Iron-On Harry Potter House Ties and Crests

I made so many fun things for Milo's Harry Potter party, and I thought it would be fun to share some of those things here as printables. First up are Hogwarts House ties and crests! Since it was going to be a warm day, I knew my boys wouldn't stay in black robes and real button-down shirts and ties for very long, so I decided to make them iron-on house ties that I put onto white t-shirts that had little pockets. (I found these at The Children's Place).
I've put the downloadable PDFs on Scribd. I've never used this site before, so please let me know if you have any trouble with it!
Please note that these printable are intended for iron-on transfers. The images are already flipped (house crests and words are backwards) and ready to print onto iron-on transfer paper.

Gryffindor and Slytherin House Ties and Crests

Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw House Ties and Crests

Wand Tutorial for DIY Craft at a Harry Potter Party

Milo's Harry Potter birthday party was this past weekend and it was a whole lot of fun. Most of the stuff I did was inspired by all of the amazing Harry Potter parties that came before ours. You can see my inspiration board on Pinterest if you want to see a few of those creative tutorials and ideas. I did make a few (kinda) original projects that I'll share over the coming days. The first is the craft/favor that we did with the kids. A DIY wand made from bamboo, hot glue and craft paint:

The Fine Print: Please remember that all tutorials, patterns and projects on Hideous! Dreadful! Stinky! are for personal use only and may not be distributed commercially without my permission. Make them for yourself, make them for your friends, hand them out at your kid’s birthday party, but please don’t sell them without my permission. Making objects from my patterns for charitable donations is also okay, as long as you do not exceed 25 pieces for that purpose. If you want to make larger quantities or sell objects made from this pattern, please contact me for licensing information at sadsilver@gmail.com. For independent handmade sellers, I ask for a nominal fee ($5-$10/year) and a design credit. Thanks!

Harry Potter Wand Tutorial 

You will need:
Bamboo sticks (I found mine in the dried floral section of Michaels)
Hand saw
Lightweight spackling
Craft (popsicle) stick
Bamboo skewers
Styrofoam
Hot glue gun
Hot glue sticks
Acrylic craft paint, assorted colors and metallics
Paintbrushes and foam brushes
Assorted cores (feathers, fibers, etc.)

1. Use a handsaw to cut your bamboo sticks down to various lengths of 9"-12". Remember that bamboo is not hollow all the way through, and every time there is a "bump" in the bamboo that joins sections, that part will be solid. So plan your cuts so that you will be able to add a core later. I cut mine so that the bumps fell at about 1/3 from the bottom of the wand. It makes a great, natural point for the handle.

2. Seal off the bottom (handle-end) of your bamboo stick with lightweight spackling (the stuff you use to patch holes in your walls). You can apply it with a craft popsicle stick or just use your finger. Allow to air dry for at least 15 minutes.

3. Meanwhile, set up your drying rack by pushing bamboo skewers into a block of styrofoam, and heat up your hot glue gun.

4. Use hot glue to create handle designs on your wands. Squiggles, swirls, stripes, dots. . . play! Place each wand on a bamboo skewer to set.

5. (Depending on the age of your party goers, you can do this step, or leave it for the kids to do.) Paint your wands with acrylic craft paints. Be sure to cover up the white spackling at the bottom of the handle. A regular (hair) paint brush is good for your first layer to get into the little crevices. A dry foam brush is great for dry-brushing on accent colors and painting contrasting colors onto the hot glue. Sometimes I just dry-brushed gold onto the glue and bare wood for a more subtle effect. I used a mix of cheap craft acrylics and I also had Jaquard Lumiere paints, which have a nice 2-tone metallic and pearl finishes. I also did ombre effects on several of the wands by painting on a heavy color at one end, and then dry-brushing the color down to the other end of the wand. Another tip is to pull the bamboo skewer out of the styrofoam and hold onto the skewer with the wand over it as you paint, then put the whole shebang back into the styrofoam block to dry. It will keep your fingers from getting too messy!

6. Allow your wands to dry on the skewers. They are now ready for the kids to stuff with cores. I allowed each child to choose a wand and then he or she got to choose from two cores: Phoenix Feathers (orange/red  feathers) or Dragon Heartstrings (I cut strands from  these iridescent and red foil centerpiece sprays). I was also going to have Unicorn tail made from metallic rainbow thread, but since the kids were mostly 4- and 5- years old, I thought that might be too difficult.

7. The easiest way to seal the cores on would probably be to use hot glue. However, since our party was at a park without access to an electrical outlet, I brought along some spackling mixed with brown and metallic bronze acrylic paint in a small jar and sealed the tip the same way I sealed the handle end. It dries to the touch in about 15 minutes and continues to dry without shrinking over the next few hours.

8. And finally, attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and learn to immobilize your enemies and save the world from You-Know-Who!

The Summer of . . . Pants?

I've had a few comments lately asking me if The Summer of No Pants is a go go, and, sadly, the answer is a no no. I just couldn't pull it together this year. I started working on it a few times, but it takes many hours and a big commitment on my part to coordinate all those guest posts and giveaways and sew, sew, sew on top of it all! The few weeks before summer were busy for me on the Real Life end of things, and I didn't think I could pull it together in a way I would be proud of this year. Thanks to all who have expressed interest in SONP. I hope to bring it back next summer! Until then, keep your pants on!

Invitations to Milo's Harry Potter Party

I know you thought this would be the year that I would not go nuts with the boys' birthday parties. I'm afraid you were wrong again, my friend.
I saw this great owl balloon invitation idea on Pinterest and decided that Milo's invitations had to be delivered by owl. But there was no way I was going to deliver balloons to the doorstep of every kid we are inviting. So I came up with the idea of having have the boys help me decorate a bunch of cardstock owls. They glued on the eyes and feathers and beaks, and we soon had a dozen adorable owls ready to deliver invitations.

By the way, I had these feathers on hand--a giant bag of them given to me from some other crafter's destash. But if you are concerned about humanely sourcing your feathers, check out The Feather Lady on Etsy.

To deliver the party info, I cut slits under the beaks with an Xacto knife and stuffed green mini envelopes (size 2.5 x 3.5) under the beaks. I added a small piece of tape behind each envelope, too, just to make sure they made it out of the big envelopes still stuck in the beaks.

The party info came on 3.5 x 5 pieces of parchment paper. I modified a letter from Hogwarts that I found online and hand-drew a Maurader's Map. The freeware fonts are Harry P and Lumos.

And that's that! A little much, maybe? Yeah, well. That's how I do, boo!
Off to make wands!