A Harry Potter Birthday Party!

My oldest is a HUGE Harry Potter fan!  She has turned our whole family on to it and now we are all fans of the series.  We listen to the books on CD in the car and we have all caught the bug!  So when her birthday was coming up - I was not surprised when she asked for a Harry Potter themed birthday!

As the guests arrived - we gave them each a handmade "school bag".

The bag was theirs to keep.  The bags are fully lined with a soft batting and completely reversible.






Pattern for the bag came from http://crazylittleprojects.com/2012/09/messenger-bag-tutorial.html  I used a fleece like interfacing as suggested in the tutorial and I made the bags a bit smaller then suggested.  I also did not do the extra stitching on the handle to save time.

Inside the bag was a checklist of all the tasks to complete in Diagon Alley...along with a warning to watch out for Voldemort!

Then we had the sorting ceremony which was definitely a highlight for the kids.  They each took a turn wearing the sorting hat which has a pocket inside for a walkie talkie.  We used a phone so that my father in law could hide upstairs and pretend to be the sorting hat!  It was a blast and the kids just loved how the hat talked to them!  The kids were sorted into only Hufflepuff or Gryffindor but the sorting hat mentioned the other houses.

Then we took a break and had lunch - there was a storm passing over outside so it added to the atmosphere!  We had lasagna and mac and cheese along with salad for lunch.  All the kids ate well and were ready to begin their adventure!

Next we watched a video that my daughter and her cousins made showing how to use the Expelliarmus Curse!  It was funny - adorable - and definitely homemade as the dog walked through and the baby kept chatting during it!  In addition, the girls had a lot of fun making it and falling back onto pillows pretending to be stricken by the curse!  So FUN!

Then we finally headed out the the big barn to enter Diagan Alley!

There were a number of stations for the kids to visit.  The first one of course was HoneyDukes Sweet shop!  The kids filled up their bags with licorice wands and chocolate frogs (chocolate covered bananas).

There was also the Owl Post to visit.  There the kids wrote a letter and left it by an owl on the wall.  I'll send the letters through the muggle post along with thank you notes and a fun picture or two.

There was also the quill shop where we set out a quill and ink along with some homemade parchment (paper soaked in water and tea bags to turn it brown).  

Next was the robe shop where the kids picked up their robe.  They simply found one with a yellow hood for Hufflepuff or one with a red hood for Gryffindor.

The tutorial for the robe came from http://www.instructables.com/id/Sewing-a-JEDI-or-Harry-Potter-Robe-or-Cloak/  This was a great tutorial.  I decided to line the hood and the arm holes could have been bigger.  It's hard to find a free robe tutorial so I was grateful to have this one!

  

The kids also had the book shop to visit.  There they assembled spell books.  This was another project of my daughters.  She picked out 6 spells and looked them up and wrote about them.  Then we printed them out and soaked the paper in tea to get the parchment effect.  

Then of course there was Ollivanders - the wand shop - you have to have a wand if you are a wizard! I picked up some dowels from Micheals.  We put hot glue on them in different patterns and spray painted them black.  When we painted them - we threw on some glitter in green, gold or purple.  

When the kids came to the wand shop - they first picked up a spoon that had a drop of food coloring on it with baking soda on top.  Then they mixed the spoon into a cup with vinegar in it causing the vinegar to bubble up and a color to be revealed!  The color in their cup was the color wand they were to pick up!

Last but not least they settled into the Three Broomsticks for some butterbeer and rock cakes.

Butter beer recipe is cream soda from the pioneer woman using the vanilla syrup: http://thepioneerwoman.com/food-and-friends/homemade-cream-sodas/

with a topping using butter flavoring from http://mic.com/articles/95918/the-simple-way-to-make-the-mysterious-butterbeer-from-harry-potter#.5s2lSS9FC

Copied below for convenience:

For the cream layer:

2 cups heavy cream
6 tbsps sugar
2 tsps vanilla extract
1.5 tsps imitation butter flavor

The rock cakes came from http://bakingbites.com/2005/08/cooking-school-better-than-hagrids-rock-cakes/ and they were delicious.  We read the recipe right but still needed to add a lot more milk so - FYI.

Then Voldemort showed up!  He battled each of the kids in turn - "running away" and "swearing to be back" after each kiddo used the Expelliarmus curse to have him drop his wand.  Voldemort was played by my husband who was a very good sport!

When Voldemort seemed to have enough of being poked by wands - we called "CAKE!" and the kids ran back to the house for cake and ice cream followed by games until the parents picked up the kids.  

It was a great party with great kids!

Enjoy :-)

One last picture of an advertisement for the joke shop: