December 10 - Snowflakes

"It's snowing," Michael said looking out the window in the middle of morning lessons.

"Really? It's snowing?" Liam called, running to the window himself followed by the rest of the children who all stood oohing and ahhing over the large white fluffy flakes falling from the sky.

Harry and Draco exchanged a glance and a chuckle.

"Well, I don't think we'll get much more out of them right now," Harry commented.

"No, I doubt it," Draco replied. "So, what should we do?"

"For now we let them look. I always wanted to be able to stop and watch the snow. Besides, it won't hurt them to take a break."

"Can we go outside Dad, please? Can we go outside?" the children began to plead.

"Later today or maybe tomorrow. We'll see."

"But we've never gotten to play in the snow before," Liam pointed out.

"I've never even seen it before," Freya said.

"Me either."

"Me either."

"We used to sit at the window and watch when it snowed," Michael told them, "Mummy wouldn't let us go out but we could sit and look at it and it's so pretty. She said it was too cold to go out."

"She just didn't want anyone to see you," Conor said.

"Then why were we able to sit and look out the window?" Riordan asked.

"There are spells that can keep people from seeing in even when you can see out," Draco explained. "It's likely they used those on the windows.

"At least you got to look at it," Conor complained. "We weren't even allowed to get close to the windows. If we did we got yelled at."

"Or worse," Freya said.

"We got to look at it and Mummy taught us to breathe on the window and draw in it to make pictures," Riordan said and then demonstrated for the other children. They each immediately began to take turns fogging up the window with their breath and drawing with their fingers. The second group exclaimed in wonder when they breathed on the glass and saw the first round of pictures still there.

"That ought to keep them busy for a little bit," Harry said, "and I have an idea what we can do when they get tired of that."

"Okay, are you going to share it with me?" Draco asked.

"Sure as long as you come to help me get some paper and scissors." Harry looked back at the children. "Scissors for each child and lots of paper. I have a feeling they'll go through it. We might have to duplicate some to make sure we have enough."

"Paper and scissors?"

"I guess I shouldn't be surprised you don't know what I want to do. You've probably never made a paper snowflake before have you?"

"A paper snowflake? Why would I do that?"

"For fun," Harry answered. "I'll show you and the children how to do it. I learned to do it in primary school. We used them to decorate the classroom. It'll be a great way to kill time until we let them go outside."

"You think we're going to do that today?"

"No, not for more than a few minutes just to feel what it's like to stand in the snow, maybe catch snowflakes on their tongue. I think we'll wait till tomorrow for any actual playing in the snow. There's supposed to be almost a meter on the ground by then."

"How do you know that?"

"I looked it up."

"Where did you do that? The Prophet doesn't have a weather forecast. Do you get a Muggle paper over at the other house?"

"I don't, though that's not a bad idea. I should get a subscription. I'll show you how I did it after Christmas or maybe for Christmas," Harry replied.

"So, whatever it is is part of a present."

"For the whole family, yes. So we'll cut out snowflakes, let the kids taste the snow and feel it fall on their faces and arms, and then we can curl up in our personal theatre with some snacks, and watch a Christmas movie."

"The longer Grinch one?"

"Yes, I bought it. We can watch it. I decided not to put it in anybody's calendar, it'll just be an extra surprise. We can pop popcorn and see how they do with a full-length movie."

"I'll get the scissors, you get the paper."

The two men met back in the library-turned-school room where the children were still drawing on the windows and watching the snow.

"Everyone come here," Harry said. "I have something I want to show you how to do."

"Do we have to do school stuff?" James asked.

"Yeah," Conor said. "Why can't we go play?"

"You will get to play in the snow. Right now I have a fun thing for us to do."

Freya's eyes lit up. "Is it our special activity for the day?"

"Not the one I planned on, no, I think we'll do this instead. I did learn to do this at school, but it was fun. First, I think you should know a little more about snowflakes."

"So we still have to learn?" Marcus frowned.

"A little bit, yes. It won't hurt," Harry grinned. "Do any of you know what snow is?"

"It's white and fluffy," Fiona said.

Riordan shook his head. "Not always. Sometimes we saw little bitty snowflakes."

"Yeah, Michael added. "They were more like little balls, not like those." He pointed to the window.

"Mister said they were cold," Liam put in. "He didn't like snow. He complained it was messy and cold. He didn't go out when there was snow. He'd stay home and we had to eat less."

"Yeah, he was always grumpier when he had to go out in the snow because we were out of food," Marcus grumbled. "His feet would be wet when he came back, and he'd complain the whole time as he changed his socks."

Harry and Draco looked at one another and the thoughts: Did Thoros not use magic? Did he live more like a Muggle? Could almost be heard in the air. Neither commented on it, but they both stored it away for further discussion at another time.

"So, snow is made up of frozen water," Harry began. "A snowflake begins to form when an extremely cold water droplet freezes onto a pollen or dust particle in the sky. This creates an ice crystal. As the ice crystal falls to the ground, water vapor freezes onto the primary crystal, building new crystals – the six arms of the snowflake. Snowflakes always start with six sides or arms. They bump into each other as they fall though so they may lose arms. There is an even more complicated explanation for why they have six arms, but I'll save that for when you're a bit older and we've studied more science."

"Now," he said and held up a piece of paper. "Who would like to make their very own snowflake?"

"With paper?" Conor scoffed. "That's not a snowflake. You just said they're water or ice."

"Yes, I did. However, we can make paper versions. We can hang them up around the room for decoration."

"How do we do it?"

"The first thing we have to do is make the paper square," Harry told them. "Draco and I can help you with the scissors." He passed a piece of paper to each child while Draco gave them each a pair of scissors.

"The first thing we do is fold one side of the paper up to match the other side. Then we cut off the extra at the top."

"Does it have to be straight?" Liam asked.

"As straight as you can get it."

"Can't cut," Teddy said. "Scissors won't work."

Harry reached over to the boy and helped him guide the scissors along. He and Draco took turns helping the other children until they all had a triangle-folded piece of paper in front of them.

"Ok, let me show you how to do this then you can try it. First, we fold this triangle in half then in half again."

"Um," Draco said, "if you fold it that way it won't have six sides. It'll have eight.

Harry sighed."Leave it to you to figure that out. I should have known."

"I wouldn't have been the only one. You know how smart these guys are, someone would have counted it out."

Harry chuckled, "Okay, if you insist that it must have six sides."

"Well, you said snowflakes have six sides," Draco replied. "I've never checked or looked at them closely enough to know, so I don't know for sure but that's what you just said."

"You did," Caela said and the others agreed.

"Okay," Harry replied and shook his head. "Let me get a new sheet to start."

He quickly folded the original triangle and cut off the excess. "So, now to make this easier, here's what we're going to do: we take this half and we're going to fold it in thirds so there are three pieces, 3 layers. That doesn't make a lot of sense. Let me show you how to do it and then I can help you and everyone can start the same."

He did exactly that modeling how to fold the paper. He watched Draco do the same then the two of them again helped all of the children.

"This is hard," James complained.

Conor frowned, "Yeah, I can't get it to line up right."

"That's why I wanted to do halves," Harry responded. "You can still do it that way if you'd rather."

"I wanna do it right," the boy snapped back.

Harry took a measured breath. "There really is no right or wrong with paper snowflakes. Real snowflakes are different. No two are the same. When we make them from paper we can do things that nature can't so it's ok if they're not six-sided."

"It's really okay?" Liam asked.

"Yes, it's really okay," Harry assured him.

Liam smiled. "Can I have a new piece of paper? I wanna do it the other way."

"Sure, who else wants to try the other way?"

James and Caela said they did so Harry got them new paper and they started again.

"Ok, if you have the paper folded in thirds we have to cut the extra off again so everyone has a triangle."

Once that was done he held up his folded triangle."Next, we cut out small pieces from the edges. You just have to make sure that you don't cut away all of the folds. When you're done cutting pieces out you unfold the paper and you have a snowflake." He demonstrated for the children quickly cutting several shapes out of the triangle and opening it to reveal the final product.

He went to help Teddy and James while Draco helped Liam and Caela. The older children did their best on their own. Soon the table was covered in tiny pieces of paper and full snowflakes.

"Can we make more?"

"As long as we have paper," Harry replied.

The children cheered and each asked for a second sheet. It wasn't long before the table had a large stack of snowflakes on it.

"Can we start hanging them up?"

"I want to try something before we do. Just give me a second," Draco said, pulling his wand from its pocket. He directed the wand at his newly folded paper and began small motions cutting the paper. He then sent the completed snowflake into the air, directing it this way and that with his wand.

"Make mine dance," Caela requested.

"Mine too."

"And mine."

Draco gathered the snowflakes while Harry began sweeping the cuttings into a pile and vanishing them. Once again the blond aimed his wand at the paper. This time the stack of snowflakes rose into the air and swirled about the room. The children laughed and cheered and began to run and dance below the dancing snowflakes. Harry watched the other man play with the children, letting the snowflakes fall to just within reach then sending them flying up high again. The smile on the blonde's face made Harry nearly as happy as the smiles on the faces of their children.

After several minutes Draco dropped his arm. "I'm sorry. My arm is tired. Maybe we can do that again later."

"Thank you, Draco!"

Harry gathered the snowflakes once again setting them aside to play with later or to hang up depending on what the children wanted to do.

"That was clever," he said as the kids ran off to wash their hands for lunch.

Draco shrugged. "It wasn't anything big."

"They loved it, and so did you. I saw you smiling."

"When they're happy," Draco replied. "I'm happy and so are you."

"True."

"I just wish I knew if I had ever been happy with such a small thing. I can't imagine that even at any of their ages I would have been excited about cutting out a paper snowflake or even content to do so. I had too much to appreciate little things like this."

"But you appreciate them now."

"I do."

"Better late than never," Harry quipped.

"I think it might actually be better this way. I appreciate it even more seeing it through their eyes, their joy, and excitement."

When the children went outside after lunch for just a few moments it looked much the same. They danced and twirled and ran around in the snow. They stood with upturned faces catching the flakes on their tongues. They scooped up the snow and tossed it in the air letting it fall down over them. They were soon shivering and Harry called them back inside.

"Movie time," he said.

Harry shook his head as the kids ran past him up the stairs to the drawing room. He smiled as did Draco as they gathered trays of popcorn, candy, and pop and then headed up after the children.

It wasn't long before they were all curled up in their seats with their drink and snacks, eyes glued to the screen as snowflakes fell there.

Harry tried to keep an eye on the children and on Draco as they all sat absorbed in the movie, but he found himself also absorbed. The children again booed as the Grinch stole the presents and cheered when he returned them. They carried their trays back to number twelve for Kreacher to collect and headed to their rooms without being reminded that it was quiet time.

Harry stretched back in his chair, extending the footrest.

"How did you do that?"

"Reach down on your right," Harry instructed. "Do you feel the handle?"

The blond nodded.

"Pull up on it as you lean back."

"This is wonderful. I could watch another movie just like this."

Harry laughed. "I thought about it, but I was afraid I'd pass out."

"Didn't you sleep well last night?"

"I did, but for some reason today I'm feeling more tired than usual. So what did you think of the movie?"

"I liked it," Draco replied. "I like that they gave the Grinch a reason to hate Christmas and not just be mean and nasty for no reason."

"But," Harry prompted.

"But I like the other one better."

"The cartoon? Me too. I'd watch the movie again, but if I had to choose I'd watch the original. We should go check on the kids."

"We should," Draco acknowledged. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For the movie. You didn't have to get it, but I asked and you did."

Harry shrugged and dropped his recliner back to its normal position. "It wasn't a big deal."

"Maybe not, but it still means something. What's your favorite show or movie from when you were younger? I know you didn't get to watch much, your relatives were awful, but when you were able to sneak and watch something what did you enjoy most?"

"I enjoyed watching almost anything I could catch just because I so rarely got to."

"But was there any one show or movie that you tried to see more of than others?"

"There was one," Harry replied. "It was an American show about a private investigator. I don't remember the name though. I think it was set in Hawaii. Every time the show was on it was a different mystery for him to solve. It was interesting. I only ever saw a few episodes though."

"Were there any good children's shows? Any that we could use to help the kids learn more about Muggle life?"

"There are still a few on. We can look into it after Christmas. That's a good idea. Ok, enough talking about television shows and movies, it's time to go check on the kids."

"And tomorrow we take them somewhere to actually play in the snow?"

Harry nodded. "I'll call Molly tonight."

"Sounds good.

A/N: A week or so after I wrote this I made snowflakes with my students as part of our novel unit, we were reading The Giver by Lois Lowry, and I was shocked at how many 8th graders had never made a paper snowflake before. It actually sent me back to this chapter to see how I'd written the directions Harry gives the kids. ;)