For my daughter's 5th birthday, she wanted a Harry Potter party. We did the flying car theme for the plates, napkins, hats, cups, and invitations. Included in the invitations, I did up an acceptance letter to Hogwarts for each guest. I made it out to look like the one Harry recieved. I put in it that the guest would arrive by "Muggle Express" (their parents car) and that we awaited a "howler" (phone call) conforming their acceptance. The day of the party, we hung up posterboard at the road with a picture of a train that said "Muggle Express Turn Here for the Birthday Party". At the house, we put up big signs with a picture of a castle that said "Welcome to Hogwarts". To decorate, we hung up balloon ghost, moons, stars, and lightening bolts. On the pillers of our porch we hung signs for platform 9 and platform 10 and in the center we put a sheet up that said platform 9 3/4 so the kids could walk through it to get in the house. We also have a small work house in the backyard where our German Shepard is chained up, so we put a sign that said "Hagrids House (gaurded by Fluffy)" on it. We hung a ghost in the bathroom and hung a sign on the door that said "Beware of Moaning Myrtle". We put my daughter's presents in a ceder chest and called it Harry's Trunk. When the party started, we had a sorting hat ceremony. I read the sorting hat saying from the book and then each child came down and was placed in a house (my husband drew nametags out of a hat to choose the houses). After everyone was placed, we decided to transform everyone into Harry Potter. I made capes out of black trashbags. To make the wands, I used small dowel rods and wrapped them in black electrical tape with red electrical tape on the ends. I got black rimmed glasses from Oriental Trading.  The next step was to do the classes. The first glass was Divination. In this class we made crystal balls. (baby food jars filled with baby oil, beads, glitter, and a plastic spider or bat and superglue the top on). The next class we had was Potions. In this class, we used food coloring to change the color of bubbles. The kids really enjoyed doing this..mixing the colors was really fun. In Mythical Creatures, we played Pin The Horn on The Unicorn. In Herbology, we planted flower seeds. The kids liked getting to play in the dirt! The final thing we did was the pinata. I announced that Lord Voldemort was seen with the sorcerers stone running through the yard. He had trapped the sorcerers stone (a rock wrapped in brown paper) and Proferssor Dumbledore ( a paper wizard) in the pinata (shaped like a wizard hat) and we had to break it open to get them out before Lord Voldemort destroyed them. When the pinata was finally opened (with some adult help) the kids ran to get the prizes out (we filled it with wizard themed toys and candy) and the ones to find the sorcerers stone and Dumbledore won a prize.  The final thing to do was to head into the great hall for opening of presents and cake and icecream. We also had "Witches Brew" (orange pinapple punch in a cauldron).  Before the kids left, we gave out the goody bags. In them, we put a bendable Harry Potter lookalike that I purchased from Oriental Trading, some wizard themed tattoos also from Oriental trading, some rubber bugs, some play money, a plastic spider ring, and I put regular jelly beans in a baggie and put a sign on the front that read "Bertie Botts Every Flavor Bean...will you get vomit or earwax? Eat if you dare". This was a fairly easy and fun party to do. All 18 kids and even the adults had a good time and can't wait to see what we come up with for next year!