Tricky step. Alright, Sophie'd pay extra attention and would be very careful then.

The Hufflepuff added the hellebore's syrup and eyed her Potion for a bit. She had always found interesting how Potions.... looked. Anyway, carrying on. She didn't want to mess up or anything, so she'd better not get sidetracked.

Good thing she had already cleaned the knife she was going to use, so now all she had to do was pick up the puffer-fish eye and grab the knife. Sophie looked around to see how the others were doing and noticed it was indeed quite tricky.

So she held both things above her cauldron and slooowly and caaarefully cut a small part of the back of the eye she was holding. Eek. That thing looked odd! Sophie stared at it before starting to quish the liquid into the cauldron. Just the liquid! Not the actual eye. CAREFUL, SOPHIE.

...Only after she was done doing this step did she realise she had, in fact, hold her breath. Heh. Intense!

The seventh year quickly cleaned her gloves and knife before making the rest of the eye vanish. Looking up around her workstation, she saw another puffer-fish eye and double-checked the instructions. Oh. She needed to add that other eye as well. Good thing she noticed that before going onto the next step.

Doing the exact same thing as before, Sophie made a small cut at the back of the second puffer-fish eye while holding it above her cauldron and carefully squished the liquid into the Potion. When she was done, she eyed the mixture in her cauldron for a few seconds before useing her wand once again to clean up her gloves, knife and make the second eye vanish like the first one.

The brewing process was good and underway when Sophie finally got started on the steps the professor had listed. She started with step one, since...well, that was the first step. Duh. She added some water to a glass bowl. With her gloves on her hand, she squeezed the bubotuber's pus into the bowl.

She followed that by adding the seal milk. When it was mixed in, she turned the heater to high for a minute and then lowered it to medium. With step two out of the way, she added the hellebore syrup. She then made a small cut at the back of the pufferfish eyes and squished them into the cauldron. That should have been gross to her, but instead, she grinned at how amusing it was.

When the liquid was out, she tossed the leftovers into the bin.

See he liked Bart’s slippers, he wondered if the professor would like a pair. He could get him some, maybe as a gift or something. Did he take gifts from student’s maybe he would have to figure that out, but at least he could get some of the ingredients from Professor cool’s stalk. He went to the cupboard to get what he needed and then shuffled back to his work station. Using the borrowed pestle and mortar he crushed the asphodel roots and put them aside. Now it was time to catch up.

He added the .2 litre of milk into his cauldron and turned up the heat for a moment and then lowered it to medium. What was the next step now. He seemed to be on a roll. He looked at his notes remembering he had put the ingredients on parchment. Hellebore.. that was yes right here. He grabbed it and added to the cauldron. Taking a clean knife and cut at the back of the puffer-fish eyes.. Puffer *giggles* he couldn’t help but laugh over that. The squishing part was kind of gross, but whatever he liked gross. Squishing them into the cauldron. He shuffled his feet over to the rubbish bin and threw the eyes away.

Now what was next.

Bay added the next step to his parchment, add hellebore syrup and squish puffer-fish eyes.. ewww this sounded a tad gross but Bay didn't want anyone to noticed how much he didn't want to do this part.

Bay added his Hellebore Syrup and moved on next to the eyes.. ewwwwwww… he couldn't help but shudder.. he picked up his first eye and made the small cut at the back of the eye, some of the juice came right out… "ugggghhhhh" he said while moving it over the cauldron and squishing the liquid in and he moved to go put the used eyeball in the rubbish bin.

He picked up his second eye ball and it was so slippery it slid right out of his hands on to the desk. Bay picked it up quickly and cleaned off the eyeball, taking out his wand to rinse the eye ball "Aguamenti" after he felt that it was all washed off he used "Scourgify" to make sure all dirt was off of it. Then he proceeded to make his small cut and squish out the juice.. after it was all finished Bay threw away the rest along with the other one in the rubbish bin.

"alrighty…thats all done." he said to himself as he went to wash his hands and dry them off… then went to his notes and updated them.

A good, clean hand. Riiiiiiiight. Sophie cursed herself for being so shaky today and listened intently to Culloden. So the eye was... likely to be slippery and slip out of their hands? That was inconvenient. She examined her gloves, wondering if there was a different kind she could wear in the future that would be better for handling slippery objects. There probably was, but she didn't have any.

Her gloves still on, Sophie took the hellebore's syrup from her potions kit and added it to her cauldron. She was less thrilled about the next part, but she was sure she could do it. She knew that being too light and gentle with the eyeball would let it just slip from her hands, and she knew that handling it too roughly would send it flying across the table. Picking up her clean knife, she held one of the pufferfish eyeballs carefully in front of her and made a small slit down the back with ease. Simple enough. Drawing her gaze to the blackboard, she managed a smile smile - squish the eyeballs into the cauldron. Good terminology there, Culloden. Obediently, Sophie set down her knife and used both gloved hands to steady the eyeball over the cauldron, then pressed the eyeball between the palms of her hands and let the juices dribble down into the concoction below.

There. With the eyeball pinned between her hands, it couldn't go anywhere!

When only a few more drops dripped down from the eyeball, Sophie set it off to the side on her napkin aside the dried-up bubotuber, then started the same process with the other pufferfish eyeball. She didn't really mind that she was handling a fish eyeball - it was just an object to her currently and part of the task at hand. Cutting a slit into the back of the second eyeball, Sophie smushed it between her palms over the cauldron just like she did the last time. It probably wasn't the nicest way to squeeze the fluid out of an eyeball, but it was effective and that was what mattered, right?

With that done, she set the eyeball on the napkin with the other one. She... COULD vanish the waste, but she was drawing a blank on whatever spell would do that. She was certain she knew the name, but she wasn't sure how it went, so... to the rubbish bin it was. Sophie took an extra napkin from her supplies and wrapped the two eyeballs and bubotuber, then carried them to the rubbish bin with ease. She disposed of them, then hobbled back to her workstation to remove her gloves and did a quick, "Scourgify," on them with her wand in an attempt to clean up after herself as she went. She did the same to the tabletop, then to the cutting knife, then set out a new napkin in case she needed to set something there later.

Feeling confident in her work so far, Sophie decided to peek around at the others and see what techniques they were using for the eyeballs. And... she saw the tragedy of one Gryffindor girl as it unfolded. Poor thing. Setting down her wand and slipping her newly cleaned gloves back on her hands, the Ravenclaw plucked one of her unused pufferfish eyes from her kit, slid out of her chair, and made her way over to the girl, shooting a suspicious glance back at her cauldron to make sure no one was going to try to sabotage her work. No? Good.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rosa Chispa Princessa

Oichi grabbed the eye which was really slippery and slipped around in her hands till it fell out of her hands to the floor. She looked for it but could not find it till 'squish', she stepped on the eye. "Professor, I had an accident with my eye".

"Hi," Sophie greeted a bit somberly, eyeing the girl's squished eyeball. "You can probably just go throw that away - I have more than just the two I need in my kit, so you can have this one. Be careful with it, okay? I'd suggest gloves first, which'll help with keeping a grip on them, but you'll still have to be careful." In other words... she should try not to do what she had just done. "Y'gotta find a nice medium holding it, I think - if you grip it too gently, it'll slip, and if you try to squeeze it too tightly, it'll slip that way too. What I did was I kinda just smushed the eyeball between the palms of my hands and that got the juices out just fine, and I didn't really have to worry about the eyeball slipping out 'cause it was caught between my hands, y'know? Dunno if there's a better way, but it's worth a shot, if you wanna try it." It had worked for Sophie, at least.

Ana looked back at the Potions Professor wondering why he was looking at her so strangely. Had she done something wrong? Well she had but he'd missed that bit so why was he looking at her strangely? Strange old man.

Deciding to ignore him Ana turned her attention back to writing down the next step for the Potion. Hopefully this one she'd do correctly.



That seemed easy enough. But eww to having to touch eyes. Ana didn't like that part one bit. Shiver. Still if it had to be done it had to be done. Grabbing the Hellebore syrup she tipped it into her potion, making sure all of it got in there before turning her attention back to the eyes. Yuck.

Picking up her knife Ana cast a quick, "Scrougify," on it before looking back at her instructions. Alright, small incision to the back of the Puffer fish eyes. She could do this. Taking a deep breath Ana cut into one, and then the other eye before putting her knife down. Now time for the tricky part.

One eye after the other Ana squished the eyes to her cauldron, making sure she got all the liquid into it, hands shaking very slightly as she did so. When she was done she vanished the eyes and cleaned her knife once more before sitting back and awaiting further instructions. This step she'd pulled off without mishap.

She could see plenty of disgruntled looking students along with a very annoyed looking professor, but Alice was confused as to why. Was something going on? If everyone else was having hearing issues as well, didn't they know it was smarter not to speak when they couldn't control the volume of their voice? Choosing to remain silent, she glanced up at the board..... only to find that it was all blurry.

What? Her vision was going bad, too?

Extremely close to panicking, it took the seventh year a while to realize that her sight was only affected when she looked at far away objects. Her cauldron and all her materials were still clearly visible, so Alice tried to copy notes from the boy beside her before adding the hellebore syrup to her concoction. Whew. She was fine, see? Everything was fine.

Of course, she cleaned her knife before she started on the next step. No careless Gryffindors here. With the utensil, she made a small slit down the back of the eye, careful not to handle it to roughly and send it flying across her station. Then Alice set down her knife, both gloved hands steadily holding the eyeball over her mixture and pressing it between her palms. That gave her better control over the round object than her fingers would allow, and soon all the juices from the fish eye had been squeezed into her cauldron. The lioness carefully did the same to the other eye, following the squishing up with a quick "Evanesco!" to rid her table of the used materials.

Er... would she really want to put this stuff on her skin? Not really, but if it would cure those wrinkles that had appeared along her arms and legs that morning, Alice would do it. She didn't want to look like a shriveled up prune, thank you.

She could barely hear him but at least the directions were written on the board. Beverly jotted them down on her parchment for reference. Memory issues were terrible.

Instead of focusing on all of the things going wrong, she focused on the task at hand. Hellebore syrup was next. Beverly poked the eye with a gloved finger. Puffer fish. Ha! Reminded her of a Hufflepuff. Poke, poke. Puuuuuffer.

What was she supposed to do? She frowned and checked her notes. Oh right, squish the puffer-fish (puffer, hehe!) eyes over the cauldron. Doing just that, she made sure to not drop the eye. It would be such a drag to start all over again, she was sure she didn't have the energy to.

Fortunately she wouldn't have to. All squeezed out, she tossed the eyes into the rubbish bin. YAAAAAAWWN. Dang. She was ready for a nap.

When Tobias next looked up, the writing on the board was MUCH bigger. Much easier to read. But still, having help from a friend gave Tobias more comfort than an enlarged blackboard, though he wasn't able to explain why. Both were helpful, however, and so Tobias would use both.

He was getting pretty behind again, so Tobias squinted between the board and Cutty's notes before reaching for his mortar and pestle.

"Scourgify," the little old Hufflepuff cast on the apparatus, and then added the asphodel roots and began TO CRUSH THEM. Yeah. A lot of vigorous crushing went on, but Tobias found that he tired too easily, and instantly regretted using so much force so early on. He took a moment and had a breather, before having at it again. Eventually, it reached a pretty smoth consistency, though what did Tobias know, really? He could hardly see a blasted thing.

That went off to the side with the puss, and then Tobias got started on the actual potion.

"Scourgify." Because his cauldron needed to be clean, you see. Tobias added the 0.2 litres of seal milk (??? okay sure seal milk why not) and pointed his wand at the flame pit beneath the cauldron. "Incendio."

Something Tobias had noticed but never really shared with anyone was that he had quite the penchant for fire spells; anything fire related fell squarely in his court, particularly when it came to spells that produced flames (rather than that one from History of Magic, which Tobias had taken a few goes to get right). He'd discovered a neat little trick with the fire-making spell that was very useful in potions.

With his wand still pointed at the flames, Tobias rotated his wand slowly clockwise, and subsequently set the flame to high. He smiled to himself, as it just reminded him of his little knack for certain spells, which was always good for boosting confidence. When the flame had been on high for a little while, Tobias rotated his wand back anti-clockwise again until it had lowered to a medium sort of level.

Now that his potion was underway, Tobias felt his confidence rise dramatically. The start of the lesson had been a minor setback, and Tobias refused to dwell on it. He continued the potion cheerfully enough, focusing only on the blackboard, Cutty's notes and, occasionally, Cutty and his potion.

Speaking of Cutty, the Slytherin pushed his notes over again, and Tobias bent over them and quickly (or as quickly as he could) jotted down the new steps, and then cross-referenced it by squinting at the board. As though in an odd game of to-me-to-you, Tobias smiled and transferred the notes back to Cutty's desk because his friend would obviously want to add to them for his own benefit.

Right, syrup and eyes then. Working with eyes was difficult, because it reminded Tobias that these were dead animals he was working with, which was sad. But at least they were going to good use, right? Right. And they probably were dead BEFORE being harvested as potions ingredients. That's what Tobias told himself, anyway.

Adding the syrup was easy, it was just uncorked and then BAM, in it went. The eyes, however, provided a bit more of a challenge. They were remarkably slimy and slippery, and Tobias struggled to get a good grip of the first one. It kept sliding through his fingers and was pretty much impossible to grasp. Eventually, the Hufflepuff worked a way of making his hand into a fist with an eye-shaped gap that he wedged the eye into. Toby quickly 'scourgified' his potions knife and picked it up before looking to the eye.

This was were his own eyesight was making a mockery of him again. Tobias had to get in real close to ensure he made a slit in the back of the eye, and not in his hand or something instead. He succeeded, but not without getting a noseful of the vile smell the eye was giving off, and then twisted his outstretched arm so the eye was directly over the cauldron and squeeeeeeeeeeezed. When Tobias was sure he'd got out all the fluid, he did the same with the other eye using the same technique, and then threw the rest of both eyes away.

Tobias looked around his workstation for a rag or something. Slimy hands were going to make things difficult. No go, so he picked up his wand and pointed it at said slimy hand with a "Scourgify." Perfect.

Mo's cauldron and utensils were still clean from the thorough cleansing he had just put them through a few moments before, and he was ready to move on to the next step. Or the first real step, as the case may be. He settled the cauldron in front of him before adding the seal milk and setting heat on high. With the time required to heat being only a minute, Mo counted slowly in his head rather than pull out his pocket watch to keep time. At exactly 60 seconds, he lowered the heat to medium.

Into the cauldron went the hellebore syrup, and Mo only paused for a moment to watch the viscous fluid dissolve before moving on. His knife was very clean too, although he did give the tool another Scourgify for good measure.

And now for the slightly gross (yet uniquely fascinating) part. The puffer-fish eyes were pretty small, and slitting each of them wasn't an easy task. Nor was draining the liquid into the cauldron. In fact, the first eye drained all down Mo's gloved hand, and he had to retrieve a new eye for the task. This time, the liquid dripped neatly into the cauldron, and Mo dropped the empty eyeball detritus onto the work station surface. "Evanesco," Mo rid his space of any leftover materials before re Scourgifying everything he could think of, including his gloves.

“Tricky for the young ones.” Andrew thought as he glanced at small people around him. Yeah, the next step will be a messy one. Hopefully Cosgrach was up for it, given his foul mood. The seventh year thought that it was best to mind his own business and get down to making the perfect solution for that day. Andrew got his Hellebore’s Syrup and added it to his cauldron. Up next was the Puffer Fish Eyes.

Andrew winced at the thought for a second, and reached for his knife. Oh. Wait—not his knife but a scalpel. That would make his job easier given its tiny and sharp tip. So yeah, scalpel it is. Andrew cleaned his lancet with the cleaning charm and proceeded to give the first eye a slit. He did this on top of the cauldron to make sure that all of its contents will land inside the cauldron. Precious ingredients were precious. He then took the second puffer fish eye, incised the back of it and added its content too to the mix.

The seventh year took a quick peek inside his cauldron and shrugged. He went on to vanish the remains of the puffer fish eyes. He then took the opportunity to clean his gloves and scalpel. Andrew simply cannot stand the icky stuff that smothered his gloves and tools. Scourgify, scourgify. Since the last step was a tricky one, the seventh year took the chance to write down the notes in front of him, since he assumed that he will have to wait a bit for the next instruction to be given.

With everyone doing fairly well, Cosgrach was relieved. No one seemed to have too many problems with the eyes, which told him his class was crafted with their hands. It was good to know for future reference.

He stepped in the front again. This time, he first tapped his wand on the blackboard and the next step appeared.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blackboard

4. Stir 3 times counter clock wise with a wooden stirrer and lower the heater to minimum.

"The next step is on the board," he said, and it was pretty simple that didn't require any explanation, but he read it out just in case.

"Stir 3 times counter clock wise with a wooden stirrer and lower the heat to minimum." Clear? Any questions?

Sander looked up and squinted, grateful that Professor Cosgrach had largened the writing on the board. He picked up his quill and copied out the next instructions that appeared on the board, into his potions journal.



Now that he had that all written down, Sander put down his quill and replaced it for his wand. Pointing his wand at his wooden stirrer, he cleaned it, saying, "Scourgify." After inspecting it to make sure it was clean, Sander holstered his wand before placing the wooden stirrer into the mixture in his cauldron.

He stirred the mixture counter clockwise three times.

One...two....three....he counted them off. Then he reached down and lowered the temperature of the burner until the heat was turned down to minimum.

Once that was done, he picked up his quill again, and updated his journal.



Putting down his quill, he sat back again and watched his mixture brew while waiting for the Professor to give his next instructions.

Did they turn the temperature down before, after or during stirring? Ana didn't know but she figured she'd do it after. Picking up her wooden spoon she dipped it into her cauldron stirring 1,2,3 time counter clockwise, just as directed. After removing the spoon from the cauldron she turned the heat to minimum and hoped that she'd done everything correctly.

So far so good with this potion. But it didn't take long for Theo to get bored with it. It's not like it would do him much good until he was like, 80, since this weird ageing stuff hadn't affected him. He picked up a wooden stirrer and plopped it gently into his cauldron. He stirred it three times, counter clockwise, then placed it back onto his desk.

Theo lowered the heat and then pulled out his notebook again. Better catch up on the writing since this was quite a simple step.

Ooooh. They had more steps now. Grace liked that, because she wanted stuff to do. She wanted to learn lots. She looked at the instructions, reading them carefully before she began. The easy bit was first. Picking up the Hellebore syrup, she added it to her cauldron gently. That was easy enough. The next bit was going to be hard. And disgusting. Who wanted to touch an eye? Shaking her head, she picked the eye up gently. It didn't look very nice.

She frowned picking up her knife, and making a small cut into the back of the eye. At least nobody was going to be cutting her eye open. Putting her knife back down, she went to start squeezing it into her cauldron when it slipped out of her hands. "Opps..." She giggled, quickly picking it up, and cleaning it with that spell that she was really good at now. Okaay. Try again. Concentrating some more, she squeezed the liquid into the cauldron. And didn't drop it this time. Beaming, she quickly but the eye into the bin. She didn't know the vanishing spell yet. Maybe she should learn that next.

Okaaay. Step four. The first year looked up at the board, to make sure she knew what to do next. Ohhh. They seemed easy. And no eyes this time. Picking up her wooden stirrer and stirred her potion anti-clockwise three times. Okaay. That was done. Nodding, she turned the heat of her potion down to minimum. and noww to wait for the next instructions.

"Oh, he smiled to me! He smiled to me! I think I'll faint right now!" Annabeth lowered her head and muttered to herself, in ecstasy. Her hands started trembling and she barely could hold her quill to take the new notes. He said they should have good hands to do the next step, so she should control her nerves... But, how would she do it when the remembrance of his perfect smile was printed on her retina? She breathed deeply while trying to pay attention on the next steps. With her hands still trembling, she jotted the instructions.

With some difficulty, she poured hellebore syrup into her cauldron. Then the girl took her silver knife. She didn't bother cleaning it, she always had it cleaned, just as her former teacher had taught her. Anna took carefully a puffer-fish eye and rolled it in her hand to cut the back side. She had to show him how skilled she was, he would be impressed and certainly would invite her to talk about potions, so they would have hours to talk, just he and she... She sighed. She pursued her lips by pressing her knife against the eye, making a small cut on its surface. Perfect. Then she squeezed the eye into the cauldron until it was emptied. Completely satisfy with her own skill, she took another eye and repeated the procedure. She couldn't believe, it was perfect! Did the teacher observe her? She looked at him, expectantly.

He wasn't looking at her, but at all of them when he told them the next step. His voice flustered her a bit. Suddenly a quite simple instruction seemed to be impossible to follow. She breathed deeply again. "Alright. Stir. I have to stir. Counter clock wise. Just three times, no more."

She took her wooden stirrer and counted three, clockwise. It was when she noticed the hollow eyes on her work station and got stressed about. "Oh, no! I forgot to vanish it!" She couldn't decide what to do first: if lower the heater to minimum or take her wand to vanish the emptied eyes. She grabbed her wand and pointed to the eyes. The potion began to boil ominously. She threw her wand aside and lowered the heater to minimum. Though the boiling hadn't ceased and the potion was about to overflow.

"Professor Culloden!! I think I have a problem here!"

She shouted and quickly shoved the emptied eyes into a pocket.

After her little mistake Oichi was almost certain the professor was gonna yell at her when of all things a younger girl came up to her and offered her another eye and even showed her how not to make the mistake again. She followed the girls instructions and sure enough the eye juice of a pufferfish was in her potion in no time. "Hey thanks for the eye and the tips on how to get its juices in the potion. That was really creative, I'm Oichi by the way", Oichi said as she added the hellbore syrup to her potion. She then stirred all of it three times counterclockwise and lowered her heater to minimum. She then added the two steps she just did to her notes

... Ewwww. Delilah eyed the puffer-fish eyes on her table, suddenly wanting to throw up. This was rather gross. But she had to do it, yeah? She carefully slit the back of each eye and gently squished them into the cauldron before disposing them in the bin. She stared at her hand and made a face. The girl picked up her wand with the other hand and directed a "Scourgify." at her slimy one. There. Her hand was clean now. Phew. Now, to the next step.

She pointed her wand at the wooden stirrer and muttered another, "Scourgify." With the clean spoon, she followed the professor's instructions. Stir anti-clockwise three times before she lowered the heat to minimum. Okay, done.

What was with all the yelling? GOSH. Delilah made a face before she started noting down the steps in her parchment. People should tone down their voices, yeah. It was rather annoying and distracting.

Time to move on to the next set of instructions. Adi read it carefully after Culloden had spoken it just to be sure he hadn't misheard anything.

"Scourgify!'' The wooden stirrer was clean and now he stirred three times counterclockwise.

One...
Two...
Three...

Next, Adi lowered the heat beneath the cauldron to minimum. He added those instructions to his notes and waited to continue his brewing.

When professor Culloden spoke again, Sophie looked up and read the new instructions that had just appeared on the board.

She grabbed the wooden stirrer that she had cleaned earlier and looked at it to make sure it was still clean. Good thing she did, because something had spilled on it already. So she Scourgified it before placing it in her cauldron and checking the next step again.

Counter clockwise. Okey doke!

One.... two...... and three.

After that, she cleaned the sitrrer again and placed it down next to her cauldron as she picked up her wand and lowered the heat to minimum.

Alright so this part was going to be way easier.. he added the next step to his notes and went in search for a wooden Stirrer.. he had one in his kit earlier.. where was it.. he moved around everything in his kit in search for it it… thats when he spotted it.. it must have fallen out… it was under the table all dirty now, Bay pouted and bent down to retrieve it.

Once in his hand he thought it was best for him to clean it off.. taking out his wand he said "Scourgify" to make sure everything was off it.. Alrighty so now he had to stir it 3 times counter clockwise.

Taking his wooden stirrer he counted the times out loud "One…..Two…..Three" he said while taking out the wooden stirrer.. he washed the stirrer and then put his wand away. he moved back to his parchment and made sure he scratched off what he had completed.

Phew. Sophie was relieved that the girl followed her instructions well and succeeded - it would've been embarrassing if her advice had failed the girl. "You're welcome. M'Sophie. S'nice to meet you, Oichi. Cool name." Giving the girl a small smile, the Ravenclaw headed back over to her cauldron to continue working, just in time for the professor's next instructions.

Text Cut: Culloden

Quote:

Originally Posted by StarShine

N'aw, his favourite student was helping another. Cosgrach's chest filled with pride and he couldn't help but smile at her. He would thank her later, though. Now, he had to explain the next step.

With everyone doing fairly well, Cosgrach was relieved. No one seemed to have too many problems with the eyes, which told him his class was crafted with their hands. It was good to know for future reference.

He stepped in the front again. This time, he first tapped his wand on the blackboard and the next step appeared.

"The next step is on the board," he said, and it was pretty simple that didn't require any explanation, but he read it out just in case.

"Stir 3 times counter clock wise with a wooden stirrer and lower the heat to minimum." Clear? Any questions?

Slipping back into her seat, Sophie looked attentive as Culloden explained the next set of instructions. Eeeeasy enough. First, she slipped her gloves from her hands, scourgified them with her wand, and slid them back on her hands. Plucking her clean wooden stirrer from her kit, she peeked into the cauldron curiously as she lowered the stick inside and gently stirred counter-clockwise once... twice... and a third time. The concoction looked pretty un-exciting so far, didn't it? Sophie rested the stirrer on her laid-out napkin so the potion wouldn't run all over her workstation while she took care of the next step, then she pulled one glove off, scooped up her wand, and reduced the flame under the cauldron to a minimum.

Then she pointed her wand at her wooden stirrer on the napkin and murmured, "Scourgify." Hehe. Potions was so fun. If her heart wasn't so set on being a Wandmaker some day... she thought she'd make a pretty good potioneer.

OH WAIT. Caleb had forgotten to add water to his bubotuber pus! Ugh what was wrong with his brain today? Heading over to the water (mainly so he could catch up faster, not because he couldn't do Aguamenti) he added a bit of it to the pus and then set that aside again.

Alright, time to add the milk. He put the seal milk in his cauldron and immediately turned the heat to HIGH. One two three...waiting all the way until sixty when his minute was up, and he turned off the heat to medium. Alright, making progress!

He was grateful for the end of the dealing with the eyes and the next step certainly seemed simple enough. Taking out his wooden stirer, Ben realized it hadn't been cleaned so he took up his wand as well. "Scourgify," he cast quietly yet correctly, solving that problem before moving to handle the stiring as he slipped the end of the clean stirer into his cauldron.

One...two...three counterclockwise.

Then cautiously slipping the stirer back out, he reached for the burner and lowered the heat. The bare minimum was all it was set at as he leaned back. Nope....no questions here. Except maybe...why was he doing alright in potions this term?