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Saturday, August 4, 2012

{ The Epic Harry Potter Party Post }


Check out my 2013 party here!







Check out my 2013 party here!


This has what has taken over my life for the last month.
Coupled with, ya know, work and real life.

I started planning this party in January. It was supposed to be held last Friday night (anyone else hear Katy Perry in their head just then? No? Just me..?), but there was a big ole stinking thunderstom that rolled through and postponed the event. I was finally able to have it last night! Weehaw!

So, here's the straight owl poo on what went down.

Are you ready for some pictures? Sorry, they don't move.

Sign for Platform 9 3/4
If you are wondering, those are sweat bees on the sign, those were fun to fight off ;)
Good thing Ron's afraid of spiders, not bees!

The drinks were Oak Matured Mead (aka Fruit Punch), Polyjuice Potion (aka Lemonade with key limes, Mt. Dew & Orange Hawaiian Punch), and Pumpkin Juice (aka Pumpkin Juice)


For food, I just had pizza, potato chips, & fruit, plus Cauldron Cakes

House Points were awarded throughout the night
I found these Hourglass-ish shaped vases at the $1 store.
The stones are just the decorative 1/2 marbles you can get in any craft section
(but I couldn't find yellow for Hufflepuff, so clear it was).

Decorations
The glass bottles are from Hobby Lobby, I got them when
they were 50% off, making them between $1 & $1.25
The Pensieve

Because I think I'm funny

The Cauldron Cakes

The Butterbeer

The Three Broomsticks cups. I created the logo with a broomstick from digitalscrapbookplace.com
printed on sticker paper. 


Butterbeer bottles (made from IBC Rootbeer bottles)


wands and quills
(info on how to make both below)

Everyone was sorted into a house. This is the house that that person belongs in, not the character they came to the party as. They simply drew names from a hat.


Then, it was time for the Wand Ceremony. The wands "chose" the wizard via Spin the Bottle method.

The Bean, my niece, and I all made these wands.

All of the wands came with Ollivander's tags complete with type of wood, length of wand, and core ingredient listed.

Here are a few different photos of them. They are so cool (and fun to make)!


Yes, this one has someone's tumblr listed on it, no worries,
that's me! I didn't steal some poor tumblr's photo and claim it as my own ;)


Here is my tutorial
.  Find the inspiration for my tutorial here on Deviantart 



Wand choosing a wizard

After everyone had been sorted and properly wanded, it was time to become the character. Add a little 'essence of someone' to the Polyjuice Potion, and BAM! It's like magic ;)

I didn't use hairs, I used 'skin cells'. Yeah, that's gross, but so is a hair, or a toenail, etc. eww.
Becoming Harry via Polyjuice Potion

'essence of someone' for the Polyjuice Potion (it's Pixie Stix)



After everyone was present (we had: Harry, Ron, Hermione, Luna, Luna #2, Ginny, Prof Snape, Lily, Prof Trelawney, Draco's Long Lost Sister, Bellatrix, Pansy Parkinson, and Dobby)
 

....it was time to head off to hunt Horcruxes.

I forgot to take a photo of them last night, so here is one I took a couple weeks ago via Instagram:
The Horcruxes
Hunting Horcruxes

The last Horcrux was quite elusive. It was the locket, by the way.


After Horcrux hunting, it was time to settle down for a bit with some trivia.

No surprise here, but the ones who knew the most about Harry Potter trivia? The 3 people that came as Harry, Ron, and Hermione. Funny, eh?

Next, we traveled down to the Quidditch Pitch.

There weren't enough people to make full teams, so we combined houses to make Gryffinclaw & Slytherpuff. Gryffinclaw trounced Slytherpuff 180 to 10. Harry Potter found the Snitch in record time- naturally.


Quidditch!

To set up the course, I used 6 Hula Hoops and 12 stakes and twine. I actually used some of my dad's tobacco sticks (we used to grow tobacco). I tied 1 hoop to 2 sticks with the twine. Then I used 3 dodge balls, 2 blue for the Bludgers and 1 red for the Quaffle. The Snitch was an actual person who went off the field and hid. The Seekers went to seek her... haha. The game was played a bit like dodge ball meets basketball meets soccer. If you had the Quaffle and were hit, you had to drop the ball and it was fair game. The point, of course, was to get it through one of the hoops at the end, while the Keeper tried to keep it out. They had a LOT of fun playing!

After Quidditch, it was time to cool down with some tasty potions. I had an assortment of colored drinks in mason jars, labeled with names: Gillywater, Pondslime, Leechjuice, Honeywater, Nettlewine, & Moondew. Then I had different colored sugars in antique looking containers with names such as: Nightshade, Lacewing Flies, Moonseed, Crushed Scarab Beetles, & Powdered Mandrake Root. I had a few other containers with liquids: Acromantula Venom (honey), Syrup of Hellebore (light corn syrup), and Phoenix Tears (um, that was just water). They mixed to their delight and then drank up! Some liked it so much they made more.

Potions Class!
I made the labels with graphics from Digitalscrapbookplace.com
The small glass jars came from  Hobby Lobby, I got them when
they were 50% off, making them between $1 & $1.25.






The fun was adding Pop Rocks to the drinks, they pop and sizzle in your cup! Magic!

On to the Pensieve!

I knew I wanted to do a Pensieve, but I couldn't find containers for the memories. I wanted quarter machine plastic bubble containers, but could only find them in bulk. Finally I found these cool diamond shaped plastic containers in a Wedding section.


I put glitter in the water, and then floated the memories. Inside each shell was a favorite part from the book series. I also put a tiny glow stick in each one. This was a really fun part of the night. Someone would fish out a memory, read it aloud, and then we'd all discuss it. Some of the memories were: Hogsmeade Weekends, "Yer a Wizard, Harry", Ron & Hermione's kiss, Draco Malfoy 'The Incredible Bouncing Ferret', Fred & George's Hogwarts fireworks display, Snape's memories, and more. This elicited not only good discussions, but cheers, and laughter at times.


Wizard Dueling was next on the list. This was simply 2 people facing off in a posing contest. This is much funnier than it sounds. They would start together and then pace off steps (like in the Chamber of Secrets movie), then I'd count down, and they'd turn and pose in their best 'spell casting stance'. Winners were chosen via applause. The victor would then go on to face the next person and so on. One of the highlights of the night took place during this time when Harry and Ginny faced off. They never got so far as casting a spell because they started arguing about paying bills and Harry spending too much time at the pub with Ron!


By this time it was getting pretty dark, as you can see from the above photo.
The last event of the night was shopping at Honeyduke's Sweet Shop.

They all got bags with the Honeyduke's logo & filled 'em up!

(you can find the great pre-made Honeyduke's logo that I used here on Bakingdom).

This is what they got:

The goods!

Peppermint Toads- recipe here

Acid Pops: Jolly Rancher suckers & Pop Rocks

Candy Corn

Dementor Relief- Hershey Bars.
I found the great Dementor Graphic here.

Drooble's Best Blowing Gum
Chocolate Frogs- OF COURSE.
recipe here

Dumbledore's Favourite! Lemon Drops


Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans.
I found the template on Deviantart.

 
Jelly Slugs!
I was just going to use gummy worms until I found these great
"Sluggies" by Willy Wonka.





What everyone went home with: Bag full of Honeyduke's Candy,
Floo Powder, Butterbeer Bottle, wand & quill.

Here's the Floo Powder 
Just green, white, and silver glitter of course


The Quills were simple enough as well, I just bought white feathers and cheap pens that you can take the ink tube out of.  Here's a tutorial.

Some of the fonts I used for my packaging logos are: Lumos, Felix Titling, Parchment, Vademecum, & Times New Roman. The owl on the Floo Powder label is from a font called Birds of a Feather.

Well, I think we've come to the end here.

I hope you've enjoyed reading about my Harry Potter party.

Man, I'm tired! I also cannot wait to do it again!

QUESTIONS? COMMENTS? Post them below! :)

Tina

OH!

Did you want to see me? Well, please forgive my self portrait, but here I am, as Dobby, post freeing, when he wore some crazy mad get ups.

Enjoy ;)


P.S. If you haven’t already,  you can ‘like’ my Facebook page here, and follow me on twitter here, and you can follow me on instagram here.


Shared at:
Michelle'sTasty Creations
Tip Junkie
What's Cooking, Love?
Something Swanky
It's A Hodgepodge Life
Six Sisters Stuff 








31 comments:

  1. That must have been one heck of a party, Tina! I wish I could've been there :)

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  2. Tina, you could probably make money hosting these parties for people.
    -Alissa

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  3. But wasn't there REALLY a thunderstorm on the date of Harry's actual 11th birthday? Mother Nature was just trying to make it authentic for you and you didn't appreciate it!

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  4. You're right, I definitely didn't appreciate it, Elisabeth... at all. lol!

    Thanks Sue & Antoinette!

    Alissa, if only people in our area paid for party planning, haha :) Thanks!

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  5. Wow, coolest party ever! I'm so glad it didn't storm again!

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  6. Such an awesome party! thanks for the recipes and decoratng tips!

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  7. Oh Tina it looked magnificent! I wish I could've been there!!! You all seemed to have a blast and it all looked so perfect! You're a "wiz" with creative projects :)

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  8. I can't believe how cool this looks- I WISH WE WERE FRIENDS!!! Seriously, the detail and all the hard work you put in paid off enormously. I wasn't even there, and everything makes me so happy!

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  9. How exciting! Great idea, hummm. found you at Creative Thursdays.

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  10. Wow! My husband is a Harry Potter freak. This would be such an amazing birthday for him. I might just have to do this. Such wonderful ideas!! We used to dress up for the movies as Prof Lupin and Tonks. Thanks so much for the inspiration!!

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  11. OMg !!!! love love LOVE!!!! I am so jealous. I want to go to a HP party like that! Great job!

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  12. WOW! I LOVE THIS! So creative.
    Im having a Harry Potter party this month and you gave me some really great ideas!
    Thank you!

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  13. I am sooo inspired with your HP party for I am a Potter fan too. Thanks for posting :)

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    1. Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it, my fellow Potter fan :)

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  14. LOVE this! I'm planning an HP party for my daughter's Sweet 16 (7/4/13). Lots of fun ideas for me to borrow! THANKS! Found you through Pinterest & promptly pinned this party.

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  15. I hope it'll be amazing and also enjoyable. Thanks for share the party news.

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  16. Congrats Tina !!! Great job....

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  17. These are some of the best HP party ideas I have seen. I am planning a party for my son's 9th birthday and he is going to L-O-V-E this!

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  18. I LOVE THIS!! Thank you for sharing your ideas! Yay Harry Potter!!

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  19. We had one for my daughter's 8th this past March and it was so much fun for me to plan. I spent hours online and found your site and Darla's, amongst others, in January and the vortex known as Pinterest. I have a huge file still of all Harry ideas, I am hoping she will want another Harry party in the future. It was fun with small details and all of the baking--we did a Honeyduke's as well. It really is a great theme to run with, so many details you can add.

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  20. This is amazing. THank you so much for sharing.

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  21. I am totally bookmarking this in my computer. My husband and I are such HUGE HP fans that he recently got me (a bookworm) to play Xbox 360 Harry Potter Lego Years 1-4. (I am now on 5-7). One of our friends is talking about having a HP themed wedding! Thanks for all the creative info.

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  22. This is so awesome that I want to cry! I'd love to throw a party like this!!

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  23. I'm actually throwing a Hogwarts party soon and this has been so helpful! I can't seem to find the how to on the wands or quills though, if you could email me about it at fourscorebrando@gmail.com I would greatly appreciate it.

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  24. I don't know if you posted it or not but did you post the template of the dementor relief chocolate bar cover as it's awesome and would be a great addition to my party :)

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  25. I don't, sorry. The image wasn't mine, so I didn't feel comfortable making it available.

    They are easily made in photoshop though :)

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  26. Thank you! It looks like it was a lot of fun! I can't wait until our Harry Potter party next month

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