Ollie's Harry Potter party

For Ollie's Birthday we had a surprise Harry Potter party for him.  He wanted to have a party in Utah with his boy cousins but I wasn't sure if there would be time or if everyone would really be able to get together so I planned one with his friends in Texas and then we took the supplies with us to Utah and had another Harry Potter party in Utah.  The party in Utah wasn't a surprise nor a birthday party.  Both parties were a lot of fun and Ollie had a blast!
We arranged for him have a play date with a friend so he was gone for a few hours before the party...  this gave us some time to set up.  This party required a lot of planning and set up...

 We had two classes that the kids got to attend.  They got to go to potions class and make three different potions.  The first one was Felix Felicis (liquid luck), then Polyjuice Potion (changing into someone else), then we had lots of different (gross) ingredients on our stock table and they got to invent their own potions and drink them if they wanted.

 We also had a care of Magical creatures class where the kids got to make their own creature.  I had playdoh with tons of different craft supplies.  I also hung up some pictures of different magical creatures from the Harry Potter books.

 We created our own Hogwarts Express platform complete with a "brick" wall.  My creative hubby helped me by figuring out the wall. :)

 We made magic wands and had Harry Potter glasses to give everyone.  Another shout out to my awesome hubby for making the awesome wands!

 And then Ollie came.  He was super excited!  He had a blast playing with his friends.

 Everybody got to pick a wand with the birthday boy getting first pick and then the kids all practiced their spells with their wands for a few minutes.

 While we waited for Ollie we all got some lightening shaped scars.

Cute Harry Claire Potter had to keep her head tilted up to keep her glasses on.

 After the wands came some lunch of pizza and snacks.

Then it was off to potions class

The kids loved making the potions.  I experimented ahead of time and found some fun ingredients that would fizz and bubble and such.  The kids really liked it.  I noticed that the kids automatically ended up with a girl table and a boy table, except Lily who wanted to be at Ollie's table.  (Lily also choose to dress up as a witch for the party.)

After potions we headed to care of Magical creatures class to create our own creatures.

Then we finished off by opening presents.

Ollie had a great time and I think it will be something that he will remember for a long time.  :)


Our Utah Harry Potter was the same with a few changes.  Utah is FREEZING cold in December so everything was inside.  We did care of Magical creatures first and then potions to make the clean up between classes easier.  (I didn't take pictures of the decorations again but we did haul them with us and set them all up again.)

 Cousins with their magic wands.

 Making our creatures...  they were all very creative!

 Potions class...  nothing like mixing, pouring, fizzing, and mess to make a child happy!

 Part of the directions for the potions- jumping jacks and push ups

We had a blast having the party with our cousins.  It was fun to have some time to watch all the boys interact.
Ollie had tons of fun at both Harry Potter parties.  It was a lot of work and effort but it was worth it for my sweet boy!