The road so far...

So over the past about year and a bit, I have completed 29 and a half Harry Potter tarot cards. I have written posts for most of them, some I haven't posted yet. The list of the ones I've completed are on the blog, but I thought it would be cool to get a group photo.

Because there are so many, it's hard to get all of them together. So I also took this photo:

and one of each one of them in their groups:

The Major Arcana:

Gryffindor:

Hufflepuff:

 Slytherin:

Ravenclaw:

Just thought it was pretty cool. I've done a lot, but I still have 48 and a half more cards left to do. :)

6 of Hufflepuff: Happiness

6 of Hufflepuff: Happiness (or Nostalgia)

Meaning of the card facing you: looking back, nostalgia, connected to children, childhood
Meaning of the card facing away from you: not being able to let go, getting stuck in the past, naivety

To be honest, I messed up a tiny bit on this one. I named this card Happiness, when I should have named it something else. Happiness/Joy is the 9th card, if I am remembering correctly, but I got the meaning behind the card and who I chose right, just used the wrong title. it probably doesn't matter that much in the long run. But if it bugs me a lot, I might redo the card.

Hagrid, I feel represents these interpretations of the cards very well. He is a big part of the change in Harry's view on the world. Hagrid is the one who introduces Harry to the wizarding world when he is eleven and remained a friend for the rest of his life. He gave Harry his family back with an album that held pictures from Harry's family's childhood and life, in a way giving Harry a way to connect to this parents and their friends in a way that he hadn't before. He was able to find connections to Sirius and his parents through the album. He was Harry's first friend which is a pretty important person to be for an eleven-year-old in my opinion.

Hagrid's connection to innocence/naivety is there as well. He is kind of naive when it comes to teaching his students and dealing with people like Draco Malfoy and Professor Umbridge. He doesn't realize how scary/dangerous the creatures are (like the blast-ended skrewts, buckbeak, but also Aragog) and doesn't really know how to teach about them. He ends up messing up a lot when Umbridge comes to inspect his class. He is also innocent for what he is accused of int he third book as well as the first time he was accused of it as well. (and by this roundabout way of saying it I am talking about how he was accused of setting the creature from the chamber of secrets on the students and Hogwarts. He was innocent when accused of this both times, but no one believes him until Harry proves it.

I want to say that I have evidence or some way to show that Hagrid is stuck in the past, but I can't really think of something, it's just a feeling I have. Most of the adult wizards and witches in the wizarding world are stuck in the past a bit. Everyone praises Harry for something he does not remember, they all flinch at the sound of Voldemort's name. Of course, they are at war in a way o it makes sense to refer back to the previous war against Voldemort though I think there are limits that people cross, even without realizing it. Especially with Slytherins who are never given a chance to prove that they are not all dark wizards who want to eradicate muggles. Most wizards are stuck in ideas of the past which is good in some ways, but damaging in others. I associate this with Hagrid in some ways (and I cannot explain exactly why)

2 of Hufflepuff: Love

2 of Hufflepuff: Love

Meaning when the card is facing you: united love, partnership, affection, relationships
Meaning when the card is facing away from you: break-up, imbalance, lack of harmony

First things first, it must seem weird that Love is a Slytherin card, but it isn't. Slytherin is about loyalty, family, and ambition among other things and those are things that are part of what love is.

I'll focus on the bad first. Ron and Hermione had a very interesting relationship from the start. They didn't like each other at all until the Troll incident. Even after that, they still fought and got on each other's nerves. This can represent lack of harmony- at least while they were growing up. I think as they got older, they learned how to be with each other from friends to in a committed relationship. It isn't easy and it takes a lot of of both of them. They trust each other in different ways, they want different things, but in the end they figure it out because they love each other so much. Imbalance could be represented in the way that they have different kinds of strengths. Hermione is the smartest witch of their year- she knows like everything ever, a GryffindorRavenclaw-ish personality while Ron is very open and reckless which is kind of just Gryffindor. Ron, though she says he has the emotional range of a teaspoon, (I feel) shows a lot more emotion than she does. Hermione is practical and looks at things logically, Ron tends to view things more from his heart and from his gut feelings more than thinking things through.

I'm not really sure how to connect them to break-up unless we count when Ron left Harry and Hermione during their quest to find the horcruxes, which I think we should. Obviously, Ron and Hermione aren't together at that point, but they were still really really really important to each other and the fact that he left was heartbreaking. Hermione was able to count on him when she was debating things with Harry. Ron was also emotional support kind of- he made a lot of jokes and kept them all a bit more lively. Without Ron, Harry and Hermione struggled- Hermione didn't talk very much and tey both seemed kind of listless in general. It was a break-up, even if it wasn't a traditional break-up.

Ron and Hermione, though they argue, they still care deeply for each other. It's clear that they have affection for each other. Hermione cast a Confundus Charm on a fellow student to ensure that Ron would be Keeper for the Team. Ron gets jealous of Krum when he takes Hermione to the Yule Ball. I think one of the reasons Ron started dating Lavendar was because he did flirt with Hermione and had affection for her but she didn't want him. When Ron was poisoned by the love potion, he mutters Hermione's name (even though he was dating Lavendar at the time) which proved his real feelings.

I don't know. It's hard to describe why they are such a good couple, they just are. They balance each other out. They are in love with each other. I think that they are ~soul mates~ kind of like how Arthur and Molly are just meant for each other and there isn't a way to explain why, they just are perfect. I don't think I've ever shipped a ship harder than Romione. They are love.

(I originally had Snape down for this card because of his thing with Lily and Harry, but I decided he was meant for other cards that could capture more of who he was)

7 of Slytherin: Illusion

Meaning when the card is facing you: fantasy, wishful thinking, choices, imagination
Meaning when the card is facing away from you: temptation, illusion, diversionary tactics

(Apologies for the lopsided pic of the card. the lighting was weird on the other pictures and this was the best even if it's kind of sideways)

(Also this color scheme reminds me of a bakery in Paris that I went to once with my dad...)

The Mirror of Erised is a very interesting and mysterious object in Harry Potter. We only saw it during Harry's first year, but it played a very big part. It is mentioned a few times later, mostly in the seventh book in reference to Dumbledore but I think its very important and I kind of wish it had a bigger part in the story.

The Mirror of Erised can represent fantasy, wishful thinking, temptation, and imagination. It shows whoever looks into it what their deepest desire is. When Harry looks into it when he stumbles upon it for the first time and all the times after that, he sees his family surrounding him. Ron sees himself proving himself to everyone as Quidditch captain, head boy, etc.- everything his brothers have achieved, who he is/will be compared to. Dumbledore says to Harry when asked that he saw himself holding up a pair of socks because he always gets books for Christmas. It's rather obvious that Dumbledore was not telling the truth but Harry never really thinks about what Dumbledore was really seeing until the seventh book. He thinks that Dumbledore saw his family, just like Harry did, especially his sister, Arianna, based on the information he finds out with the help of Ron's great Aunt and Rita Skeeter.

So this mirror shows what your deepest desires are, but it can be a trap. It's cause for wishful thinking, temptation, and longing. People have sat and watched the Mirror- themselves with the things they desire- until they waste away. Harry himself becomes obsessed with the mirror until it gets moved to a different location and Dumbledore tells him not to go searching for it. It's kind of like the Narcissus story in Greek/Roman (I forget which one) mythology. Narcissus was a beautiful man who saw his reflection in water and fell so in love with himself that he died watching his reflection because he didn't eat, drink, or sleep. That's kind of what would happen to people who get too tempted by what the Mirror was showing them.

It can also represent choices because of the choice that Harry subconsciously makes at the end of the first book. The Mirror was moved to where the Philosopher's Stone was being hidden. It was the last obstacle a person had to get through to get the stone. If he/she looked into the mirror with good intentions, not wanting the stone for their own personal selfish gain, then the stone would come to them. Voldemort makes Harry look into the mirror to try to get him to figure out how to get the stone. Harry's "choice" of not wanting the stone for himself, wanting instead to get it as far away from Voldemort as possible, was what the Mirror saw when he looked into it and he was able to get the stone. Because of this choice, Harry was able to keep the stone from Voldemort, saved the day, and escaped Voldemort for the second time in his life.