My 42 Birthday: Harry Potter Extravaganza!!!!!1
My Harry Potter Birthday!!!
I am 42 years old! I told Eric I would like a Harry Potter birthday, specifically, I wanted to read a few of the books out loud with the kids. Serenity had gotten as far as book five. We read the first two together, and then she read 3,4, and most of 5, but she got stuck at a scary part. Donovan and I read 1 and part of two, but he got scared off by the spiders. I had great hopes that my brave Gryffindor Maia might listen all the way through book three, my favorite book. Well, 42 was as epic a birthday as I could possibly have hoped for, because we read THE ENTIRE SERIES TOGETHER!!! They LOVED it! All of them! I am so thrilled there are not enough exclamation points IN THE WORLD! I started just with Serenity and Maia with the first book, but about halfway through it Donovan got drawn in and he started begging for more chapters every single night. We got to the end of book six one Friday before a long weekend, and he insisted we start book 7. And then none of us could put it down! We read the entire book that weekend. So awesome!!! They especially love the silly songs Peeves sing, and they sing and shout along to those parts. Serenity often asks me to repeat dialogue or tidbits she finds especially funny, so she can memorize them to repeat later. They love the antics of the Weasley twins. Maia agrees with my opinion that she’s in Gryffindor. Serenity still loves Ravenclaw. Donovan, however, prefers Ravenclaw even though I sorted him in my head into Hufflepuff, since he’s such a good friend. But I’m just so happy they actually want to be in houses! We are having so much fun with all things Harry Potter!
Maia has delighted in telling me my birthday isn’t done until we finish both the series and the puzzle they got me, so my birthday lasted until mid-October. Oh, and not only that, when we finished book 7 Donovan asked to start over again at book 1!!! So we’re reading the illustrated version and Maia reads along in the regular copy to see the differences in the English and American versions. I love it! They are the best. We’re back up to Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback, and it’s really interesting reading it again so soon because they know all this foreshadowing and they are really examining Snape’s motivations.
Not only are they all super excited by Harry Potter, they’ve even started a Harry Potter talking game! They are creating an alternate universe where Severus’s mom leaves his Dad, so he’s raised in a much better environment, and he becomes best friends with Sirius and James. Snape’s in Ravenclaw, he marries Lily, and he’s best friends with the Marauders. Oh, Lupin is Ravenclaw too, and Pettigrew is the spy for Voldemort, with Snape’s help at Occlumency. It’s hilarious and awesome! They love saying “Are you SERIOUS?!? And then replying, “no, HE’S Sirious.” =)
Maia wants to be a Snitch for Halloween, and Serenity is going to be Ginny Weasley playing Quidditch. DZ wants to be a Ravenclaw Quidditch player. The only thing Maia didn’t anticipate is that Serenity and Donovan keep trying to catch her =) It’s so much fun watching her flutter around the house!
We’ve (ok, I’ve) been getting more Harry Potter legos. Maia asked for the Transfiguration classroom, and then the Charms classroom, and well we’ll just need to complete all four classroom sets won’t we? And they asked for Harry Potter lego advent calendars so the fun will continue through Christmas! Eeeeeek!!!!
Some favorite quotes they love to repeat while they skate in circles around me: “Oh Potter You Rotter oh what have you done? You’re killing off students you think it’s good fun.” “He got off! He got off! (When Harry got acquitted by the Wizengamot.)” “When there’s strife and when there’s trouble, call on Peevesy he’ll make double!” “It unscrews the other way.”(McGonagall helping Peeves cause trouble as directed by the Weasley twins.) “We know we’re called Gred and Forge.” Oh, and they call Umbridge, Dumbridge. LOL!!!! Maia even made a poster to say We hate Umbridge. “I hardly think that will be necessary” (By Hermione pretending to be Bellatrix). “We did it we bashed them wee Potter’s the one! And Voldy’s gone moldy so now lets have fun!” Really captures the scope and tragedy of it right? =) “Kreacher shut up!” (Then Serenity rolls around on the floor pretending to be silent Kreacher.)
Oh, the first time we read Harry Potter, Donovan thought Uncle Vernon’s name was Uncle Vermin. So perfect.
