DIY Ultimate Harry Potter Treasure Box

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This is the box that Max will find at the end of the scavenger hunt. What started as “Let’s have Max get his Hogwarts letter!” has evolved into something very different, and OMG I can’t can’t wait to give it to him!

Decorating the trunk

The box is repurposed; it’s one of those heavy-duty cardboard boxes, with a little magnetic clasp. Jamie brought it home from work recently (Because he won an award! Go Jamie!) and I set it aside because I always hoard interesting boxes around the holidays, so I have lots of gift wrapping options.

Once we decided to do the scavenger hunt, we knew we wanted a treasure box at the end. After some discussion we decided to make it look like a mini trunk (as opposed to a more traditional wooden pirate’s chest sort of thing)

The supplies are pretty simple; and a combination of homemade and store-bought. For the actual trunk, we used some wide leather lacing from the jewelry aisle, and a mini padlock and hasp. (Side note: We picked that hasp because it had a combination of decent price and fast shipping. We discovered when it arrived that we had to drill our own hole into the bottom piece so we’d have a spot to attach the lock. If this might present a problem for you, you can find a hasp that already has the hole in place.) E6000 glue is magic for this kind of project.

I designed the stickers myself, and used my Silhouette to cut them out. There’s a SPEW logo, Hogwarts Express, Ollivander’s, and a Gryffindor crest, which went on the inside of the lid. You can download a PDF of the sticker designs here, with a bonus Deathly Hallows symbol. (This will open Google Drive in a new tab)

Inside the box

When he finally gets it open, Max will find a variety of items inside, both things that we’ve made and things that we bought. I’ve written tutorial posts for all of the pieces we made, so I’ll link them in the list.

• Harry Potter candy
  Jelly Slugs, Chocolate Frogs and Bott’s Everyf Favor Beans. These are an easy purchase!
• Harry Potter bookmark
  A random little goodie that I picked up somewhere.
• Goblin Gold
  While there are actual goblin chocolate coins you can buy online, I went with the regular chocolate version.
• DIY Marauder’s Map
  I found an incredible tutorial on Instructables and it was a breeze to assemble. I did the miniature version, because it fit better in our box, but there’s a full-size version available too! Just pay close attention to the folds when you’re assembling it!
• DIY Book of Spells
  Your little wizard can get ahead of the game by studying Miranda Goschalk’s first year Book of Spells.
• DIY Dementor attack chocolate
  This post will give you the directions and a link to download the chocolate bar wrapper I created. Just grab some Hershey bars, print some wrappers, and you’re all set with a Dementor-attack recovery kit!
• DIY Hogwarts letter
  You’ll find the tutorial to create your own above, including a fillable PDF file of the letter so you can do your own really easily!

Lock it tight!

Once everything is placed in the box, lock it up! We used our trusty E6000 to hold both parts of the hasp in place, so it’s locked up tight until Max finds the correct key and opens it.

<<— Check out the complete Scavenger Hunt post