After everyone made it successfully on to the train it was time to pick up their school supplies. Keep in mind they all have wands already (from a previous wand making event) and the invitation stated that they could bring their own Hogwart’s approved pet if they liked, so it was a brief shopping trip. Brief for them maybe, but this is where a lot of my time was dedicated. For those who didn’t bring a pet but still wanted one, we have Eeylops Owl Emporium:
Ok, so that isn’t what took a lot of time. For the first time in EVER, I will say thank goodness for all those stuffed animals. I can truly not believe we could come up with that many “approved” animals (except the eagle, which the birthday girl swore was “close enough”.)
Then it was on to class supplies:
The birthday girl and her supplies. Everyone needed to pick up a cauldron, 3 textbooks, and a pair of ear protection. You can see “Unfogging the Future” here. Most of the text from this amazing, generous site though I added sketches of what each “tea leaf” symbol would look like so they could decipher theirs during class.
A not so little potions textbook. The title and author are taken directly from the school supply list that was in the invitation (and that was taken straight from the actual book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone). The information inside is mostly copied and pasted (and then heavily re-formatted) from here.
The last book was not critical for any of the classes but they all enjoy learning and practicing the spells and sometime there is even a little Dueling Club going on.
They do all have a spell book already but it was big and not very pretty and I really wanted them to have a pocket sized reference book. It is a quarter sheet of paper size.
A peek inside. The spells were found here (again, truly such an amazing and helpful site for this party, downloads galore) and here. Finding the information = not the hard part. Formatting it so it is pretty, the right size, and in the right order for a double sided, fold in the middle book = some major dedication.
And finally, ear protection. Bet you can guess what we are doing in Herbology.
A GIANT thanks to my mom for saving the day on this one. I went into planning this class thinking it would be easy to just borrow earmuffs from friends. HA. My girls each have a pair, that makes 2. A friend had 2 pair to loan….we are up to 4. There were 2 pair of manly ear protection in the workshop in the garage (maybe the boys will like those better than fluffy, cute ones anyway?). We are up to 6 pairs now. Could not find anyone else that had earmuffs. Ack. Do not want anyone dying from hearing the scream of the mandrake. Well it turns out, if you look hard enough, you can find ANYTHING on the Internet…like say a pattern to knit your own earmuffs. Then my mom, who is a whiz knitter, just whipped up the last 5 pair….and they are adorable! Keep in mind that I had a little something to do with the sewing part which might explain why they are not a uniform size and shape.
More party stuff next week…classes, the Great Hall, and Honeydukes. Happy Friday!
We were SO impressed with the world of Harry Potter! Fun! Fun! Fun!
Thank you again