For Zoe's 6th Birthday she wanted to have a Harry Potter theme (my kids are obsessed with Harry Potter right now). Usually I encourage them to go to Chuck E Cheese or something so I don't really have to do anything especially the clean up the mess part! But I figured what the heck, let's go all out and it will be fun!
First I did the invitations. I dyed card stock with walnut ink I borrowed from my mother-in law. Actually most of my supplies came from my mother-in law as she has a small craft store in her home.
Then I hung them to dry. I actually did the process twice to get a better color. I wanted it to look like old parchment paper.
I found a Hogwarts crest online and put it into word. I rotated the image on its side so I could print 2 to a page.
Then I flipped it over and printed the invite on the other side. It read:
We are pleased to inform you that you have been invited to Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for special mid-term classes in honor of Head Girl Zoe's 6th birthday.
Your class schedule will include orientation and matriculation, potions, care of magical creatures, and defense against the dark arts. There will also be a speial birthday fest featuring treats from Three Broomsticks and Honeyduke's Sweet Shop (Pizza, Cake, and Candy).
Classes will begin at the stroke of 4:30 in the afternoon on Friday, January 22 and conclude at 6:00 in the evening. Please take the Hogwarts Express train (your parent's vehicle)to Hogwarts Academy currently disguised as the Muggle home at (our address).
Please respond by Owl (my email) or Muggle telephone system (my phone number) with a yes or no response. School robes optional. We look forward to your arrival at Hogwarts!
Sincerely,
Michelle Sim
Deputy Headmistress of Frolic and Feasts
Hogwarts Academy
Next I made school notebooks for each child. I gathered some Harry Potter Printable Coloring Pages, a word puzzle, and I made a class schedule. I borrowed a binding machine and used a Hogwarts Crest for the cover page.
When each class was completed I was going to put a sticker by each, but I just didn't have enough time at the party, we cruised through everything really quickly.
My husband made the wands. He purchased wooden dowels and took them to his shop and shaped them. They turned out amazing! The darkest one my mother-in law rubbed with regular cooking oil doesn't it look cool?
Zoe had the idea to do a Hegwig the owl cake. And she wanted chocolate (which shows through white so easily I won't tell you how much frosting I went through to cover it up!) I made the cake from scratch and got the recipe from my Betty Crocker recipe book, it is delicious! I used two rounds and then cut a crescent out of one to fit in the other so it would be the head. Then I did a crumb coat. The frosting is vanilla buttercream from scratch.
On my my next layer of frosting I used a paper towel to smooth the entire surface. It worked really well.
I poored coconut on some parchment paper and rolled the sides of the cake in it (works best when frosting is still wet)
I added a beak with some shaved almonds. Then I shaped out where I wanted the wings to be and put coconut there as well.
Ok I know it looks more like a chickie but I didn't want to cut too much off the sides to make it more narrow because I wanted to make sure I had enough cake for the kids! I used mini oreos for the eyes and cut them in half for the claws. I also crushed them to make the black speckles. I also put coconut around the edge of the face and made a forehead peak with it too. Not too shabby for my first cake and it did taste good!
Ok now the actual party. We ended up with 9 kids who came. While we waited for everyone to arrive I had the first Harry Potter movie playing and fun flavored jellie bellies for the kids to try, I didn't want to get the funky flavored ones.
When everyone arrived first we went to Diagon Alley to get their wands
We played a fishing game over the curtain (my husband was already hiding on the other side when they came in-It was kind of dark too so they were freaked out by whatever was giving them their wands, it was awesome). We just got an old tree branch from outside and used some kite string.
I made a poster for each class. We actually didn't really have time for Defense Against the dark arts but the kids ran around a played with their wands while waiting for the others at the fishing game.
Next we had the children sorted into their houses. I had them pick out stickers I made with house crests on them. I didn't do slitherin. I printed the crests off my computer and used my xyron machine to make them stickers.
I used a witch had we had from Halloween and each child came up and reached in and picked a crest out.
For Care of Magical Creatures I had my daughter Mia show the kids her rat and she told them about it and let them hold/pet it. They liked that. We also have firebelly toads and I had my husband get those out to show the kids too.
Next we played pin the wand on the wizard. The kids had a lot of fun. I drew and colored wands on paper enough for each child, cut them out and put a bit of brown tape on each so they were ready to go and the game would run smoothly.
Then we did potions at the dining table. I put a few drops of food coloring in plastic cups before the kids arrived. Then before I passed them out I dropped a few iced cubes in each to cover the color. I gave them each a can of sprite and told them to wave their wand over their cup say the magic words and poor the sprite in. They loved seeing what color they would get. Then my husband added his fun flair and said the yellow was Ogre Toe Jam, the red was Werewolf Blood ect.
Since we were all at the table at this point it was the perfect time to have pizza, open gifts, and do the cake!
Finally I took the kids in to Honeyduke's Sweet shop for candy. I gave them a paper sack that they could fill up one of each item. My husband had it displayed cute with different glass dishes filled with candy and such and I didn't get a picture! The kids loved picking out their stuff for their party bags!
So there you have it. Zoe's Harry Potter birthday. Her favorite part was the gifts of course. The party was an hour and a half so we moved through everything pretty quick there was virtually no down time which was good but we didn't have quite enough time to do everything, and I'm ok with that!
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