Planning a magical Harry Potter party for your Hogwarts candidate?
Check out these amazing Harry Potter party games and Harry Potter decoration ideas – they are cheap to set up and will delight budding witches and wizards!
Set up a “Potions Table” and let their imaginations run free – and bonus – they take their own Harry Potter potion and wand home as their Harry Potter party favor in their Harry Potter party bag! Bargain!
Harry Potter Party Game – Potions Table
You will need:
- A cauldron (we used an old fondue set but try the dress ups section at your local dollar store)
- Wrapping paper to use as a table cloth (things will get a bit messy!)
- Diluted essential oils
- One paint brush for each child
- Gaffa tape/ electrical tape
- Dried flowers (optional)
- Two large water jugs
- Scrolls containing spells (paper, instant coffee, ribbon)
- Plastic craft bottles so your guests can take their potion home with them (available from dollar stores or in bulk from Aliexpress)
Creating a magical Harry Potter Potions Party
Harry Potter wands
Take the paint brushes and wrap tape around the brush to create a “handle”. When it comes time to hand out the wands, hold all wands in one hand and ask each child to place their hands on them. Using your other hand, wiggle one to the top – as the wand has “chosen the child” – the key to an amazing Harry Potter party is getting the kids to REALLY believe and this sets the scene beautifully.
Here are some other cool DIY Harry Potter wands
Magical spells
Dissolve 200 grams of instant coffee in boiling water. Stir well and allow to cool. Pour into a long flat baking tray. Carefully dip sheets of A4 (or thin card) into the mix until completely soaked. Hang on the line to dry properly. This will give it a “parchment” look and feel. Allow to hang for longer to get rid of the coffee smell!
Write your spells and directions onto the paper using your best “magical handwriting” (in my case, messy biro handwriting, not very arty I’m afraid) and then roll the scrolls up and tie with a ribbon. Alternatively, you can print these spells (changing ingredients to match the essential oils in your potions cupboard!) and then soak in coffee.
Speed Potion
- 1 drop lemon
- 2 drops orange
To run fast as light, stir three times clockwise, while reciting this spell
Fast and strong and full of might
Make me run fast as light
Sleep Potion
- 2 drops lavender
- 2 drops balance
To sleep and dream, stir three times clockwise, while reciting this spell
A little drop to dream so deep,
Help me go straight to sleep.
Happiness Potion
- 1 drop balance
- 1 drop lavender
- 1 drop lemon
For excitement and bliss, stir three times clockwise, while reciting this spell
Hear me now for girls and boys
Make me full of happy joy
Jump Boost Potion
- 2 drops ylang ylang
- 2 drops cedar wood
- 1 drop lemon
- 2 drops balance
To jump as high as the sky, stir three times clockwise while reciting this spell
Two stirs left and twice around
See me spring up off the ground
Sneaky Potion
- 4 drops lavender
- 1 drop lemon
- 2 drops ylang ylang
To move as quietly as a snake and as quickly as a cat, stir three times clockwise while reciting this spell!
I am silent as a snake,
I walk by no sound I make,
With one spray I hover by,
Sneaky as a silent spy.
Lucky Potion
- 1 drop lemon
- 1 drop orange
- 1 drop lavender
- 1 drop ylang ylang
Be the luckiest kid on the block, stir three times clockwise while reciting this spell!
4 drops around my room, before I go out to play
Give this potion all the power to boost my luck all day
Want to get serious with your spells? We had an aromatherapist craft some REAL spells for kids. Check out these options to help turn a Harry Potter party game into an educational exercise for your little witch or wizard!
Setting up your Harry Potter Game
It’s all about getting them to really believe that these potions work so setting up your Harry Potter games means putting a little mystery and excitement into the execution.
Once your Harry Potter party is underway take all the kids to the potions table. Explain that you have connections in the magical world and can get access to Diagon Alley. Tell them that you’ve got some magical spells for them to try but that they’re REAL – so they need to listen carefully and be very, very safe.
Make sure you explain that these spells are powerful, and NOT TO BE EATEN or placed directly on their skin. Tell them to only ever use their own wand (to prevent arguments and missing wands) and that Harry Potter himself would tell them that potions are so powerful that you must follow the rules to the letter.
How to make the first potion
- Place dried flowers and 1/3 cup of water into the cauldron (this gives you a final result that fills a “takeaway” bottle)
- Demonstrate how they must follow the spell EXACTLY (this stops them using all the oils in the first three minutes because … kids)
- Follow the directions on the spell and then p0ur the resulting potion into a craft bottle
- Choose a “volunteer” to try the potion (pick someone wide eyed and believing)
The child will jump high, or run fast because they WANT to believe. W
hen we did this, the sceptical and oh-so-cool older sister hung back and was way too cool to believe in this childish nonsense. Until her little brother started running “fast as light” – the 13 year old instantly converted to a believer!
Once done, the kids can then make their own potions. For larger Harry Potter parties, you may wish to get multiple cauldrons so there are no lines to “craft”. Our little witches and wizards had a blast.
We’d planned plenty of Harry Potter Party Games for the event but the power of this magic was so strong that the party quickly turned into demonstrations of supernatural jumping and running and happiness. And what did the kids have to say? BEST PARTY EVER. The parents however complained that they were now setting up potions stations at home by request!
Want to get a REAL (kind of) Harry Potter Hogwarts letter? Find out how here!
