Harry Potter and the Warner Brothers Studio Tour, London

It must have been when Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (#6) was released that T and I gave up trying to share a copy and instead each bought our own. That tactic continued through #7, HP and the Deathly Hallows, and I very clearly remember reading side-by-side in bed, both our noses buried in our respective books, flying through the pages as fast our eyes and brains could carry us. It was thrilling: the story; the fanciful shared flight; the total immersion in a great tale.

When I closed the back cover of the Deathly Hallows, I did so with real sadness. The epilogue was terrible and unnecessary, so certainly I mourned that rare misstep by Rowling, but most of my grief was because there was no more Harry Potter to be read. My maiden voyage with the series was finally over, and I considered that fact fairly awful.

The films, excepting number 4 (the Goblet of Fire which certainly deserved and needed the two-part treatment granted the Deathly Hallows, and was quite miscast) were marvelous and have provided repeat succor. David Yates really finished things off with a directorial bang; films 5, 6 and both parts of 7 were masterfully executed.

Jack was ensorcelled by Harry Potter when he started book 1 several years ago. We told him that as he finished each book, we'd all watch that movie together. (That means that second child Oliver has seen all the movies despite being only halfway through having book 1 read aloud to him. Alas.) J took a hiatus after book 6 but became re-energized early this summer when London started looming, so we encouraged him to read HP 7 so that we could watch the movie before heading here. He finished it a couple weeks ago and was as crushed as I was when he finished. To my delight, he immediately started reading the series again.

 All of us got to come full circle on our Harry Potter fandom yesterday when we trekked out to the Warner Brothers studio where much of each film was shot. There you tour many of the original sets, see thousands of original props, learn about the make-up and costume creations, see the blueprints and variously scaled models of Hogwarts, Hogsmeade, etc, and also about how the creatures and other magical beings were constructed and filmed.

out front!

It was really an outstanding place that in no way disappointed; I absolutely had as much fun as the kids did. The attention to detail was inspiring: 17,000 wooden wand boxes labelled with hand-written notes; 400 place settings at the students' tables in the Great Hall whose real stone floor added to the grandeur of the set; various animatronic items that made magic come alive. In this case I think pictures say it all, so here you go. 

Harry Potter fans: what do y'all recognize? 

One of my favorite parts of the experience was the enormous range of people there. There were just as many teens as younger children, and adults of all ages were there with their families but also on their own. A number of people were dressed in costume. I heard at least six different languages being spoken and am certain there were many more in the (very well-managed) crowd.

What all that really proves is that Rowling touched a representative sample of everyone with Harry Potter. The series' demonstrations of kindness, hard work, loyalty and courage; portrayal of good and evil and the battle between them; honest take on fairness and justice as something that should be striven for but is often elusive in the real world; respectful treatment of children and the very real capabilities they possess; belief in the power of progressive education; and the wish so many of us have for magic to be real are appealing on multiple levels and in various ways. They are universal themes or goals that we can all understand and desire.

Everyone at the studio was a big fan having fun in the unabashed way children do. At the green screen station where you can "fly" on a broom and "drive" the blue Ford Anglia that Harry and Ron crash into the Whomping Willow, I donned robes (Gryffindor, naturally! The kids chose Slytherin- what?!)  and hopped on that broom as quickly as did the kids. It was such a blast.

Hilariously, Oliver wore a green shirt that exactly matched the green screen color and so on the screen looked invisible except for his head and hands. He said, "It's like I'm wearing the invisibility cloak." The people in line were laughing hysterically!

Tips for if you visit:

Buy your tickets well in advance and get to the studio early. Kids under 4 are free though I don't think this is a great venue for such little ones, and various packages are available. We bought the family package.

The tour is mostly self-guided though you can rent (~£4.99) an audio component for extra information. Tom really enjoyed all he learned via his. The boys and I just roamed and took in plenty that way. We spent about four hours total from lobby back to lobby.

The studio, which is in Watford, is about a 40-minute drive from London. You can take public transportation there but not in a direct fashion. We took an Uber which was easier, faster and not much more expensive than taking the tube and buses you'd need to otherwise.

You can bring your own food and drink which is lovely. If you don't feel like schlepping vitals out to the studio, the two cafes (Studio and Backlot) offer really nice salads, sandwiches, burgers and such at reasonable prices. The food is loads better than anything you'd find at an American studio or theme park. For example, I had a couscous salad with beets and goat cheese, and the boys had a beautiful hamburger on a glistening brioche bun that came with stunning lettuce leaves (NOT iceberg) and gigantic tomato slice. 

The gift shops are pricey though I admit that much (not all but much) of the merchandise is nice. We did a spin before going on the tour so the kids could be thinking about what they might want to spend their money on. I think that was helpful because as they went through the visit, certain things faded or became more beloved in their minds.
We've had the kids saving their own money from gifts and such and have asked them to buy their own souvenirs. It's been meaningful for them and a great lesson on budgeting, and hey, we are treating them to this trip. 

Bring a camera and wear comfortable shoes! 

Try to get a good night's sleep before you go. I hope you do. It's well worth it!

in Ollivander's

We made it to London

We powered through our 24-hour delay in leaving for London and got to the airport all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Having been upgraded to first class because of the insane air traffic control outage messing everything up, we checked in and went to the fancy, preboard lounge for snacks. 

The boys were besotted by the Shirley Temples and general fanciness of it all, and we then eagerly boarded the plane to New York. Row 1. Wow.

And then we waited. And waited. And the auxiliary power control broke. And the heat crept up to 88 degrees F in the cabin. And not one person was offered a snack. An hour or two in, the coach customers got a beverage. Nearly three hours after boarding, and after listening to the flight attendants talk rudely about the passengers (oh what you can hear in Row 1) and basically ignore us all, we took off.

I love taking photos from airplane windows.

So many people on our flight missed their connections, a number of which were to locales abroad. As it was 9:30pm when we finally deplaned at JFK, I'm sure lots of folks had to wait until the next day to get another flight. Fortunately, we made our connection to London, but I think it goes without saying that that first leg really sucked. I'd have been furious if I'd paid for those first class seats. Damn! Air travel has sure become largely un-fun.

That said, international first class is off-the-hook fabulous. We each had a large, comfortable, massaging seat that reclined fully into a bed. We got pajamas, the option of food at any time, individual TVs/movies/video games/noise-canceling headphones, and two bathrooms for just seven passengers. It's absurdly lovely. The kids were beside themselves. Ol and T fell asleep almost immediately; I wasn't long to follow. J stayed up videogaming with manic glee. 

seriously??

First class is definitely the way to most enjoy long-haul flights. I told the boys to savor every bit because they will likely never fly this way again. And did I mention that as compensation for the original canceled flights which took a day from our vacation, we got to extend our trip and fly back business class? Mahgah!

Once in London, we moved in to our B&B, part of a gorgeous home in Kensington, and immediately went out to foil jet lag by keeping ourselves occupied. We walked along the Thames, through Belgravia and then to Kensington Park before succumbing to exhaustion and returning home by way of La Cave au Fromage and a separate, non-cheese but very lovely market for other goodies.

albert, in kensington park

I was asleep by 7p, the boys and Tom by eight; Jack and Ol slept for 13 hours, as did I with the kindly assistance of a midnight Ambien. Jet leg is such a bitchy side effect of the otherwise fabulous fortune that is international travel.

Today we met an old friend at the British Museum and roamed its endless galleries: the Rosetta Stone! the Elgin Marbles! an Easter Island bust! elephantine Assyrian gates! Sutton Hoo riches! It's so nice that museum admission here is free of charge; it's especially liberating when traveling with kids because you can come and go as you need to or please. I will say, however, that the BM's complete lack of garbage cans is vexing and odd.

The boys spent a long time wandering the gift shop, deducing how best to spend the first of their saved money. Oliver ultimately decided on a working catapult pencil sharpener, and Jack chose the same sharpener, two small Egyptian scarabs (I love scarabs) and a quill-and-ink set. He feels one step closer to Hogwarts.

Tomorrow: the Warner Brothers studios for a tour of the original Harry Potter sets.

Summer Makes Them Smarter, Year 2

Summer Makes Them Smarter, year 2

Well, it’s that time of summer again. The time at which most of my friends’ kids have gone back to school, and we are just leaving for our family vacation. We have four.weeks.left. people. FOUR.

In this snail race to the finish, I am again of the mind that year-round school is a terrific idea for so many reasons:

• no summer “melt” when your kids forget everything they just spent 9 months learning
• no “what day is it today” blank-face stares because their regular schedule left with the last school bus back in June and their brains are haywire now
• no wild-eyed fatigue of their continued bickering about who gets your bathtub and whether or not each person takes his own head off the toothbrush or is allowed to leave it standing: they have too much time on their hands

Enough already.

You might recall my post from last August 14 (funny how without planning a matched date, I started writing this in the same week, one year later) about all the ways in which summer makes kids smarter. This summer is no exception, people. Here you go; you’re welcome.

I knew things were really coming along when I suggested a very inspired, if I say so myself, art project in which the kids would sketch in their art journals, all the things they loved about summer. Jack went for the gold, and I was thrilled.

Then I spied it: SUMER.

Amazing. This fourth grader is ON IT, people. He loves sumer and all it involves!

Oliver drew this masterpiece. I don't think his sophisticated work needs much explanation.

After a week of playing “Boujad and Piney: Where Did He Go?” an inane game that involved Piney (Oliver) walking around with a weird, butt-out posture and asking in an odd baby’ish voice, “Where is Boujad (Jack)? Where did he go?” it was, mercifully, time for Camp Calleva.

Oh to be in my quiet home for hours and hours while they were blissfully outdoors, kayaking, rock climbing, horseback riding and shooting bows and arrows. They burned loads of energy every day and came home filthy, bedazzled with all manner of woodland ornament.

It was all really wonderful except that it’s made me seriously ponder two somewhat terrifying questions:

1. Will Jack ever show interest in being clean? And, will he ever successfully bathe himself?
2. Is Oliver a hoarder?

Q1: Jack’s feet, neck and hands were about nine shades darker than his torso and thighs. His face looked like he’d cobbled together camo paint from natural sources. Dust and degraded plant matter snowed from his hair whenever he sneezed or nodded with even the slightest gusto. And yet he insisted, with a somewhat feral growl, “I am not dirty, Mom.” Did he lose his eyesight at camp? Does he not smell himself?

I decreed, on the very first day, “Baths happen as soon as we get home and then you can play and eat.” The water was so shockingly gray-brown that Oliver was moved to video it one evening. I dare say our tubs may never return to white.

Meanwhile, at the ripe old age of 9+, Jack still requires coaching on the intricacies of shampooing one's own hair. Was this difficult for me to learn and I have forgotten the challenge? I think not.

Two weeks ago, he got out of the bath, drained the water and got dressed before I could check him. His hair was slicked with conditioner. He vaguely resembled Kenickie in Grease. Then, his hair dried.

If you would like to style your hair such that it resembles a shellacked rat’s nest, follow Jack’s lead. When I tucked him in that night, I tried to run my fingers lovingly through his blond locks. They got stuck. I managed to retract my digits; they were sticky and looked as if they had dandruff. It was vile.

Why did this not faze my boy? He is dirty- plain and simple.

Q2: It pains me to consider this, but I believe Oliver is showing early hoarder tendencies. At the very least, he is entirely too interested in bringing the forest back to his bedroom. I feel we owe Calleva about 90 bags of assorted natural treasure: mulch, rocks, sticks, pinecones, whatever those revolting shriveled-cantaloupe-looking seed pods are…

This is ONE day’s example of what he’d crammed into his backpack and lunch box. I mean, did he actually go to camp? Or did he wander the woods, picking this shit up? I do wonder. In case you're wondering, that shiny blue thing is a noisemaker. It never belonged to Ol or anyone in our family, and yet he blew on it many times. #yuk

I throw things out in the dark of night, after having moved them around the house strategically, hoping he doesn't catch on to my plan. He has taken to going through many of our trashcans and removing things he deems treasures. This is stuff like used straws, y’all. That were never his. Gum wrappers, frizzled yarn, tape coated with dirt and crumbs. #nottreasures

We will never need to collect kindling again.

Dear husband, during this time, ordered one of those Google cardboard thing. That ridiculous looking adult-viewfinder into which you put your smart phone. You then walk around wearing this contraption and looking like a complete dork. Naturally, the kids were as thrilled as Tom. Mah gah. With whom do I live?? Let’s pay even less attention to our surroundings, shall we?

Now we're off for that family vacation, y'all! Sayonara!!

**Epilogue: We spent five hours at the airport today but are back home now. Our bags have gone to London, and we have not because the air traffic control center for the DC-area crashed. For so many hours. We try again tomorrow night, to leave. ON THIS EFFING VACATION! Do you hear my relaxed tone?????