Wild About Harry

Despite some logic flaws, some "forced" plot devices, and all of the hype, I will happily admit to being a long-time fan of Harry Potter.

I love the richness of the wizarding culture, the depth of the characters, especially the minor ones, and above all the detail. I LOVE detail! And the Potterverse provides plenty.

I also love the messages that flow throughout: you have choices and they are more important than other people's expectations, the true value of a person has little to do with their ancestry or finances, doing what is right isn't always easy, people aren't "good" and bad" but there are many shades of grey, love is the strongest of all magic, tolerance and acceptance of those who are different than you is important if not vital.

We had the pleasure on Friday of attending the opening day of the Harry Potter exhibit at the Ontario Science Centre. While I found the admission price a bit hefty, I have to say I was truly impressed. The presentation was nicely done, truly bringing the wizarding world to life. The detail was phenomenal. We spent about two hours in the exhibit in all. I especially enjoyed the books, magazines and newspapers, as well as the candy presentations. Hagrid's hut was also spectacular. My sons enjoyed the dark magic and quidditch sections. The portraits, some moving, were also lots of fun, and the costumes were incredible, esp. the dress robes and the Bloody Baron's costume.

We have had lots of fun with Harry Potter. I read the entire series aloud to the family, and a couple of books I re-read aloud. We have held two HP themed birthday parties. We even made the trek to "New Hogsmeade" (New Hamburg, transformed) for the release of book 7. We stayed at a campground on that trip, just like in the quidditch tournament in book 4.

We are planning a 3rd HP themed birthday party soon. This one will be a sleepover with less "pretendy stuff" but lots of themed candy and drinks. I have enough unique ideas for several parties still! From firewhisky (gingerbeer spiked with hot pepper sauce), to homemade Bertie Botts jellybeans (dill, salmon, lavender, onion, cayenne pepper, clove, brewer's yeast and basil flavours), there should be some interesting conversations happening. I also designed a chocolate frog box loosely based on the ones used in the movie, and adapted a wizard card idea from another I found on the web, changing them from rectangular to pentagonal, editing the information to make it fit better on the cards, and adding several new wizards to the mix. Since I did use someone else's work for that part, I will not be sharing those on my site, but I will try and share the ones I did myself. Here is a link to the original:
http://www.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://www.minionsweb.com/images/frog/cards1.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.minionsweb.com/frog.htm&usg=__1OsagBsOjPRJXQzU6IzsHMNKinc=&h=1391&w=1550&sz=759&hl=en&start=5&itbs=1&tbnid=M82A1UU0omBVTM:&tbnh=135&tbnw=150&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dwizard%2Bcards%26hl%3Den%26rlz%3D1B3GGGL_enCA260CA261%26tbs%3Disch:1

One other set of cards I found are here:
http://www.sewhooked.org/crafts/pdf/hp_wizardcards.pdf

Other things I found already done were the butterbeer labels: http://www.costumes.org/tara/photoalbum/potter/butterbeerlabels.jpg
and Bertie Botts jellybean bag template (a bit of a colour ink pig!): http://www.sewhooked.org/crafts/img/ref/bertiebottsbag.jpg

I am also planning to add many new ideas to my wizarding page, and divide it into party ideas and educational ideas. I will add links to knitting patterns, candy templates (like the ones above), and all of the party ideas we have tried thus far (refrigerator box maze, growing jellybeans, talking sorting hat, making your own "Moaning Myrtle", and much, much more! Since I have been searching the net, and creating my own materials, activities and resources for several years, this may become one of the larger sources of Harry Potter related "stuff to do" found on the net.


Currently, the wizarding page has experiments, ideas for further research, games for older kid/teens too), a novel study and some recipes and wizard-theming ideas.
You can see my current wizarding page here. don't forget to check back in May!