Making Phoenician Purple Dye

The kids are on spring break this week.  I called one of Tom Thumb's friend's dads to see if his friend could play this morning and he answered the phone with, "So how's your sanity?"  Ha ha---hanging on by a thread!  In an effort to keep the kids not fighting (when left to their own devices a fight is sure to ensue), I whipped out The Story of the World activity book to see if we had anything on hand for one of the crafts in the book.  I was in luck!


The Phoenicians, featured in chapter 15, were known for their luxurious purple dyed goods.  A craft to tie in with the chapter was to make your own purple dye using purple cabbage and alum.  So what the heck is alum?  I was on the phone with my mom this morning and I asked her.  She said, "Oh yeah...alum.  That's what gives pickles their pucker.  I think I have some of that in the basement.  I'll drop it by later."  The vintage container above (isn't 70s chic?) is what she brought over.  I had made Rainbow Stir Fry earlier in the week (which by the way was super yummy.  Even the kids liked it!) so I had 1/2 a head of purple cabbage leftover to use for the dye.


Here's how you make the dye.  First you put the cabbage head in a large pot of water. Red did the honors --- check out that missing tooth!

Next, you boil that cabbage for an hour.  Be prepared for the house to smell like Charlie Bucket's house. :-)  Although, Red said it smelled like I was making broccoli soup.

Once you're done with the boiling, let it cool for a while and then remove the cabbage and discard it.  Then, add a tablespoon of the alum to the cabbage water.  This will turn the water more purple.  Prior to this addition, it will look more blue.

Stir the alum in, let the dye cool a bit, and then you're ready to go.  We tried dying pasta to make necklaces and fabric.

Now we wait...  I checked the pasta about a half hour after we put it in and it still looked like pasta resting in purple water to me.  The cloth immediately turned lavender.  We'll see if it gets any darker.


And who knew dying pasta could be so dangerous!  Tom Thumb actually got a piece of ditalini pasta stuck up his nose!  He claims he was smelling it at the time.  Luckily, I was able to pluck it out with a pair of tweezers.  Eek!  I'll have results pictures soon---of the dying, not of the booger pasta. :-)

Making a Sumerian Seal

We finished up reading about The First Sumerian Dictator in Story of the World this past week.  The art project in the activity book for this chapter was making a Sumerian seal.  Back then, most Sumerians did not know how to write so they each had their own unique seal that they used to identify themselves when writing in clay. We decided to make ours out of Roseart modeling clay, but didn't realize until it was too late that we didn't buy the air-drying variety.  No matter--- Red stamped with it anyway.

We also read a couple of the recommended books --- The Three Princes and The Golden Sandal.  Red and I especially enjoyed The Golden Sandal because it was a Middle Eastern version of the Cinderella story.  It had cute illustrations to boot!  One more thing to add about this lesson --- I let the kids watch Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope and Red asked me, "Is Darth Vader the leader of a military dictatorship?"  I guess these Story of the World lessons are really sinking in. :-)


We had a snafu with our plan to see which one held up better --- the hieroglyphic scroll vs. the cuneiform tablet.  When we checked on them a week after putting them in the yard, the scroll was still there but the tablet was nowhere to be found!  Perhaps some wild animal likes the taste of Play Doh tablet?  Since it is the tablet I made that is missing in action, Red is debating whether or not she'd like to do some of the other experiments about seeing which one lasts longer using her tablet.  We've already decided not to leave it outside though.


On an entirely separate note, I finished the long process of removing the wallpaper border from Tom Thumb's room.  It was a bittersweet moment for me.  Before Red was born, I spent hours poring over wallpaper books at a small paint and wallpaper store in the downtown area of our city trying to find the perfect border.  I fell in love with this one.  Even after she attempted to rip it off the wall a few times during her 2 year old destructive phase, I pasted it back up.  When she and Tom Thumb swapped bedrooms in the spring we left it up.  He has been begging me since then to paint his room yellow (his favorite color) so it was time to say adios to the baby border.  Here are some photos before I took it all the way down.  Sniff, sniff...

It was so difficult to remove (I scraped at the adhesive for HOURS) I told Red that no matter how many years pass that if Mommy ever says she wants to put up wallpaper again she is to tell me NO!  I think we finally have a shade of yellow selected that matches what is already going on in Tom Thumb's room without burning our eyes out.  I had to immediately talk him out of the neon yellow he really wanted.  T.G.I.F.!

Building Lego Pyramids

After reading the section on Egyptian pyramids yesterday in Story of the World and then reading a bit more about them in Pyramids and Mummies (great easy reader on the subject!), we dumped out the Legos and built two small pyramids according to the instructions in the Story of the World activity book.  The block options are to make your own blocks out of sand or use sugar cubes or Legos.  Although I'm sure making the sand blocks would have produced a more realistic looking facsimile, I'm all about projects that are easily dismantled because my kids are pack rats.  If we had built a pyramid out of sand cubes, it would still be in my house when they were 20 and off at college. :-)

Then, in the end, we built the behemoth "Great Pyramid" in the photo above.  Currently, Red has erected it on top of her headboard in her room.

Yesterday, we put the hieroglyphic scroll and cuneiform tablet in our backyard to see which one lasts the longest.  Updates coming soon!

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!

Making a Cuneiform Tablet

Yesterday Red and I did the "Make Cuneiform Tablets" activity that goes along with The First Writing chapter from The Story of the World Ancients activity book.  She had been pleading with me to do it for several weeks, but we didn't have clay on hand.  Finally, I caved and we used Play Doh (which we do have) instead.  First, we checked out the key in the activity book for the symbols we wanted to use and wrote them out on a piece of paper to make copying them easier.

Then, we rolled out our Play Doh and used a straw to poke a hole so we can hang it up later when it's dry.

Pumpkin decided to get in on the action by lying on the activity book.  Good thing we had already copied down our characters.

Next, we carved our tablets using a paper clip.

Here's Red with our finished products.  Mine is the dark brown one and hers is tan.  

We're going to use mine for an upcoming project called "Why Do Clay Tablets Last Longer Than Paper"?, but first we have to make hieroglyphic scrolls.  With all the rain we've been getting, we might make those today.  Happy Friday everyone!

Making a Model of the Nile River

 Whenever we're not away from home on vacation, Red and I have been doing a Mommy Camp project nearly every afternoon while Tom Thumb is napping.  She is obsessed with Egypt!  Yesterday she asked if we could make a model of the Nile River, a project from chapter 2 (Egyptians Lived on the Nile River) from the Story of the World Ancients activity book.  This was an easy project.  All you need is an aluminum baking pan, aluminum foil, dirt, pebbles, and grass seed.

First, Red dug up some dirt from under our pine tree and put it in a tin baking pan.  Then she tried to shape the river bed similar to the Nile.

 The right end in the picture below is shaped more like a triangle because it's supposed to be the delta.  We lined it with two layers of tin foil so the river wouldn't wash out the banks made of dirt.

 Next, Red lined the river bed with pebbles to hold it down.

 Then, she sprinkled grass seed on the banks to represent the Egyptians' crops.

 Finally, it was time to flood the Nile!

And she flooded it good!

Now we wait and see if we get any lush crops of grass growing on our river banks. :-)

Making A Mummy!

We're really enjoying learning about ancient Egypt using the Story of the World Ancients book and activity guide.  Although we hadn't officially arrived at the chapter about mummies yet (it's in chapter 4 and we're still back in chapter 2), our Lift the Lid on the Mummies book and mummy making kit came in the mail.  Red couldn't wait to do it so we did the project during Tom Thumb's nap yesterday.  


We decided on the kit because one of Story of the World activities for chapter four is making a mummy out of a raw chicken.  While this probably would have been really cool, there are a few reasons the chicken mummy wasn't going to work for us:


1. I'm a vegetarian right now (I know saying "right now" seems funny, but I've only been eating this way for three months and don't know if I'll be able to sustain it for the long haul).
2. We have two cats that are constantly trying to eat everything edible (or sometimes inedible) in sight.
3. The idea of having a raw chicken lying around the house for six weeks grosses me out.


In the end, this kit was a great alternative to the raw chicken mummy project, especially since the book included in the kit is designed to be read as you do the project .  Here's how the mummy making went for us.  You need to allow at least two hours to complete this project.  When you open the box, this is what it looks like inside.

Red was super excited to open up the mummy and check out his little plastic organs, although she was bummed out that there was no brain for her to pull out of his nose with a hook! I think she may be reading too many Egypt books right now. :-)

Red named her mummy Happy because she said it looked like he was smiling.  What do you think?

Next, we had to make the canopic jars to store Happy's organs.  The description on Amazon says this kit is for 9-12 year olds, and I think the process to make the jars is the reason.  They are made of a heavy glossy paper.  Each jar is made of a rectangular piece and a circular piece of paper that must be cut out and glued together.  This was definitely a team effort.  I did all the cutting and gluing and Red held the bottom of the jar (the circle piece) on to the cylindrical part of the jar (the rectangle piece) while they dried.  Once all the jars were glued together it was time to put Happy's organs in them for storage.

Each jar came with a resin lid that represented the god that was supposed to protect that particular organ.  Here's Red putting Happy's intestines in their jar.  We had some issues with Imset's head (the liver god) falling off his jar.  We kept yelling "Put the lid on that liver!"

After our canopic jars were complete, it was time to wrap our mummy.  

One thing I have to say about this kit is that they should have included some more gauze.  We had to re-wrap Happy a couple of times in order to get full coverage.  If you buy this kit, plan on having some extra gauze on hand to make the wrapping part easier.  The kit included a sticker sheet with amulet stickers for you to stick on your mummy as you wrapped him up for protection.

Here's Red posing with Happy after he was all wrapped up.

Next, it was time to put him inside his sarcophagus.  

The punch out mask was included to put on Happy after he was wrapped.  When you're done you're supposed to seal the tomb with this sticker and then bury it.

Red decided against the sealing (why would you seal it?  Then you can't play with it anymore) and decided she wanted to decorate it like a real sarcophagus instead.  Since we didn't have any gold or jewels, she settled for tin foil, glitter glue, and beads.  I covered the lid for Red with tin foil and then she decorated it.

Here's the final product.

Happy even looks happy on the outside of his tomb! 

Overall, this was an excellent project.  Even though it required quite a bit of parental participation, it was great fun!  I would highly recommend this kit as a vegetarian alternative to the chicken mummy.

On a separate Egyptian note, Red just attended vacation Bible school with her friends and the theme was Joseph and Egypt.  What a perfect tie in to our studies!  I have great admiration for the coordinators of this vacation Bible school.  Check out the pyramid and the girls' costumes.  They got to wear those everyday that week.  We'll definitely be going again next year.  They had a grand time!

The kids and I are off to Chicago on Monday to visit my cousin's family so I may be on hiatus for a few days again.  Ah---gotta love summer!