Making a Hieroglyphic Scroll and the Maker Faire

Last Friday we made a hieroglyphic scroll as we continue our early writing study in The Story of the World Ancients.  The instructions in the activity book called for using ink, paint, or purple berry juice to write with.  We decided to make our own.  We started out with some blueberries.  

 When that was too faint, we added some cherries and SQUISHED.

And in the midst of our squishing, this happened:

Then, when I tried to clean it up I dropped even more on the floor.  Sigh...not my best performance.  We finally caved and added a wee bit of red and purple paint to the berry paste so you could see the writing.

Red used the hieroglyphic decoder from the activity book to write her message on some resume paper I had taped together (which is slightly more papyrus like than regular printer paper).  She wanted me to write too so I wrote on the top sheet and she wrote on the bottom. Here's our finished hieroglyphic writing.

The next step was to attach some dowel rods and roll it up, but she just wanted to roll it up and tie it with some blue curling ribbon instead which was just fine with me.  Next, we're on to seeing which will last longer --- our cuneiform tablet or our hieroglyphic scroll!

Speaking of making things --- we attended the Maker Faire over the weekend.  The Cobbler was very interested in going in the hopes that he would find some more inspiration and ideas for the electric car he's building.  I was just hoping that the kids would last long enough for him to get his fill.  It ended up being a lot more interesting and fun than I expected.  While we missed out on the fire breathing pony and I was too hot and tired to enjoy the life size Mousetrap game, we did have a lot of fun! 

Here's the front end of the fire breathing dragon (not to be confused with the pony :-).

 Red on the trapeze

 Tom Thumb making a paddleboat using recycled items.

 Me, the Cobbler and Red with some members of the Dark Side (Tom Thumb is in the stroller out of frame because he was too afraid!)

 Red weaving.

 Tom Thumb swinging on the waterfall swing.  I did this too with Red and it was awesome.  Water would fall on you based on your rhythm created on the swing.  We got very wet which was very welcome in the heat!

 And of course, where there are balloon hats, my children will come.

Hope your week's off to a great start!