In order to make our Harry Potter Christmas tree perfect, a lot of DIY ornaments had to be created. This was a fun exercise to think about visual cues from the movies and books that could be re-created into ornaments to embellish our tree!

From Harry's Hogwarts letter...

to small versions of the Daily Prophets, there were a ton of fun ideas that we explored.

We even went way back to the first book, when Harry, Ron and Hermione ran into the Flying Keys obstacle when trying to find the Sorcerers Stone. I was able to find a collection of antique-styled keys in all different shapes. Then to create the idea of wings, I simply tied glittered gold string in a bow around them. Simple! Alohomora!

I also bought plain red ornaments to draw Harry Potter icons of the stories on.
HP, ⚯͛, the lightning scar, and the deathly hallows were all perfect visuals to help make our tree come to life!

Mark was an awesome sport through all this DIY-ing. Always listening to my new ideas, and going to Michaels and Joanns with me to get all the supplies I needed to create them. One day while we were at Michaels, Mark found these mini corked glass bottles. He grabbed them and said "these would be cool for the viles that hold memories for when you want to watch them in the pensieve."

It was a fab idea, and I was so excited that Mark came up with it! So we grabbed the supplies we needed, and went home to make them. They turned out to be adorable.

This experience of our first Christmas together has been such a blessing. We are creating such wonderful memories that we are now able to store away in a vile and keep forever - no pensieve required!

Where there is a Christmas tree, there is a Christmas tree skirt.

I knew as soon as we got a tree that this would be a great opportunity for me to make my first tree skirt that works perfectly with our Harry Potter Christmas theme. I sketched for a couple days different themes that could inspire this tree skirt.

Could the tree skirt represent the four Hogwarts houses?
Should I draw the Marauders Map on it? (immediately knew that was quite a feat)
Should I embellish it with the seven horcuxes?

After a while I took a break and looked up some Harry Potter quotes for inspiration. I landed on the most perfect quote from J.K. Rowling, and I knew this was it!

"It is important to remember that we all have magic inside us."
- J.K. Rowling

Christmas is the most magical time of the year. From everyone being in the most wonderful spirit, to the beautiful lights, and the overwhelming love of family, it is the best time of year. The magic of Santa Claus brought my family such joy for years. Even today, his spirit lives when we wake up on Christmas to find gifts for all of us from Santa.

That is why I knew this quote was perfect for my tree skirt. Bringing the magic of Christmas together with the magic of Harry Potter was the perfect metaphor.

Once I figured out the quote, I got to work! The supplies needed for this DIY project are very simple. I purchased a round table cloth from Bed Bath and Beyond (about $12), and 6 black fabric markers from Michaels (about $3 each). Then, I printed out the quote in the Harry Potter font, and created templates with each letter. Next, I traced each letter with a pencil to make sure the spacing of the quote was perfect on the round tree skirt.

From there, I went to filling in each letter with the black fabric pens. Not going to lie, this project took me ten hours to create. It was laborious! But thank goodness for the first four Harry Potter movies. I watched those while creating this to keep me going!

Even though it took forever, I couldn't be happier with how it turned out.
It turned out to be so beautiful, and the perfect sentiment to keep in mind this Christmas season :)