Crafty Monday Part 1: Ancient Egypt

In this post: Pyramids, mummies, and King Tut! Crafts and a yummy treat! A trivia game with our group and a trip to the pottery store for our family Sukkot tradition. 

Hello dear ones! Today I’m splitting my post again between Fall crafts and our homeschool studies.  As you know, we’ve incorporated The Story of the World with our Draw and Write Through History book.  This past week we studied Ancient Egypt. We had so many neat books to read each day. We also watched Egyptian documentaries on Netflix.

Michael began “Who Was King Tut?” and answered journal questions.

• The Nile River ~ We began our studies by learning about the geography of Egypt. We found some reeds at a pond and made a reed boat. Then Michael painted the Nile on a box and I added moon sand and moss.  We got the Egyptian solder figurines at Hobby Lobby.

I found this Ancient civilizations game online and Michael played the demo for free. There was also a mummy game from Discovery Kids (I think) but it scared Michael. It was an educational game but I guess just seeing a mummy put scary thoughts in his head.

Michael liked the game below though. He was able to build up Egypt, kind of like Sim City.

• Rice Krispy Treat Pyramids! 

I bought pre-made treats and we formed them into pyramids. It takes three treats to make one pyramid.

Michael drew a picture of a pyramid and sphinx from his drawing book.

It accidentally “rained” in the picture. Michael used water colors again.

• Mummies!

So later that week we read the book “You Wouldn’t Want to be an Egyptian Mummy!” and Michael colored Canopic jars.

• Then we mummified a doll that I had found at a thrift store. I cut her hair and dressed her to look more Egyptian. You can find the links where we got our ideas on my Pinterest at the end of this post.

*Warning! Doll will be naked!

1. We gathered all our supplies: oil, salt, spices (cinnamon), linen wrappings (medical tape), Canopic jars (tp rolls with the the pictures pasted on them), tools (paintbrush & box cutter), a sarcophagus (box), and the doll.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   
2. Michael “cut” her open to take out her organs.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                

1. Then he rubbed her heart with spices and oil.  Then it was “salted” and wrapped in “linens”.                                                                            
2. Her mummified heart was put back “into” her body and the mourning process began. Michael is a good actor.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

1. I almost forgot. Her brain was removed through her nose and thrown away. It wasn’t that important to them.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

1. The rest of her organs (excluding the heart) were rubbed with spices and oil and then put into Canopic jars. Each jar looked like a specific Egyptian false god.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

1. The doll’s body was then stuffed with wrappings to make it full again. In this case we used cotton balls.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

1. Her whole body was washed with oil and spices. Then she was wrapped. I didn’t want to completely ruin the doll so I put plastic wrap on her hair so the medical tape wouldn’t destroy it.                                                                                                                                                              
2. I did the main wrapping and Michael finished it for me. It was tricky business.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

1. We put “amulets” between the wrappings. They were supposed to bring good luck and help in the afterlife.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                
2. Michael put her death mask on and she was put into her sarcophagus.                                                                                                                                             
3. Lastly, we added her valuables: clothes, furniture, and jewels.  We left her a cup of coffee because the Egyptians believed the dead would return to their body and eat and drink before going on to the next world.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

1. Michael and I built a pyramid out of cardboard bricks. We were limited so it is what it is.

Our Egyptian princess was laid to rest in her tomb. I made it where the bricks could be lifted off the top in case there were visitors or thieves.  I was fascinated with Egypt as a kid. I would’ve loved to play archaeologist with my barbies. What do they say? Youth is wasted on the young!

• Making papyrus

We used a method I found online. We cut strips of paper and weaved them together. We left them in sugar water for a couple of hours.

Then it dried over night.  A lot of the strips fell off so our papyrus is smaller. Then Michael rolled over the paper to make it flat.

We practiced writing a Cartouche on paper first. This was Michael’s first time using these calligraphy pens. They have to be dipped in ink. They are very hard to use.

It was too hard so we resorted to putting cuneiform on the “papyrus”. The ink blotted together unfortunately. We tried  at least and now Michael knows what his name looks like in cuneiform and hieroglyphics.

• Egyptian lapbook

Through out the week we put together this lapbook found online. I copied the Egyptian flag from an Around the World book we have.

• Pharaoh for a day!

We made a pharaoh mask. First, I traced Michael’s head onto a poster. Then I drew the mask around it and cut it out.

Michael colored a design on the mask.

Later I punched holes on the sides and added yarn so Michael could wear it.

I had to punch the holes near the eyes so the sides wouldn’t fold against his head.

Pharaoh telling Daddy what to do!

You can find all of our inspiration here on my Pinterest:

http://www.pinterest.com/doverette/egypt/

• Our group met this week for Trivia. It was so much fun!

The kids were divided into three teams made up of different ages. The kids came up with their own team name. Michael’s team was The Lightning Bees! They were team B at first so it worked. Plus the kids were thinking up names like Bunnies and Butterflies. One boy wanted to do lightning. So it all kind of mixed together to form the kewlest name ever! The kids and us moms put our hands together and shouted “Go Lightning Bees!”

Our host made up a “jeopardy”  board of sorts. There were 5 categories with various points. Each team picked what they wanted to do and the kids took turns being the speaker.

“Vanna” (her name for this post) 😉 asked the kids the question and then the group had to come up with their answer as a team. The speaker would then give the answer. Our team kept choosing the harder questions so we got more points and actually won.

All of the kids got to pick prizes at the end. Here’s Michael trying to see if he could lick his elbow (which was one of the questions).

One of the little girls had a birthday so her mom brought in yummy pink cupcakes.

• After our group, Michael and I went to the pottery store to continue our Sukkot tradition of painting fall themed pottery.

You can see what we made last year here: https://amberdover.wordpress.com/2012/10/15/crafty-monday-candy-corn-and-homemade-rootbeer/

Michael painted a pumpkin with a black cat in it. We don’t like black cats because they are “scary” or related to witch myths. We like them because we have a black cat and I happen to think he looks stunning against my favorite color, orange.

Here is a small plate for Sukkot that I painted. These aren’t the finished product. They still have to be glazed and baked.  You’ll get to see them next week, Lord willing :).

The manager was nice enough to give Michael a tour of the pottery process.

Here’s where they dip the pottery into the glaze.

Here’s the kiln, which gets hotter than I thought.  Maybe one day when we have time we will take a pottery class.

• Lastly, I wanted to show you what books we are using this year…at least the main ones.

These are the new piano work books. There’s also the actual song book that Michael plays from but it’s not shown.

Inside the theory and notespeller books.

Bob Jones devotional and spelling books. There are three spelling books because we started this series late last year. So Michael is at the end of book one and he should be able to finish all of book 2 and most of book 3 by the end of this year. Then he will catch up super quick in 4th grade.

Horizons Math book 2 of second grade (which is actually on 3rd grade level. Horizons is advanced). So we will begin book 1 of Third grade later this year. Lifepac Science for third grade and our cursive book.

Draw and Write through History, States and capitals, and Flash Forward Language Arts for 3rd grade. We are actually only doing parts of the language arts book because I’m trying to do more hands on for that subject. I didn’t take pictures of The Story of the World books but we are also doing those as you know. And we read “Life of Fred” for math every now and then. We use resources from all over and Michael reads a lot. But I wanted to give you an idea of our basics.

God bless & remember the High King lives! ~Amber Dover

Last Week: https://amberdover.wordpress.com/2013/09/09/crafty-monday-part-1-ancient-china-and-the-rats-of-nimh/

Next week: https://amberdover.wordpress.com/2013/09/23/crafty-monday-ancient-israel-and-her-neighbors/