Harry Potter Birthday

Whitney requested a Harry Potter party for her 9th birthday.  I think the party went well and she said she had fun.  Thank goodness for Pinterest for most of my Harry Potter ideas.

We started off with our traditional activity: coloring pictures and then decorating goody bags.

We gave all the kids a list of items that first years needed from Diagon Alley and some gold galleons and sent them searching.  They all needed a wand and some sea shells and rose petals, etc.

Then when they collected everything we went to several classes.  Our first class was charms.  Using their wands the kids had to keep their balloons "flying" while saying "wingardium leviosa".  Good swish and flicking.

Then was care of magical creatures.  Everyone picked a creature and got to decide its magic powers and name and all that.  One girl was so surprised that we were letting everyone keep their magic creatures.

This was potions class.  This might be Harry Potter's least favorite class but I think all the girls loved this one the most.  We got to make some Exploding Filibusters and Fleeing Spider Eggs.  It was pretty awesome.

For History of Magic we did two teams and answered Harry Potter trivia questions.  Whitney was a whiz at this one.  I was a little surprised that most of the kids didn't know anything about Harry Potter.

Our last class was Defense Against the Dark Arts.  I made a dementor pinata and the kids went to town with it.  Unfortunately, with all the snow we had to do the pinata inside and that messed things up a little.

But none of the kids cared about that as soon as the candy came out.

Whitney is not a huge fan of cake so she chose rice krispy treats.  I made it into a shape of a snake to be Nagini.  It was a lot easier to form than I had been afraid of and it all was eaten quickly so I might start doing something like this for all future parties.  I think Whitney liked being the center of attention as we all sang Happy Birthday.

And drunk butterbeer - which was really a mixture of whatever kind of ice cream and soda pop flavor you wanted.  I tried cookies and cream ice cream with cream soda and it was delicious.

And present opening.  Whitney got a lot of Harry Potter items - like this alarm clock from my mom. 

Phew...I am glad the party is done and my next isn't until the end of August.  Unfortunately, Megan has requested a Harry Potter party.  Aaagh!

Battle of the Books

This is Whitney's Battle of the Books team.  They are all third graders.  It is a state wide competition where the students read 16 books and then battle other teams in the school.  The books can be all elementary levels.  Mostly fourth and fifth grade books.  The team practiced during recess and had a practice at one of their houses.  Then it is a double elimination. So Whitney worked really hard to read all the books.  A lot of them multiple times to be ready for the different competitions.  Then their team got second in the school championship.  First place team gets to go to districts.   So we are super proud of her hard work.  I think the team wants to do it again next year.  I like the competition because it encourages kids to read all kinds of books; they had everything from Among the Hidden to The Lightening Thief to What Was Ellis Island?  So it is pretty cool.  Good Job Whitney!