As you know, we are going to be accepting school supply (and monetary) donations for Boys & Girls Aid this year at Wizarding Weekend. Like Harry, many kids have had to grow up in foster families. Boys & Girls Aid makes those transitions much easier on everyone, but especially the kids. Their goal is to make sure all children have a safe, stable home, along with the support needed to thrive in their environment, and ultimately go from foster to adoption.
As the first and longest-running child welfare agency in Oregon, Boys & Girls Aid maintains a legacy of impact through innovative foster care, adoption, emergency shelter, and supportive housing services, offering a full range of informed supports that meet each young person’s unique needs and circumstances.
Boys & Girls Aid is proudly leading the charge to create a bright future where a permanent, loving family and lifelong stability are within reach for every young person. We believe Harry would have both benefitted from such an agency in the Wizarding World, and also would have created something similar once he left school and second Wizarding War was over. All kids deserve a loving, safe family, so let’s help them with just a few things they need for starting the school year off right.
As you can see, they are not in need of backpacks, which I know people love buying for extra House Points. This year we will give out extra points for gift cards instead – 1 point per $. Everything is is 1 point per item. Thank you in advance for all your generous donations. The Wizarding fandom always shows up to make magic for the great charities we choose each year and we are so grateful for it.
If you are at Wizarding Weekend on Saturday before the costume contest, Daisy from Boys & Girls Aid will be talking about their org and all the good they do. We can’t wait to see you!
You asked for it, and now we have it. This year’s Wizarding Weekend will be a bit different, as we’ll have some shorter hours on Sunday. **Please note that Way of the Wand has been moved from 5pm to 2pm on Saturday.**
Friday, July 24 Great Hall : open 5-9pm Owl Letters & Pixie Hunt Photo booth Movie Trivia: 7:15pm Diagon Alley, Knockturn & Hogsmeade: open 5-9pm
Saturday, July 25 Great Hall: open 11am-9pm Owl Letters & Pixie Hunt Photo booth
Way of the Wand: 2pm – moved from 5pm
Costume contests (kids & adults): 2:30pm Book Trivia: 5:30pm Wizard Bingo: 7:30pm Diagon Alley, Knockturn & Hogsmeade: open 11am-7pm
Sunday, July 26 Great Hall: open 11am-4pm Owl Letters & Pixie Hunt Photo booth Magic Mash-up Costume contest (kids & adults): 2pm **mash your favorite witch/wizard with a Muggle sport Way of the Wand: 5pm Diagon Alley, Knockturn & Hogsmeade: open 11am-4pm
This year Kennedy School will be showing a mix of magical movies throughout the weekend: Wizard of Oz Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them Labyrinth Neverending Story Wicked The Dark Crystal Where the Wild Things Are
Last year we tested out House meet-ups, which didn’t go over great, but we’re not ones to give up. Y’all asked for them, so we’re trying them again, with shorter sessions this time, so you don’t have to take too much time away from all your other activities. Stop into the Great Hall, take some pics with new friends, maybe team up for trivia, and then get back to finding your owls, shopping, or hitting up one of the movies playing all weekend.
We will be collecting school supplies for Boys and Girls Aid, which is committed to ensuring children and youth are able to build lifelong stability through connections to loving families, supportive adults, and nurturing environments. Harry didn’t have the best childhood before he came to Hogwarts and an organization like Boys and Girls Aid would have helped him immensely in finding a better placement for him than the Dursleys. We believe he would have founded a similar organization to help other orphaned children, because not everyone has a vault full of Galleons or a great family like the Weasleys to escape to.
We also have a special limited Wizarding Weekend design for our shirts/sweatshirts/crops and 2 different tote bags, which we haven’t had in the past. These will be available for order until July 31. If you purchase before the end of June, these will ship for wear before Wizarding Weekend. Proceeds from these items will benefit Boys & Girls Aid, which is why the price points are a bit more than our regular merch.
Mark your calendars, because Wizarding Weekend at McMenamin’s Kennedy School is coming this Summer. It’s three days of magic, Friday July 24-Sunday July 26. While we don’t have a schedule yet, here are some things you can look forward to:
Trivia – We run two different trivia sessions. Friday will feature Harry Potter movie trivia and Saturday will feature book trivia.
Costume contests – Saturday and Sunday will have costume contests for both children and adults. The top 3 winners will walk away with awesome prizes.
Last year we tried something new for our costume contest on Sunday and we’d love to continue it again this year. Magical Mashups will be different each year. Last year we did magical fandoms, combining a Harry Potter character and another magical character from another fandom. We had a great response from the kids, so this year we’re switching it up to Wizards in Muggle sports. Combine Harry Potter with a Muggle sport you think they would play. Get creative!
Magical shops – Because we don’t give any money back to the author, as we don’t agree with her views, we bring in local vendors to sell their wizardy wares! There will be three different rooms to browse – Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley, and Knockturn Alley – with everything from wands to sweets to magical creatures. Vendors have sold out in the past, so make sure to plan accordingly. This is a great opportunity to pick up something special for yourself, or get a head start on holiday shopping and any upcoming birthdays on your list.
Photobooth – Get a shot of you and your friends/family in your best wizard attire (costumes not required, but highly encouraged) in front of our spellbinding backdrop. Props will be provided, if you want to use them.
Pixie scavenger hunt – Test your luck as a magizoologist or just a nature-lover, by scouring the halls of Kennedy School for escaped pixies! Digitally capture them on your muggle device and, after you’ve found each different type of pixie, share their portraits with a member SPEWW to win HOUSE POINTS! This year Pixies will be a bit harder to find, because we’re introducing Owl Letters. You’ll use clues given to you to find owls flying around Kennedy School with letters that you’ll unscramble to answer the day’s riddle. Friday & Saturday will have one answer and Sunday will have a separate answer, so you can play twice if you’re there all weekend.
Special Food & Drink – The House Elves of Kennedy School work hard to create a fun menu for the weekend. You can get their regular menu, too, but all bars and restaurants will serve a handful of Potter-inspired foods and drinks, including Butterbeer!
Movies – Usually, Kennedy School runs all 8 Harry Potter movies over the course of the weekend. This year, you’ll have a selection of other magical movies to choose from. They aren’t set in stone yet, so we can’t announce them here, but as soon as we know, we’ll update this post.
Games, House meet-ups, and charitable donations – Every Wizarding Weekend is a chance for us to give back to our amazing community in several ways. One is throwing this event with the help of Kennedy School to give everyone something free and fun to do during the summer. Another is by collecting school supplies (we also take money) for another local nonprofit to help kids in need. This year, we will be collecting for Boys & Girls Aid. Harry had a whole vault of gold left to him and was lucky enough to be able to escape to the Weasleys when living with the Dursleys was too much. We always feel that Harry would have set up an organization like Boys & Girls Aid to help orphaned and foster children get the support then need, for everyday life, school, and moving into their first apartment as an adult.
We will be adding some to-be-determined games into the weekend and also set up some times for House meet-ups where you can find other wizards and witches to connect with.
We also have a special limited Wizarding Weekend design for our shirts/sweatshirts/crops and 2 different tote bags, which we haven’t had in the past. These will be available for order until July 31. If you purchase before the end of June, these will ship for wear before Wizarding Weekend. Proceeds from these items will benefit Boys & Girls Aid, which is why the price points are a bit more than our regular merch.
2025 Wizarding Weekend was bit quieter than usual, but we were lucky to have a steady stream of magical people come through McMenamin’s Kennedy School to play trivia and bingo, hunt for Pixies, enter our costume contests, and shop our awesome vendors.
We tried some new things this year and some went well and some might need another year to get going. Our Sunday Magical Mash-Up Costume Contest was a hit with the kids who entered. Of course, we allowed everyone’s magical costumes to enter, but we had a large percentage of children who took the challenge.
Our try at doing House meet-ups wasn’t that popular, but we also didn’t do much in the way of announcements, so we will try again next year, and maybe add some other meet-ups into the mix, and hope we do more in the way of letting people know they are happening.
Another new thing we did this year was incorporating Way of the Wand into our programming. We had a small, but enthusiastic group of children learning to do wand techniques and move around. We did this on Sunday evening, which might not be the most ideal time to do it. In 2026 we may try to move this to Friday evening and/or Sunday morning.
We were blessed with some awesome volunteers who were willing to jump right in and help wherever needed, including hosting our Saturday costume contest.
As always, we threw this whole weekend for charity. We collected school supplies and raised funds for Rose Haven day shelter for women. People turned out with bags and boxes of supplies. We had some witches come with adorable House-themed supply bags and another couple come with two backpacks that they said was filled with one of everything on the list we posted. We love this community! At the end of the weekend, we had an entire car filled with backpacks and supplies that will be donated next week, along with a check from SPEWW for $3200, to Rose Haven. We are so proud to do this for those in need and hope it helps their school year start off better than it would have otherwise.
Thank you to everyone who came to Wizarding Weekend to make it the success it was. We are always honored to have such wonderful people engaging with our events and helping to make life better for those less fortunate than us. Harry was lucky to have a vault full of gold and a second home at Hogwarts and we know for certain that he would do his best to put that money to good use in the real world. He may not be able to do that, but we are proud to do it in his name, while having a great time with new and old magical friends, drinking Butterbeer, and also supporting artists from our community.
We can’t wait to do this again in 2026. Next up, Rose City Comic Con!
Great news! This year for Wizarding Weekend, our charity partner will be Rose Haven, a day shelter and community center for women, children, and gender non-conforming folx experiencing houselessness. They help by giving them a safe place to shower and create community, have a meal, get much needed clothing in order to find employment, give them a mailing address, and help with other social services.
We’ve worked with Rose Haven before and feel like they do very important work. We were lucky enough to take a tour and meet some of the lovely women who work there and learn about everything they do. You can donate all year to them. They have a list of items they need most that they update regularly on their website.
We’ll be collecting school supplies for the children. What we know they need so far:
Backpacks
Boxes of 10 Crayola brand fine tip markers
Boxes of 24 Crayola colored pencils, sharpened
Packages of wide ruled loose leaf paper with punched holes
Spiral bound notebooks
Pencil pouches
Pencil sharpeners
12 ct Sharpie chisel highlighters
24 or 16 ct Crayola crayons
12 ct Crayola washable markers
No 2 pencils
Kids safety scissors (round point)
Plastic rulers
Elmer’s purple glue sticks
Elmer’s liquid glue
Composition notebooks
Graph paper composition notebooks
Ruled 3×5 notecards
Bic stick grip xtra comfort ballpoint pens (blue or black)
Bic brite liner chisel tip highlighters (yellow)
As always, with each donation, you’ll receive House Points and they will be added to points given for our Pixie Hunt and other activities. The winning House will be announced at the end of Sunday and we will post it on our socials.
Mark your calendars, because Wizarding Weekend at McMenamin’s Kennedy School is coming this Summer. It’s three days of magic, Friday July 25-Sunday July 27. While we don’t have a schedule yet, here are some things you can look forward to:
Trivia – We run two different trivia sessions. Friday will feature Harry Potter movie trivia and Saturday will feature book trivia.
Costume contests – Saturday and Sunday will have costume contests for both children and adults. The top 3 winners will walk away with awesome prizes.
This year we are trying something new: Saturday will be our normal Harry Potter costume contests and Sunday we are doing Magic Mashup. Combine Harry Potter with another one of your favorite magical fandoms (i.e. Lord of the Rings, Percy Jackson, Supernatural, etc.). Get creative!
Magical shops – Because we don’t give any money back to the author, as we don’t agree with her views, we bring in local vendors to sell their wizardy wares! There will be three different rooms to browse – Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley, and Knockturn Alley – with everything from wands to sweets to magical creatures. Vendors have sold out in the past, so make sure to plan accordingly. This is a great opportunity to pick up something special for yourself, or get a head start on holiday shopping and any upcoming birthdays on your list.
Photobooth – Get a shot of you and your friends/family in your best wizard attire (costumes not required, but highly encouraged) in front of our spellbinding backdrop. Props will be provided, if you want to use them.
Pixie scavenger hunt – Test your luck as a magizoologist or just a nature-lover, by scouring the halls of Kennedy School for escaped pixies! Digitally capture them on your muggle device and, after you’ve found each different type of pixie, share their portraits with a member SPEWW to win HOUSE POINTS!
Special Food & Drink – The House Elves of Kennedy School work hard to create a fun menu for the weekend. You can get their regular menu, too, but all bars and restaurants will serve a handful of Potter-inspired foods and drinks, including Butterbeer!
Movies – Each year, Kennedy School runs the Harry Potter movies all weekend long. Look for a schedule on those coming soon for ticket purchases. If you want to spend your whole weekend watching all the movies, you will have a choice of purchasing a Prefect Pass. (We did discuss running different fantastical movies this year, but it was ultimately decided that people look forward to the Harry Potter movies + it enables Kennedy School to give more money to charity.)
Games, House meet-ups, and charitable donations – Every Wizarding Weekend is a chance for us to give back to our amazing community in several ways. One is throwing this event with the help of Kennedy School to give everyone something free and fun to do during the summer. Another is by collecting school supplies (we also take money) for another local nonprofit to help kids in need. This year, we will be collecting for RoseHaven. Harry had a whole vault of gold left to him, but most kids aren’t that lucky. We want them to have the best school year possible.
We will be adding some to-be-determined games into the weekend and also set up some times for House meet-ups where you can find other wizards and witches to connect with.
Our schedule is set with some new things, so if you have questions, you can see the full post.
Friday, July 25 Great Hall : open 5-9pm Pixie Hunt Photo booth Movie Trivia: 7:30pm Diagon Alley, Knockturn & Hogsmeade: open 5-9pm
Saturday, July 26 Great Hall: open 11am-9pm Pixie Hunt Photo booth Costume contests (kids & adults): 2pm Book Trivia: 6pm Wizard Bingo: 7:30pm Diagon Alley, Knockturn & Hogsmeade: open 11am-7pm
Sunday, July 27 Great Hall: open 11am-7pm Pixie Hunt Photo booth Magic Mash-up Costume contest (kids & adults): 2pm **mash Harry Potter and another magical fandom you love(i.e. Supernatural, LOTR, Percy Jackson, Sabrina)** Way of the Wand workshop: 5pm Diagon Alley, Knockturn & Hogsmeade: open 11am-6pm
Wizarding Weekend is all-ages and free to attend. There is plenty of free parking in the Kennedy School lot and the surrounding neighborhood, if you need to bring your own muggle transport. It’s also right on the bus line. Unfortunately, there is no Floo Network hooked up, due to the Statute of Secrecy, so please plan ahead for travel time.
Welcome to SPEWW PDX 