Harry Potter Mania!

*Warning: Very Long and Very NERDY post to follow*

I have long been a huge fan of the Harry Potter books and movies. I have read all of the books many times, and anxiously awaited the release of each new movie, especially the finale, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, part 2. I have wanted to do something Harry Potter themed for a while, but never really got around to it. Now that the end is here, I decided to go all out and throw a party. When throwing a Harry Potter Party, you have to go BIG or go home. I tried to make it a really memorable party. Planning it was so much fun. The excitement and anticipation during the preparations was as much fun as the party itself. We had an awesome group of people that were willing to play along and revel in the nerdiness!

The Invitations:

I found a replica of Harry's acceptance letter to Hogwart's and modified it for the invitation to the party.

It was then delivered to all the guests by owl post, of course.

The Sorting Ceremony:

No Harry Potter Party would be complete without a sorting ceremony. So without further ado... 

The Sorting Hat

The Sorting Hat might be my favorite creation for the party. I bought an old leather jacket at D.I., and then cut it up and sewed it back together using a pattern for a witch's hat. The hardest part of the whole process was trying to form the face. I crumpled it up into the best face I could, and then safety pinned the folds so they would stay. Then I sprayed the whole thing with fabric stiffener until it dried pretty hard. When it was dry, I removed the pins and VOILA!... a sorting hat. 

Jonathon was in charge of the actual sorting ceremony. He recorded some little sound clips about each house and then modified his voice using Garage Band. Then he put all the sound clips into itunes and hit the shuffle button. That made the sorting of the teams completely random, and completely awesome! It was pretty darn impressive. 

In the descriptions below, I have included Jonathon's clips because I thought they were pretty clever. During the actual sorting ceremony, all the guests were thinking (and saying) the same thing... 

"Not Slytherin, Not Slytherin!" 

Team Hufflepuff:

Corey and Brittany

"Hmmm... You're kind of hard to read. You're friendly, but I don't really know what to do with you... There's a place for people we don't know what to do with... HUFFLEPUFF!"

Team Ravenclaw:

Michelle and Jared

"Wow! We've got a real Einstein here. Do you even know what your I.Q. is? I know just what to do with you... RAVENCLAW!"

Team Slytherin:

Melodie and Gabe

"Hmm... You love to be in positions of power. You'll step on anyone to get to the top, won't you? SLYTHERIN!"

Team Gryffindor:

Darrell and Stephen

"Now let's see... you're brave and you're daring. Oh, and you're quite charming too if I do say so myself. GRYFFINDOR!"

The Food:

Shortly after the sorting ceremony, we had "The Welcoming Feast". All of the food served came from the Harry Potter books. I even found them on Harry Potter Wiki (Did you even know such a thing existed?) and printed out a little description of the food and where it was mentioned. The majority of food mentioned in the books were desserts and sweets, so our spread had plenty of those items, but I tried to have some "healthy" appetizers too. 

The appetizers:

*ham and cheese rolls

*Vol-au-vents 

*English Muffins

*Fruit

Desserts/Honeydukes Sweets:

*Treacle Tart (Harry's favorite food-- made from golden syrup and black treacle found at our local Bristish food shop)

*Pumpkin Pasties 

*Chocolate Frogs (Thanks for the frog mold, Hannah!)

*Peppermint Toads

*Golden Snitches (Ferrero Rocher chocolates with wax paper wings)

*Lemon Drops

*Licorice Wands (licorice dipped in white chocolate)

*Jelly slugs

And of course, BUTTERBEER!  

Jonathon whipped up a mean batch of butterbeer. It was extremely tasty. He used cream soda mixed with butterscotch ice cream syrup and then a whipped cream and butterscotch foam topping. YUM!

The Welcoming Feast

Treacle Tart and Pumpkin Pasties

Peppermint Toads, Snitches, and Chocolate Frogs / Lemon drops, Licorice Wands, and Jelly Slugs

After dinner, we started with our games. We decided to have a House Cup Tournament between the 4 teams. It involved 3 different games with the winning team receiving the trophy and bragging rights.

Task #1: O.W.L.'s and N.E.W.T.'s (Harry Potter Trivia)

After everyone was sorted, we started our first game. Each team had to answer a series of trivia questions about the Harry Potter books and movies. The O.W.L.'s were multiple choice and intended to be easier, while the N.E.W.T.'s were short answer and were to separate the average followers from the die-hards. The teams all did surprisingly well and Gryffindor and Slytherin tied for first with a score of 56 out of 70 points possible.

A sample N.E.W.T. question:

Q: What was the name of the Weasley's owl that was old and clumsy?   (anyone? anyone?)

A: Errol

The test takers were quite intense with their work...

Task #2: Wizard's Duel

The second game was a wizard's duel between the houses. Each team was given a "cheat sheet" with the names of some spells from Harry Potter. Two people squared off against each other with their wands at the ready. Then they were presented with a situation, and the one to get the correct spell first was declared the victor.

Example:

Situation: Shield Yourself

Correct Spell: Protego

Stephen cleaned house on this game. Seriously, the boy was good! Most of the time he didn't even need to look at the cheat sheet. Gryffindor took the lead on this task, followed closely by Slytherin. Michelle (from Ravenclaw) was definitely my favorite though. She chose the spell she was going to use before the situation was even presented. If that one didn't work, she just started going down the list. She even won a duel that way! Here is a montage of some of the Duels:

 Task #3: Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Bean Taste Test

In the books, they describe jellybeans that are every flavor imaginable. We found some jellybeans made by Jellybelly that duplicated this idea. They were called "Beanboozled." The box contained pairs of jellybeans that looked identical, but one was a good flavor and one was a nasty flavor. The teams were given 13 different bags of beans and had to guess the flavors. Half of the bags were marked with asterisks and had the potential of being a really nasty flavor. The teams didn't have to try the asterisked ones, but if they at least tried them, they got bonus points.

Some sample flavors: cherry, watermelon, strawberry shortcake, toothpaste, dog food, skunk spray

It is really amazing how accurate the flavors are. You would never believe that a jellybean could taste like skunk spray, but it seriously does. After you eat it, your breath even smells like skunk spray. Ewww!

Team Slytherin won the contest and secured the coveted House Cup Trophy by a slim 5 points over Gryffindor. It was not, however, without some difficulty. Poor Melodie got a really good taste of vomit (voted the worst flavor of the bunch). Her quote, "If this isn't a vomit flavored bean, it will be soon." See for yourself:

The House Cup Champions

SLYTHERIN: Melodie and Gabe!

What a FUN Party, and a GREAT way to celebrate before the final Harry Potter movie!

The Movie:

We had to wait until Saturday to see the movie because our insurance company offered us free tickets to an exclusive showing with free snacks and giveaways. It was too good to pass up. I LOVED the movie! I thought the first 3/4 of the movie was absolutely perfect. It moved along so well and stuck so closely to the book. The ending was great cinematically, but the die-hard in me was a little sad that the ending was a bit different than the book. All of the main components were the same, but they drug it out a little bit with Harry and Voldemort, which I thought wasn't necessary. All in all though, I was so happy to have such a great movie to close out the series. What a fun adventure this has been!

At the theater with our VIP tags

At our party, we also watched this youtube video from BYU's Divine Comedy. We were laughing so hard we were crying. If you watch it, make sure to put the closed caption on.

Inspiration

I have already told so many people about one of my new favorite books, but it has really changed my perspective on life, so I feel it deserves a special blog post too. Jonathon and I just finished reading Carry on, Mr. Bowditch by Jean Lee Latham. It is a young adult, historical fiction novel that was recommended by one of Jonathon's cousins. I am so happy that we read it because we have really been inspired.


The book is written in a simple, no non-sense tone. There is no sensationalism or hype, just pure and simple storytelling. It may seem a little slow to start out, but there is so much wisdom and inspiration in its' pages. The basic story follows Nathaniel Bowditch (a real historical figure) as he grows up in post-Revolutionary War America. He is a genius at math and from a very young age his greatest dream is to attend Harvard University. Unfortunately, at the age of 12 he is indentured by his father to be a shipping accountant for 9 years. This means that he will no longer be able to go to school. Instead of giving up on everything he has ever wanted, he finds another way. Though he may not be able to do things exactly as planned, he takes matters into his own hands and studies in his spare time. When he is not working, he studies math, learns languages, seeks out tutors, and eventually learns the art of navigation. He calls this idea of not giving up and finding a way to achieve your dreams by your own hard work 'sailing by ash breeze.'


Here is an excerpt from the book about "sailing by ash breeze."


"Nat asked, “How do you ‘sail by ash breeze’?”

Sam grinned. “When a ship is becalmed—the wind died down—she can’t move—sometimes the sailors break out their oars. They’ll row a boat ahead of the ship and tow her… Oars are made of ash—white ash. So—when you get ahead by your own get-up-and-get—that’s when you ‘sail by ash breeze’.”(48)

In our lives, when we come up against trials or struggles that seem to stop our progression, physically, mentally, or spiritually, we can do like Nat did and sail by ash breeze. We need to stop feeling sorry for ourselves and use our own strength and determination to make our own destiny instead of just settling for where the current is carrying us. What a fantastic analogy. 

Throughout the entire book, Nat had to sail by ash breeze because he faced one obstacle after another. In the end, Nathaniel Bowditch became one of the most important people in the field of navigation. His book, along with his mathematical calculations is still the foundation which all navigators rely upon. 

Here is one more example from the book that shows this idea:

"Bonnefoy beamed. "Monsieur! You speak French! Why didn't you tell me?"

"I – I – guess I just didn't think of it." 

Captain Prince roared again. "So you didn't think of it? And here I've been expecting all along I'd have to have an interpreter in Bourbon! Have you any more tricks up your sleeve, Mr. Bowditch?"

"No, sir, I – I – don't think so, sir."

"No more languages?"

"Just – just – Latin, sir. I learned that to read Newton's Principia." (112)

Nat spent years learning Latin just so that he could read a physics/astronomy book by Newton. Wow, what motivation and drive!

Jonathon and I have actually found many examples of how we can apply this in our lives. One happened just the other day with Christian. We gave him a watch that we didn't need any more. He was interested in learning to tell time, so we started explaining it to him. Unfortunately, we realized that the numbers on the watch were roman numerals. I told Jonathon that since he didn't have the right kind of watch, we should probably just wait and teach him when he was older. Jonathon said, "No, we should just take Nathaniel Bowditch's example and teach him roman numerals so that he can learn to tell time on his watch." We started working with him and soon he was starting to understand. While we were teaching him, he called the number VII, 52. I think this shows some awfully good reasoning skills for a 4 year old. He will figure it out soon, I am sure. Bowditch believed that anyone was capable of learning and doing anything if they were willing to work at it. We are trying to take on this same attitude in our home. 

When life gets tough and we encounter unexpected obstacles, we just need to "carry on" and "sail by ash breeze."