Harry Potter This party was thrown together in one week, so I mainly used ideas from the first book (which I was familiar with).  I printed the invites to read just like the acceptance letter for hogwarts school. I printed the heading in a light gray so that I could trace over it with a green glittery pen without the black print showing through.  I melted a purple crayon to make a wax seal on the back and stamped it with a small star stamper (didn't have an H on hand). I also included the list of school supplies that they would need to purchase during a shopping trip to Diagon Alley: 1 cauldron, 1 hat, 1 robe, 1 book of spells, 1 wand, & ingredients from the apothecary. I purchased a bag of chocolate coins for each child that they had to "withdrawl" from Gringotts bank before their shopping trip. I decorated the living room with signs for each store in Diagon Alley.  They had to pay each store owner with their chocolate coins (the adults loved getting their own goodies).  They each purchased a plastic cauldron that I bought from a party store (close to halloween). I purchased blue and silver star sprays (used to make centerpieces) for 10 cents each and wrapped the bottom with black pipe cleaners to make their sparkly wands (very cute effect).  Robes were made from black tablecloths purchased from the dollar store. I folded them in half and cut a hole in the fold to slip over their head.  I tied a ribbon (in matching house colors) around their waist to pull it together. Madam Maulkin's Robe Shop also had wizard hats with shimmery star stickers to decorate them with. There were pom poms, google eyes, pipe cleaners, feathers, and glue at Eeylops Owl Emporium, so they could make their own owls. At Flourish and Bolts, they purchased a book of spells I printed on the computer and made the cover from black construction paper. I wrote "Book of Spells" in gold glitter glue on the outside.  I used craft recipes and changed the wording to sound like spells.  I included a salt dough recipe and called it "Reconstituted Bones" made from powdered bone mix (flour), ground diamonds (salt), and muggle water. They had to buy potion ingredients from the Apothecary.  I relabled everything to sound like real potion ings. I labeled glow sticks as "Essence of Firefly", Baking soda packets as "Powdered Bones", Pop rocks as "Ground Dragon Tongue", etc. I threw in some chocolate eyeballs and fingers as freebies. I told them that they could return to Diagon Alley after school to visit Honeyduke's candy store. We went through a doorway with a tablecloth sponged to look like bricks for Platform 9 3/4. They found themselves in the Hogwart Banquet Hall.  We focused on the House of Gryfendor since there weren't very many children, so we used red and gold. The table was covered with a red tablecloth, gold plates, harry potter napkins, gold goblets (plastic wineglasses wrapped in gold foil tissue paper from the dollar store). I also wrapped toilet paper tubes in gold foil tissue paper (filled with small goodies) with gold curling ribbon to make wizard crackers, and scattered them around the table. I sprinkled the table with gold star confetti. The centerpiece was a black cansiter filled with pretzel wands (pretzel rods dipped in white chocolate and rolled in star sprinkles).  The kids looked up to find that the ceiling was bewitched to look like the night sky just like the book (Black tablecloth stamped with gold stars--you can tape more than one tablecloth together to reach across the ceiling if you need to depending on the size of the room). My 5 year old daughter actually helped me stamp the tablecloth, and it was great bonding time! I also hung house banners on the wall. I used a brown grocery bag folded into the shape of a witch's hat as the sorting hat, and we assigned each child to the house of Gryfendor.  After they sat down at the table, we realized that the punch bowl was empty!  I told them we would have to have our first potions class to make punch for the party.  We went outside for this one (very messy, but very fun!) We used clear plastic cups.  To them we added powdered bones (baking soda), Snake Venom (vinegar). They were so surprised when their brew came bubbling and overflowing from the cups. Upon smelling them, we decided it was unfit for punch, so we tried one more potion.  We mixed magic fizzy water (sprite) with powdered rainbow essence (Kool Aid). Then we added ground dragon tongue (pink pop rocks). When it popped and sizzled, I explained to them it was hot because of the fiery dragon tongue so we needed one more ingredient to cool it down. Our special ingredient was frozen nightcrawlers (sour gummy worms frozen in fruit punch ice cubes). We were out of punch (and worms) within a few minutes! Once we sat down to our banquet, they "slayed" the Slytherin snake (long french bread loaf sliced and smeared with PB & J and placed together to look like a snake--red licorice string for tongue and 2 black candies for the eyes) We also served a magical shrunken forest (Herb cream cheese spread onto a platter and broccoli florets standing up to serve as miniature trees)  For the adults we had a cauldron (crock pot) of bubbling cheesy bean soup that we served in bread bowls. I held up a bag of cheese puffs and told the kids that we were going to transform them into twisty cheese puffs.  I made them close their eyes and repeat a spell, while my husband handed me a bag of curly cheese puffs ..."Abbra Cadabra, swirly-twirly...transform these puffs from straight to curly!" When they opened their eyes, ta-da, curly cheese puffs. After lunch, we played freeze dance with a twist. The head wizard had to yell a magic word to make everyone freeze in place. We played a game of quidditch with imaginary brooms and a golden snitch (ball wrapped with gold foil). My husband and I used the golden snitch to play keep away from them. We had care of magical creatures class where we had to hatch dragon eggs (black balloons with small rubber dragons inside) to save the young dragons from a dragon eating creature. After the festivites, we left Hogwarts and stopped back by Daigon Alley to visit HoneyDuke's Candy Store.  There were bags of Bertie Bott's every flavor beans (felt circles hole punched around the edge and "sewn" with curling ribbon to make draw string bags filled with jelly bellies), a cup of black licorice wands, mars bars (kitkats re-labeled), pumpkin pastries (little debbie pumpkin cakes), chocolate frogs (gummy frogs dipped in chocolate).  The kids left with a cauldron full of goodies, and they seemed to have a magical time!