On November 21st, the Glendon Order of the Phoenix club held our annual Yule Ball. As this year’s VP Social, I had a hand in planning and setting up for the event so I thought I’d do a recap! I’m so pleased with how well everything went… Can I just rewind to that night?

The Yule Ball was held in the beautiful Glendon manor… you’ve probably seen it?

They do say that Glendon is like Hogwarts….

We started setting up in the manor around midday; hanging up beautifully-cut paper snowflakes, setting up centrepieces, stringing up Christmas ornaments… the usual fancy ball magic. We had floating candles on the windows, snow in the centrepieces and even Moaning Myrtle in the bathroom. Never let it be said that we do things halfway in this club.

The night began with a cocktail hour in which mocktails like Polyjuice Potion (much tastier at Glendon, I promise), Elixir of Life, Amortentia and Draught of Living Death were served. The two drinks that I tried were both delicious and it was nice to have something to sip on while waiting for dinner. Once everyone was seated inside, there was a round of trivia to decide which table got to eat first (our table won OF COURSE #HPtriviachamp).

Dinner was delicious: salad, garlic bread and shepherd’s pie with a variety of pastries and cookies for dessert. I had the vegan, gluten-free shepherd’s pie and it was just as good as I remembered it being from last year. What’s a ball without delicious food anyway?

After dinner, there was a chance to win some raffle prizes. There were so many cool things up for grabs — house mugs, a Lumos cross-stitch, canvasses with Harry Potter quotes and so much more. There was also a silent auction for a Potter Puppet Pals 2015 calendar with all proceeds going to the not-for-profit Harry Potter Alliance. In addition to the silent auction, a minimum of 50% of all ticket sales for the event went to the Harry Potter Alliance — to find out more about the kinds of projects the HP Alliance undertakes, you can check out their website.

After dinner, it was finally time to dance! I don’t know this started but, just like last year, a bunch of balloons were released into the dance floor, inspiring a giant icebreaker game of keep-ups. I’ve never quite played such an intense game before, with new rules being added and taken away at any given moment and people diving for balloons left, right and centre. I was laughing too hard to even see some of the balloons that came my way but, let me tell you, leaping for balloons is a GREAT way to disguise the fact that you can’t dance 😉

And when balloons fail, there’s always the signature Shopping Cart Move. Or the Sprinkler. Or the Robot. I had so much fun pulling out all my ridiculous dance moves and I loved that there were so many people to do them with me. I think the highlight of the dance for me was when the Backstreet Boys, Spice Girls and ABBA came on in about a ten minute period. There’s nothing better than dancing to old songs that everyone can shout the lyrics to.

I hope everyone that attended this year’s ball had an amazing time because I definitely did. I’m already looking forward to next year’s Yule Ball — maybe I’ll see you there 🙂

Thanks to Kelly and Vivian for the Yule Ball pictures used in this post!