It's no secret that our house is filled with Harry Potter fans. When Little Jo turned eight, we threw her the ultimate Harry Potter party that made her feel like a witch attending Hogwarts. For MiniMe's eighth birthday, she also wanted a Harry Potter party, but of course she wanted it to be different. This time, we focused on a Tri-Wizard Tournament and Yule Ball theme. I have so many Harry Potter Yule Ball and Tri-Wizard Tournament party ideas to share with you.

Harry Potter costume ideas

I asked willing guests to come as certain characters from the book. I was blown away by how the costumes turned out and everyone had a blast getting dressed up. Of course, what Harry Potter themed party would be complete without "The Boy Who Lived" himself?

Harry won't travel far without his trusted snowy owl, Hedwig, and our friend DIYed an amazing Hedwig costume to wear.

Ollivander also made an appearance. He enjoyed the party until he realized I would be putting him to work later, handing out wands.

Harry Potter themed party favors

The party favors were so fun for this Harry Potter party, and it was easy to find things in the book that inspired the party favors.

Wizard robes for the kids to wear

I started by getting the kids in full character by providing each of them with a wizarding robe to wear. There were some from each of the Tri-Wizard schools: Hogwarts, Beauxbaton, and Durmstrang.

DIY wizard wands

Witches and wizards can't compete without a wand, so I made each kid a special wand using our DIY wand tutorial. I used different colors and designs to make them all unique so each child could have a personal connection to their wand.

Then I got Ollivander to hand the wands out to each wizard-in-training. They all felt so special when receiving their hand-selected wands.

I even used some of our printable Harry Potter shop receipts to make an Ollivanders receipt to go with each wand.

Dragon topped candy box favors

As a final Thank You favor, each kid also got to take home a fun candy-filled dragon party favor that I made with Fireball candies and toy dragons.

The Goblet of Fire party activity

As a fun party activity, we let the students enter their names into the Goblet of Fire. I made the goblet by gluing a small concrete planter to a wooden candle base with some E-6000. I then base coated it black and spray-painted it with a natural stone finish. McGeeky had the idea of filling it with rubbing alcohol and lighting it. Needless to say, if you use real flames, make sure you practice proper fire safety!

Dumbledore supervised the kids putting their names into the goblet.

Harry Potter party games

The Tri-Wizard tournament was full of challenges, too. Here are our at-home versions of the tournament challenges found in the "Goblet of Fire". These would work well for any Harry-Potter themed party.

Tournament challenge #1: Get an dragon's egg

The first challenge in our tournament was a battle against a dragon to get an egg without getting scorched by her flames. I set up a giant inflatable dragon and enlisted a couple of the older kids to help guard her. I equipped them with Silly String to spray at the contestants as they approached the dragon, to try to scare them off.

A fog machine provided the perfect smoke effect for the dragon. The kids got so excited when they managed to capture an egg! I made these by painting giant plastic Easter eggs with purple glittery paint.

Tournament challenge #2: Ingredient hunt and potion making

For the next tournament challenge, the kids had to search for magical ingredients and use them to create a potion. I gave each witch or wizard a cauldron for mixing the ingredients and some plastic test tubes for collecting them.

Inside the cauldron was a parchment with a potion recipe and list of ingredients on it. They had to search the Forbidden Forest (our back yard) for everything they needed.

Hagrid and Aragog were, of course, in the forest to help.

The giant spider had the venom the kids needed for their recipe. With Hagrid's help, they were able to extract the venom (vinegar) into a test tube.

Professor Sprout was on hand to help the kids harvest the Dragon's Breath plant.

A strand of hair from a cardboard Unicorn stand-up was crucial to the final potion.

Harry assisted with keeping the dragon baby calm while the kids got vials of blood (food coloring).

The kids found plenty of Bone Dust (baking soda) among a pile of bones.

Once they had everything on their list, it was time to mix up the potion. I had them gather lots of various ingredients to add to the fun, but really, the only crucial ones were the spider's venom (vinegar), bone dust (baking soda), and dragon's blood (food coloring). They loved that it bubbled up in different colors!

Tournament challenge #3: Tri-Wizard maze

The final task in our tournament was the Tri-Wizard maze. I created a large maze in my barn, and made the walls with tobacco sheeting that I stapled to the rafters and secured to the floors with bricks. You can find this sheeting in giant rolls at your local farm supply store.

The maze had several obstacles, the first of which was the Sphinx, who had a riddle they had to solve. I simply drew a Sphinx onto some foam core, and wrote the question and answer on the back to make it easy for my helper to read aloud. Once the correct answer was given, the kids could continue further into the maze.

The next obstacle was to get across a series of stepping stones. They were asked a question (What is the birthday girl's name?) and they had to find the letters to spell the answer, and only step on those to get across.

In part of the maze, a giant rope spider web blocked the correct pathway, and kids had to crawl through it to get by.

Before entering the maze, each kid learned a few spells. One was "Expecto Patronum", which would get rid of the Dementor if they ever saw it. This spell came in handy when he showed up in the maze and tried to stop them! Once they got past this point, they exited the maze and their times were recorded. Fastest time wins!

Harry Potter party cake table ideas

After the tournament was over, everyone celebrated at the Yule Ball. The witches and wizards definitely earned their desserts! The kids brought dress-up clothes with them to change into for the ball, and enjoyed the fancy feast.

We set up the ball in a white tent in the yard and decorated everything with snowflakes, icicles, and white lights. The cake was winter themed as well, with an ice dragon perched atop and hard candy icicles around the edges.

Nostalgia Electrics provided a chocolate fountain that anchored one end of the dessert table. The kids loved dipping everything into the white chocolate, and I think the Dumbledore cardboard stand-up wished he could partake as well.

Even Dobby took time out from his work in the kitchen to celebrate!

There were plenty of birthday cupcakes, too, which I decorated with picks featuring logos from the three wizarding schools.

The kids looked lovely in their finest, and really enjoyed this fun excuse to dress up.