How to celebrate St. Patrick's Day weekend in New Orleans

• Plus, it's just plain old green-colored fun.

The big picture: St. Patrick's Day parades roll through the Irish Channel, downtown and in Metairie, in addition to other events around the city.

• Here are four fun ways to celebrate the holiday in New Orleans.

🥕 Go parading: Catch all the regular stuff, like beads and stuffed animals, plus everything you'd need to start an Irish stew, and maybe some bars of Irish Spring soap.

• The Irish Channel St. Patrick's Day parade is Saturday. It rolls at 1pm. (Route)
• The Italian American St. Joseph's Day parade rolls in the CBD and French Quarter at 6pm on Saturday. (Route)
• Metairie's St. Patrick's Day parade rolls at noon Sunday. (Route)
• The downtown Irish Club Parade rolls at 7pm Sunday. (Route)

🍻 Drink up: Like any self-respecting town with residents of Irish heritage, we've got some great Irish pubs. Pick one and enjoy the scene this weekend. Here are some favorites:

• Ryan's Irish Pub: 241 Decatur St.
• Markey's Bar, 640 Louisa St.
• Erin Rose: 811 Conti St.
• Finn McCool's: 3701 Banks St.
• Go deeper: Eater's list of essential Irish pubs in New Orleans.

🕺 Dance with the Irish Cultural Network: The organization hosts an Irish Ceili with a dance lesson from 5pm to 6pm at the Hyatt Centric French Quarter on Sunday.

• The dance continues until 8pm. (Details)

🧠 Learn something new: Stop by the Irish Cultural Museum for a history lesson ... and a shot of whiskey.

• We dropped by this museum for a recent Axios Pro happy hour and were pleasantly surprised at how lovely we found this new-to-us French Quarter spot. The bar in back is great, too!