Ella is Harry Potter obsessed! It is an obsession that came about completely on its own! Byron and I had only ever watched one Harry Potter movie as teens, we'd never read the books, and so we were definitely not a family of Potter heads! She started mentioning it a few times, and then a couple of Christmas' ago she wanted to watch the first movie - and we watched the whole catalogue over the space of a week. She loved the magic of it all, that she could get her own costume and dress up like Hermoine and I think a secret crush on Harry Potter himself made it more appealing too! So when I told her one day in conversation that there was a place called Harry Potter world in England that you could visit, she was sold! We watched a few Youtube videos of people who had filmed their day out there and after saying cool about 50 times she decided she must go. I knew it would be pricey, (quite how pricey I was not aware of!), and so I said if she really wanted to go then we would do it for her 6th birthday but it would have to be instead of a party. She happily agreed and that was the plan!
As the weeks crept closer to her birthday, she had a 5 week period with 4 birthday parties in a row...I think she realised how sad she would feel missing out on a party, and I was beginning to feel that way too because if you know me at all you know I love to throw a kids party! So a week before her birthday we settled on the idea of a birthday tea, not quite a full blown party, but there would be cake and her friends and some fuss! I had to make her traditional photo bunting like I do every year, and I found that Harry Potter bunting on Amazon for like £3! I had already ordered weeks before this awesome Harry Potter bundle of balloons for her and so not much other decoration was needed!
Some Harry Potter tableware finished it off, and Ella wanted to hand write little name tags for each of her friends on their plates.
She had her birthday tea on the Friday, her birthday was a Sat, but because they do half day Fridays for school here it seemed like a good option. She invited 5 friends from her class (mainly because we only have 6 chairs that fit around the table haha, one day we will have to get a bigger table!) Ella wanted to dress up a Hermoine so I let people choose if they wanted to come dressed up as witches or not.
We recreated Addi as Harry Potter, and I loved comparing the pics from when we had done it with baby Addi!
Present opening of course had to happen as soon as all the party guests arrived! She got some lovely Harry Potter things! including a Harry Potter scratch book, a snitch necklace and even some very cool Harry Potter pyjamas!
Can you tell who was most excited about the party games?
It was so cute seeing Addi being so involved, she always seemed to be in the middle of everything!
I mean look at that little face right there!
One thing is for sure 6 year old girls just love to dance!
Molly was the twister champion, and Ella was the queen of Pie Face!
and you just can't beat a bit of pass the parcel!
After all the fun and games, it was time for the food!
and then of course the cake!
Ella had requested a Harry Potter themed cake months before. I'm not artistic enough to create characters out of icing so this was my interpretation!
I think she had a great time!
The next morning was the big day itself, so she got stuck in with some more prezzies and we just chilled at home because it was freezing and rainy, took a quick trip to the park later on and cooked her fave dinner for tea!
On Sunday she wore her new sparkly Harry Potter jumper to church and her new polka dot Fat Face skirt, complete with the snitch necklace to finish off her Harry Potter look!
Our family movie that afternoon of course had to be Harry Potter!
and then we finished off her birthday weekend with some rounds of Harry Potter Dobble before bed!
Of course the real excitement came the following weekend as we headed to London! I took a million pictures so this is just a tiny snapshot and then I've included the little video I made of some of the adventure!
We arrived on the Friday night to find Auntie Mara had pulled out all the stops, making Ella some Harry Potter Cupcakes,
and continuing on the Harry Potter gift theme, and bringing us lots of yummy gelato from her work too!
On Saturday we shopped til we dropped! Ella had a blast in Hamley's, and probably could have spent all day there! She had lots of birthday money from everyone to spend and mostly hung out in the basement which was the Harry Potter and lego zone...
and one of the upper floors which was mostly Frozen things!
These lego characters were pretty impressive!
Hagrid definitely dwarfed the girls!
There was all kinds of fun things going on in the store, Ella got her nails painted - a glitter tattoo.. She got to make a butterfly, and she even got a free pack of jelly beans after she played bamboozled and had to eat a yucky bean!
Addi just loved seeing all the different toys, and playing with blocks and this kinetic sand.
We made a quick stop at M&M world and Addi gave a high five,
whilst Ella went in for a full on hug!
We ate lots of yummy things, and then spent the Sunday at church at Hyde Park and we visited the Natural History and Science museums after that, which all led up to the big excitement of Monday - our final day, and Harry Potter World!
I really wasn't that excited about it from my point of view, I was excited to see Ella enjoying it but I didn't think I'd love it that much - but I couldn't have been more wrong! I loved it, even Mara who hadn't seen any Harry Potter loved it, and it was also a big hit for Addi too - who knew! So a definite recommendation for a fun family day out!
There was so much to see and do - we actually ended up being there for about 6 hours, and could have probably stayed longer. Ella loved spotting all the familiar scenes she recognised from the films, and educating me in lots of them too!
There was also so much interactive stuff, from instructing this broomstick to rise up! and then having her own go flying on a broomstick with a green screen!
We all had a family pic taken in the robes (Addi was napping at that point)
and one of the things we loved the most was taking a ride on the Hogwarts Express on a green screen and being told to look shocked and that there were dementors at the window and then getting to watch the whole little scene back at the end, tons of fun!
The enchanted forest was one of my fave bits! They had giant moving spiders that descended out of nowhere and everything!
Couldn't not snap the classic 9 3/4 platform shot!
Ella loved her little night bus snack box, and oh how she loved the butterbeer! She was at first horrified when Mara offered her some as she thought it was real beer! but soon realised it was something very delicious!
We couldn't pass up the chance to have a Butterbeer ice cream too!
Thumbs up from Addi too!
The girls loved testing out all the vehicles,
and Addi was really taken with this Dobby who imitated your body movements!
Diagon Alley was another fave, I loved all the colourful buildings,
and Addi put her hands out hoping the girl would puke some pastilles into them at the sweet shop!!
The full scale model of Hogwarts was super impressive,
and even the gift shop at the end was fascinating! Check out that wand room!
All the attention to detail was just so good, like these floating candles above one of the cafe stops...
Had to grab some final treats before we headed back to Auntie Mara's, and I had to snap the face of a girl who had thoroughly loved her birthday present of a day well spent at Harry Potter World!
and I just had to snap this pic of our epic Vietnamese feast back at the flat. Once we'd put the girls to bed it was about 9pm, we were ready to watch a movie and chill so we just picked up our phones and ordered this on deliveroo and it came within about 20 minutes! We scoffed it on the bed while the girls slept away in the same room as us (we really weren't sure how they were going to do on this trip but they slept brilliantly and didn't even get disturbed by us!) and I know the chance of getting Vietnamese food in the Borders is zero let alone getting delivered it to your door so I just had to make a note of it! London we miss you so!!!
I know it seems like we went all out for this birthday, but I felt Ella deserved it. If she thought baby Addi turned her life upside down when she came along, then toddler Addi has rocked it even harder! It's definitely been a big adjustment and this year has been tough on her. Addi really has her moments, where she just won't share or won't co-operate and Ella is always the one left trying to prevent the tears and tantrums at her expense. Sometimes the one who cries the loudest gets the most attention, and so I often feel like she doesn't get the attention she deserves...so I really just wanted to make her birthday super special and treat her.
She is such a great big sister to Addison, and is such an intelligent and mature 6 year old. She is a deep thinker and is always questioning things, which can sometimes drive you crazy, but is also helping her intellect to grow! She is very creative and loves all things arts and crafts. She also loves to bake, and doing the weekly bake-a-longs over on my business Instagram has probably been one of her favourite things of lockdown! She is also mega keen on lego, and loves to not only put the little sets together following all the instructions but also likes to create new little scenes and stories with them. She really loves Youtube a lot! She mostly loves to watch people playing with toys, 'ellieV toys' is her fave channel! They build and then review lego sets, and she is always engrossed watching their videos! She would love to start her own channel one day and has taken to filming herself all over the house and when we are out and about and she talks as if she has an audience she is talking to! It's very entertaining! She loves gymnastics, and is really missing not being able to go to her gymnastics class right now, but loves trying out new tricks on the trampoline. She has started reading chapter books at bedtime and is working her way through the whole Roald Dahl library. It blows my mind that time is moving so quickly, and that she is so grown up these days! but I love seeing the confident and kind loving girl she is growing into.
Here's a look at our trip summed up in a few fun filled minutes!
