Harry potter party ideas

[ChrisjenAvasarala]

Hi all, struggling a bit so hoping the hive mind can help.

The kids want to have some friends over to watch Harry Potter, so we're going to do movies 1 & 2. I'm going to make our usual butterbeer recipe and also chocolate frogs with rice crispies inside and chocolate frogs with a mellow filling, and some jelly slugs so that's the sweet stuff sorted but I need some more ideas to make it a fun Harry Potter day.

My kids are 5 and 7 so their friends will range from 5 to around 8, and there will only be a handful of them but if anyone has any ideas for something fun we could do that would be a huge help.

Thanks!

*mallow filling

Twiglets - very small wands. You're welcome. 😁

Have you looked on Pinterest? There’s tons of HP stuff on there.

I downloaded a good 'Would you rather" Harry Potter game. Same age kids.

My best thing EVER was the sorting hat though. DH was in the other room with a microphone and a camera trained on the hat, he did a brilliant job of sorting everyone there with specific references to their appearance. It was hilarious.

Games wise, you could see if you can find a golden snitch piñata... or even make one?!
You could do pin the wand on the wizard/witch (a variation of pin the tail on the donkey). Musical statues could be when you shout out a ‘spell’ they have to freeze and the m sit you could make up some sort of sorting hat game!

The tickets thing is genius! Will be using that!

I have googled, but wanted to get some ideas from people who have done it themselves, so I avoid the rubbish stuff!

Sorting hat is fantastic, and will remember that for when we have their larger birthday party!

*twiglets!!
I'm not doing well with auto correct tonight

I did a HP party for DD a few years ago,

I bought some material which had a brick pattern on the front and turned our front door into the entrance on platform 9 3/4.

I made about 100 lanterns out of toilet rolls and stuck them on the ceiling. Check Pinterest for pictures of how people have done this.

We made potions from instructions found online and I made a wanted poster frame 'have you seen this wizard?' and each child had their photo taken in it. We also did a HP quiz I found online. I sorted them into 'houses' (teams) first with a sorting hat and a sorting hat app.

Could you get some witches brooms and a few balls to play quidditch. Or just have flying races in the garden.

Potion making class - could have fun with food dyes and labels on empty jars.

A photo booth - print off some pictures online and attach to sticks.

Print off a large picture of dobby - pin the sock on dobby.

Golden snitch Pinata? If you have time you Could paper mache a balloon - paint it golden and add wings. Fill with treats jelly beans would be good (every flavour beans)

I would love to throw a Harry potter party 😍

I did a HP party for my daughter. For games we had,
Quidditch trials, running around the garden on a broomstick and batting a gold balloon (snitch) with a rolled up newspaper (beater)
L umos spell (sparklers)
Ancient runes - a coded message which lead to treasure. I found a sticker on eBay which said Ministry of Magic - Flush to Enter. I stuck it on the toilet and it's still there 5 years later.

You guys are fantastic. The 5 year old turns 6 in May, so I've got a decent amount of time to plan. The movie marathon will be like a mini trial run to see how the butterbeer etc goes down. But the ideas are great.

I'm googling like a crazy person for Hogwarts wall decals or wallpaper or anything that I can cover the living room walls with to make it look like the inside of the great hall. Failing miserably, so might be spending my days until May painting lengths of paper with atone arches!

My other idea is to make my entrance hall into the "great hall" with the stone arches decals and floating candles, then make the living room into the Gryffindor common room, and put a portrait of the fat lady on the living room door and then just going loads of red and orange throws and visions around the place!

Yy to potions class with volcano mix and green food colouring

Dementor pinata.

Wand choosing (bought wands from etsy tho should have made them, and had then instead of party bags)

Use wands for Charms lesson. Kids having to use them to keep balloons in air while bellowing Wingardium Leviosa.

Is the only decent party I've ever done

I want a Harry Potter party!

I'm 30 so probs too old but I am praying my daughter gains interest when she's older!

All these ideas are fantastic. So jealous.

The childminder who looks after my DSs just did a party like this for her son - she made fab flying key decorations and was asking if I wanted them today as she knows I’m Potter-obsessed. I do but DH wouldnt be impressed if I had a permanent flying key installation set up in the hall. She’d just got loads of little keys off eBay and put little paper wings on.

Do you know anybody you could borrow a giant chess set from?

You could also have ‘potions’ in different shaped bottles and people have to guess what they are. Or one ‘poison’ (juice with Tabasco in or something) and they need to work out a riddle to avoid that one.

Ooh and do you know anyone with a VR headset? There must be a ‘flying a broomstick’ game, surely. If not there is one called ‘Waltz of the Wizard’ which is fairly child friendly and you can make potions and do magic.

And for party bags you could give them all a sock! (Other one rolled up inside). You can get gryffindor socks on eBay. Add a chocolate frog or some Bertie botts beans and you’re done!

I’m so excited. I now want to have this party...

Sorting hat for picking teams for team games, making wands (chopsticks, glue gun, brown paint and a few accessories)

I printed the invitations on parchment paper to look like a Hogwarts letter.

We also did a platform 9 3/4 entrance but used brick look wallpaper.

We did a sorting hat.

We did some kitchen sink science experiments as our “potions” class.

We decorated plain chopsticks (wands) and learned some spells.

We had a magical creatures scavenger hunt round the house

Before the party I painted the bottom of plastic drinks cups with food colouring, let it dry and then poured ice into the cups. When we added lemonade each cup was “magically” a different colour.

I filled the dinning room with loads of battery operated tea light candles for our floating candles and used our Halloween decorations.

Quidditch obviously.

It was great fun.

The thing that started it is my friend owns a land train hiring out service, so he's going to collect the kids from one spot in the train and drive them down to the house. So that will be Hogwarts express.

The key thing is great! That's an idea for maybe moving through to potions class. Maybe I could hang them down, and give most of them white wings but then a few with coloured wings and each kid will need to grab a certain colour in order to 'proceed to potions class. Knocking balloons arou d with a wand though whilst bellowing wingardium leviosa... that might be my favourite thing ever.

Right, thank you guys. The party planning is well underway now!

Here's a party trick someone told me they did, which can work for younger kids: making them believe they have Apparated. Someone told me that when they did it, the expression on each child's face was priceless. It needs two adults to make it happen, and only one kid can Apparate at a time. It's a bit elaborate, but here's how to do it.

Stand the child in the middle of a room. Point out their starting place (cushion or low stool) at one end of the room, and where they will finish up, at the other end of the room. You could use a hoop, as they do in the book. Tell them that they must jump forwards off the stool, and they will end up in the hoop. Because the magic is very secret, they have to be blindfolded. While you cover their eyes and spin them round, the other adult should quietly move the stool to near the place where they will finish. Lead the child to the stool, talking to them to distract them, so they think they are going where they first saw it. Warn them not to take their blindfold off after they jump, or they might get Splinched.

Help them to stand on the stool, then say "Destination, Determination, Deliberation", and tell them to jump. Before you take off their blindfold, the stool should quickly be moved back to where it was before. Then they are allowed to see: and if you've done it right, they will believe they Apparated from one end of the room to the other!

Miane the dried food colouring at the bottom of paper cups is genius!

We made potions with clear bubble bath, gems, edible glitter and then wrote the ingredients on it like a spell in parchment paper. That went down a treat. The bubble bath I put in big glass flasks and then decanted all the dyes and glitters into little pots and bottles with spoons and fancy labels.
They took their bubbles home in pretty glass jars from hobby craft and that made up part of their party bag.

We also did pin the lightening bolt on the Harry! That was funny.

I had a big load of Harry Potter dressing up and props and an instamatic Polaroid camera so they had pics done.

I also have a smoke machine which was cool for the atmosphere.

Wayward all credit to Pinterest!

If you do a bit of wand waving over each cup it looks fairly impressive.

You do need the ice on top to disguise it.

letsgomaths I love it!