I did have a little more prep time for this one, but not as much as I would have liked (hence the lack of a shopping list.) The Bean was really excited about this particular movie night because she loves Peter Pan, so that made it more exciting for me. It was also exciting because we had some special guests over for the night. My aunt (the one that made the awesome Tangled cake) had two of her granddaughters in town, so they were able to join us for our Disney dinner. They also picked our next Disney movie and we did two nights in a row!
I knew I would have to do something related to pirates for Peter Pan, but I didn't really want the food to be pirate party themed because I'm saving that for Pirates of the Caribbean, so instead I went with English food because the Darling family is English. I also went with English food because I'm a Harry Potter nut and I have an awesome Harry Potter cookbook with many great English dishes in it.
A good friend and I did a Harry Potter themed dinner one night for no particular reason and we made the shepherd's pie in the Harry Potter cookbook. It was delicious. I never knew I liked shepherd's pie. Then, one day I was watching "The Best Thing I Ever Made" on Food Network and Anne Burrell made a shepherd's pie. I immediately knew that I would have to try it someday. So, this particular shepherd's pie recipe is hers, not the Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook's recipe. I did, however, make the hot rolls from the Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook, and, as always, they turned out heavenly. They take all day, but they really are worth it. (That's shepherd's pie on both ends in the picture because it ended up making more than I could fit in one dish.)
For dessert I used another recipe found in the Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook: treacle fudge. This is another recipe that my HP friend and I made, and we immediately fell in love. The first time we made it, we used dark molasses instead of treacle (because treacle is next to impossible to find in the US), and we loved it. Then, we went to an international market in St. Louis one weekend and found some treacle, so we tried it again with treacle, and it was even more magical. I now understand why Harry loved treacle dishes so much. Since that time, I have been forced to order the treacle, but it's worth it to me! I forgot to take a picture of the treacle before diving in, so the only picture I have is of a few pieces on a paper towel while I was eating. Oops!
Our activity for Peter Pan seemed to be the Bean's favorite activity so far. I started by giving her the following note:
I attempted to write the next note in invisible ink, and the magic potion was intended to reveal the message, but it didn't really work out that well. I hid the note in one of the highest places in our house. Next time I use invisible ink, I will play around with a few recipes before deciding on one. I had a feeling it wasn't going to work though, so I just wrote out the next clue just in case, and it said:
My silly old shadow is what you'll find next,
and dark places are what he likes the best.
There are a lot of dark places here, that is true,
but on the door to this place, you will see you.
When you go inside, turn on the light.
Thirty seconds should be just right.
This clue was hidden in the Bean's closet because she has a large mirror on her closet door. This next clue could have been really cool, but the Bean was too excited about finding the next clue to really dwell on the cool factor. So, for this clue, I got a can of glow-in-the-dark spray paint and tried to spray paint the message on a poster. That didn't really work because I'm not that good with a spray paint can, but if you had a stencil, I think it could work. Then, when you turn on the light for thirty seconds and then turn it back off, you should be able to see the next message. What I did instead was spray paint the entire board, and then you can stand in front of it, have someone turn the light on, stand very still, and when you turn the light off, you can see your shadow on the paper. I wrote the next clue on the back of the poster board. The next clue said:
Tink hid the next clue,
but you'll find it I trust,
because that silly fairy
left pixie dust!
You'll go to the place where cars can be stored,
as well as screwdrivers and hammers and boards.
This clue was hidden in the garage because there was a lot of glitter involved and I thought it would be better to have all of that glitter outside. When she walked outside, the piece of paper was 100% covered in glitter, but upon picking up the piece of paper she saw the following:
So the glitter only stayed on Tink! (I know, I know, Tink is supposed to be green, not pink, but pink was the only color I had for glitter!) The final hiding place was my favorite because while the Bean went out to look for this clue, my dad dressed up as Captain Hook and he guarded the treasure!
Don't you love our makeshift Captain Hook? In case you can't tell, he does have a hook in his hand.
For our treasure, we just filled a basket with candy, but on top of the regular candy, I put some chocolate coins. Walgreens is the only place that still sells them in my neck of the woods.
After our treasure hunt, we settled down to watch Peter Pan with Captain Hook and ate our treacle fudge and our treasure. After planning the treasure hunt, I was a little too tired to come up with a craft, so we didn't do one. While we were watching the movie, I heard the Bean tell her mom that she wanted to write Peter Pan a letter and tell him that she wanted to do another treasure hunt, but she wanted the next one to be longer. So, I guess The Pirates of the Caribbean will also feature a treasure hunt, though I don't know if Captain Jack Sparrow is as clever as Peter Pan, so he may not have rhyming clues!
Godspeed!
