apologetic tone! (Except when you are sincerely apologizing to practically generations of parents.) I think any school project where they tell the kids to do it all at home could engender these feelings. And leprechaun traps, while charming, …
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oh this brought me all the feels- I am not a leprechaun teacher. But visions of “green footprints” and glitter tracked through the halls haunts me. Loved the dual perspective of teacher and mom feelings on the topic. How lucky 😉
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Every year since becoming a mom I’ve kicked myself over this.
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That is too funny! Glad they were able to recreate the trap with materials you had on hand. I’ve also thought about some of the things I used to assign, and wish I could undo those. (At least I wised up after a few years of seeing projects clearly done solely by the parents.) Thank you for sharing.
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I laughed out loud at the use of “F-ing” and your promise that you apologize to every parent you’ve ever taught! Hilarious and light-hearted slice.
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I love the fun you had at home with this–but I will never give the leprechaun trap assignment (even though my first graders ask for it each year). I did not know you could buy a leprechaun trap kit! I did have a colleague tell me about her grandson (in K) who was assigned a leprechaun trap but thought it was mean to leprechauns–so he built a leprechaun house instead!
Kim
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I love that story of the leprechaun house! ❤️
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Oh man. I have many a slice about the dreaded leprechaun traps! Somehow, last year (I think maybe she forgot about it until the day of?) though, at age 10, I talked my daughter into not doing a trap and just leaving some nice things our for him instead. I would have loved to skip it all together, but this was the closest I got. The leprechaun left her a few quarters. She almost forgot about it this year too, but at the last minutes she was asking to leave things out again. But this is so much better than a trap!
(after writing all of this, I think I may make this tomorrow’s slice!)
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Why do they think the leprechaun is like the Easter Bunny?!
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I blame the teachers 😉 We never did the growing up and I had no intention of ever doing this. But here we are.
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