The Slytherin Locket

Farther back view of the Slytherin Locket with the corked vial of beads next to it.

Another post, this one on how to make your own Slytherin Locket.
We made this one entirely from scratch, and unfortunately, it does not open like a typical locket. We based it, not off of the one in the movie, but off of this one:

Here is the 'Adult' cover for the seventh and final Harry Potter book.

So if you want to make on as it looks on the movie, you'll have to make up your own alterations.

ITEMS NEEDED:

• Clay
• Green beads, sparkles, rhinestones etc.
• String of any sort; can be plastic, but ought to be wide enough to see. If you wanted to spend a bit more money for a more authentic look you could also purchase a chain at your local craft store.
• Gold Spray Paint
• Toothpicks, needles etc. for carving into the clay
• Wax paper, newspaper etc. for minimizing mess

Directions:

1. Basically what we did here was we took some of out handy-dandy clay purchased at the dollar store (the kind that does not need baking) and rolled it into an oval. Then I put the clay onto a piece of wax paper and flattened out the back slightly.
2. Next I smoothed out the clay as much as I could and took a second chunk of clay, which I formed into a small "S". I laid that out over the locket base and smoothed it out again.
3. After you've smoothed it out you can take your toothpicks, needles, etc. and carve the desired design into the clay. You must also make indents to place the green gems/beads (or whatever you plan to decorate the locket with) into.
4. When you're happy with how it looks, allow it to dry overnight. Meanwhile, you can make the chain. We just had some white GIMP string lying around (it's just flat plastic 'string') that we used. You'd be all right if you used any sort of string. This is just to make the locket into a necklace. We took three long strands of the white GIMP and spray painted it gold. When it dried we braided it so that it resembled a chain. You could also use an existing necklace chain if you so desired.
5. When your clay has dried, spray paint it gold as well. Next, to give it that "Slytherin" vibe, we're going to add the green accents. I found these adorable corked bottles of beads at my local dollar store for a dollar and a bit, and they are the perfect shade of dark green. However, rhinestones, glitter, or even just green paint would work just as well.
6. To get the beads on the locket I took a BBQ skewer and dipped it into some glue, then carefully dabbed it into the hollowed out area for the beads. I put the locket in a container and poured some beads over it, then shook the excess off and put the beads still in the container back into the corked bottle of beads. I had been hoping to find some dark green paint lying around, but no such luck. The only reason I wanted the dark green paint was so that if any of the glue showed through it would look funny, whereas the green would disguise that.

In any case, I did more dabbing and gluing until the locket was finished. Then we let it dry, and our next task is to glue the spray painted GIMP onto the back of it. Excess "chain" could be used to make a time-turner chain.

Here is the final result of the Slytherin locket close-up.

>>Back to the Table of Contents

The Letters/Invitations--Acceptance Letters and Equipment List

There are six parts to this post, although I've split them up for ease of reading. This is the first post.

Table of Contents:

 

1. Acceptance letters and Equipment list 

 

2. Platform 9 3/4 tickets 

 

3. Inner Envelope 

 

4. Outer Envelope 

 

5. How to stain your paper 

 

6. Wax Seal tutorial

HOGWARTS ACCEPTANCE LETTER

We wanted to make the invitations look as close to the Hogwarts Acceptance letters as possible, and keep the cost as low as possible, so as a result just about everything is handmade. Again, we'll add in alternatives for people to suit the items you have available. I've also uploaded some templates of things at MediaFire.com so that you can alter them to suit your needs.

First off, the from-the-book invitation with the 'acceptance speech' on it. Here's a link to the file on MediaFire.com. It's a Microsoft Word 2007 file. And here's the one we actually sent out, with some different text to explain the party to people. All of the text is in text boxes because I used two different fonts, Edwardian Script ITC and Scriptina Pro. Edwardian Script ITC came with my computer, but I'm sure you can Google it or substitute a different font if you wish. For the Scriptina Pro font, here's the link, I downloaded it at dafont.com. If you're not sure how to install fonts on your computer, all you do is:

1. Download the font to somewhere on your computer and find it.
2. Right click the file and click "Extract Here", or "Extract".
3. You'll probably get some sort of WinZip dialogue. Tell it to extract it onto your computer, preferably the same place you are now.
4. Another file (or more) should show up now. One of them should say that it's a "TrueFont" file (or something of the sort). You can delete all of the other files except for this one; that's the only one you'll really need.
5. Go to the start button at the bottom left of your screen and click Start -> Control Panel (for earlier versions it might be Start -> Settings -> Control Panel). I have a Windows Vista, so controls will likely be different for other computers.
6. In the Control Panel window, find the file labelled "Fonts" (you can search for it with the search box if you like). Open up that folder and you should see a whole bunch of fonts in there that are the same file type as the one that you saved above (after extracting it from the WinZip file).
7. Find the downloaded font (in this case, Scriptina Pro) and right-click it. Click "Cut".
8. Go into the Fonts window and right click. Press "Paste".
9. It should briefly say that it's installing the font onto your computer.
10. Open up any program and use your new font!

If these instructions are confusing you there's dozens of other ones out there on the internet if you Google it.

All right, if you're wondering about why there is two different fonts, it's because I thought that the Edwardian Script ITC capital letters were too curly and unrealistic (to be handwritten) looking so I found the Scriptina Pro font. However, Scriptina's letters, when all used, look ridiculously curly and are far too distracting. Therefore I made a combination of both, with Scriptina Pro as the capital letters and Edwardian Script ITC for the lowercase letters.

HOGWARTS EQUIPMENT LETTER

When the letters were printed off (and customised with each guest's last name) we made an accompanying "Equipment" letter that detailed the items that guests must bring to the party (i.e. a sleeping bag, and winter clothing for outdoors since some of our activities were taking place outside in the snow). It also mentioned the Dobby's Sock Contest that we held. You can omit the contest or you can put another contest of your liking etc. in there. Here is the link to download the Equipment list on MediaFire.

>>Back to the Table of Contents

Snitches -- The Deathly Hallows version with Resurrection Stone

The Deathly Hallows version of the snitch. They turned out really well, everyone was thrilled!

Hello, all!
FlightlessPhoenix and The 5th Marauder here. This is our first post for this blog, and it's on snitches! We're making a few different kinds of snitches, depending on the use.  The first sort of snitch that we made is from the last movie. If you have not read/watched the last book/movie, SPOILER ALERT!

***
***
***
Space to stop
reading if you
don't want to
spoil the book/movie
for yourself 
***
***
***

Introduction and Table of Contents

Hello, Potter fans!

This blog will walk you through the steps I took to make a memorable Harry Potter Party for my friends and I. This party was intended for adolescents and it also occurred in the wintertime, so I will make notes and changes where a different activity could be substituted for a younger audience or for a summertime activity.

This idea came into being in October 2011, and the party took place January of 2012. All of the guests were in their teens (proving that Harry Potter never gets old!). However, the more time you dedicate to planning your party the more memorable it will be – even with three months we felt we could have used more time!

I highly recommend getting an early start to your planning -- why not start today? -- and to set the actual party date a few months into the future so that you have ample time for planning as this sort of party is meant to stimulate hard-core older Harry Potter fans and therefore needed to be interesting and detailed.

On that note, I hope you enjoy what this blog has to offer.

--FlightlessPhoenix<3

P.S. I'm making a Table of Contents that I will update as I post more. So far here are links to each of the pages along with brief explanations of the subject:
P.P.S. I have also recently added a new feature: The Shopping List tab. It can be found at the top, there is a bar that says "Home" and then says "Shopping List". The purpose of this shopping list is to be a quick and easy way to look up what things you will need for each project before beginning. It has links to the posts.
Some of the posts are not found in the "Shopping List" tab, such as the Marauder's Map tutorials and some of the Letters/Invitations posts because all you need is a printer and some paper :)

TABLE OF CONTENTS


1. Snitches -- The Deathly Hallows version with Resurrection Stone
*****SPOILER ALERT*****This post contains a tutorial on how to make your own snitch which opens up to reveal a home-made Resurrection Stone.


2. Acceptance Letters and Equipment List

This post has links to download an alterable template for your own Hogwarts Acceptance Letter and the Equipment list that follows. Inside this post is a mini table of contents because it is technically one large post split up into six. All of the posts within this 'large post' begin with the title "The Letters/Invitations--" and then the subtitle which is listed in this table of contents.

3. The Slytherin Locket

The Slytherin Locket post has a tutorial on how to make your own Slytherin Locket as seen one of the cover variations for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

4. Platform 9 3/4 tickets
This post has a printable free-for-use Platform 9 3/4 ticket. It was made from scratch in Photoshop Elements 7 and there are links to download the alterable Photoshop file as well.

5. Inner Envelope

There were two envelopes: one for sending, and one that resembled the one that Harry Potter received containing his acceptance letter. This is the inner envelope.

6. Outer Envelope

The second of two envelopes, this one for sending if you wish to send your letters in the mail.

7. How to stain your paper
A very useful tutorial on how to stain your paper and make it look a little older. We use this multiple times throughout this blog such as for the Marauder's Map, the Acceptance Letters, and the Inner Envelope

8. Wax Seal tutorial

This is a material-friendly tutorial on how to make your own "Hogwarts wax seal" using only clay and hot glue.

9. Cauldron Cakes

A cute and quick way to make some signature Harry Potter treats. It also includes the 'icing recipe', which we use a few times in the blog.

10. Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans Recipe

This post will lead you to a collection of interesting ways to give your regular jelly beans the "every flavour" kick it needs to be a Harry Potter sweet.

11. Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans Box Template

Inside this post is a printable template of a Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans box along with a quick tutorial on how to put it together.

12. Chocolate Frogs Box Template

One of the ten unique Chocolate Frog card templates is free to print on this page. This template includes the picture that goes inside of the chocolate frog box as well as the description on the bottom of the box.

13. Chocolate Frogs - How to make Chocolate Frogs When You Don't Have a Mould

Since not all of us have a convenient candy mould of chocolate frogs, I devised this technique that used Turtles (the chocolate) and transformed them into adorable amphibians!

14. How to Make Your Own Broomstick
This is a tutorial on how to make a Nimbus 2000 (or a Firebolt, it really does not matter what you call it). It does not require any woodworking skills and is fairly simple.

15. Floo Powder, Remembralls, and the Golden Egg
These are very speedy and cheap tutorials on how to make these items for looks, goodies for treat bags, or to be used in activities.


16. How to Make Your Own Wands (No Woodworking Skills Required)
This tutorial shows you how to make a quick but sturdy wand out of paper and glue. They look really cool and are quite easy to manipulate to get different shapes.


17. How to Make a Marauder's Map (Party Version)
This tutorial is a simple way to make a stunning Marauder's Map that can be used in activities during your party. Alternatively, see Post 19 for a movie prop version.

18. Philosopher's Stone Tutorial
A short tutorial with four different methods you can use to create your own philosopher's stone. 

19. Marauder's Map: Inside and Outside
This is a free, printable Marauder's Map that you can print out yourself and put together. I scanned in the inside of an actual Marauder's Map so when you put it together it has the map of Hogwarts (if you can decipher it!). Alternatively, see Post 17 for a map you can use for activities during a party.

20. Ministry of Magic Identification Booklet (Printable)
This is another free printable, this time for your own MoM Identification Booklet. There is a movie prop version and also a customizable one. For the customizable one, see the post below.

21. Customizable Ministry of Magic Identification Booklet
A free printable that will allow you to customize your very own MoM Identification Booklet. Provided in two versions, a customizable Photoshop file that will allow you to superimpose a stamp of approval on the booklet, and a flat version so even if you don't have Photoshop or GIMP you can paste in your photo and write in your information.