pool noodle lances
A step by step guide to organize a medieval themed party. Medieval parties are full of fun and once you have selected your costume all the rest is very easy to prepare.
What could be more medieval than a meat pie?
Our church hosted a "Kingdom Chronicles" VBS this year so I needed to come up with some simple and inexpensive medieval decorations. Here's what I made... Poster board torches (Yield 10) 3 sheets of each red, orange, and yellow tissue paper 2 sheets of black poster board (you can get 5 cones from each sheet) staples hot glue gun 11" quarter circle made using a measuring tape and pencil like a compass sticky tack or pushpins to hand the torches with Roll your quarter circle into a cone Add one staple at the outside upper corner Take one sheet of each color tissue paper (red, orange, and yellow) Lay them on top of each other and cut into quarters Bunch the centers together and staple Hot glue the stapled tip of the tissue paper to the inside of the poster board cone Toilet paper roll chandelier (Yields 2) 1 sheet of each red, orange, and yellow tissue paper, each cut into 16 rectangles 1 sheet of black poster board 12 toilet paper tubes 4 large cardboard circles (14"-16" diameter) like the ones pictured below staples hot glue gun 1. Glue 2 circles together (for strength) 2. Makes 1/2" cuts around the bottom of every toilet paper tube 3. Open up the slits and hot glue the tubes evenly around the outer edge of your circles 4. Spray paint your chandeliers from top to bottom with black spray paint 5. Make "flame" tufts out of your tissue paper and staple them at the bottom (like the torches above) 6. Stuff tissue paper "flames" into each toilet paper tube 7. Cut poster board into 1" x 6 1/4" strips (you should be able to get at least 90 strips of paper) 8. Make 6 separate paper chains of 13-15 links each (depending on how long you want them) 9. Glue 3 paper chains to each chandelier 10. Connect your three chains together with one final link. 11. Hang your chandeliers using fishing line and ceiling hooks. Dollar store tablecloth banners 2 different color dollar store tablecloths for each banner 16"-20" piece of ribbon to tie each banner fishing line or yarn to tie the two tablecloths together at the top corners duct tape or ceiling hooks to hang the banners from the ceiling The finished product - teaching section up front, craft and coloring station at the back. Display area for our week's verses
How to Make a Medieval Trebuchet Out of Cardboard: Of all the Medieval siege engines, the Trebuchet was by far the most accurate and complex. Trebuchets were capable of throwing 350 pound objects over castle walls. While in this Instructable we won't be making a Trebuchet with that much firing power…
Field day is a school activity that kids look forward to all year. It's held toward the end of the year when the weather is warmer and is one of the last school events before summer. Traditionally, it is a sporting event where kids get to run around, play games and win prizes.
We have all enjoyed stepping back to the Middle Ages with Liz and her class this spring. They have studied history, learned traditional Engl...
Before you become a knight, you must go through the proper training. Take a look at my son's 9th Birthday! Knights-In-Training Royal Celebration! The formal invitation Check out the goodies and decorations. Alright! Let's get this party started with a fanfare from the King! (Yes, that's my 'awesome' husband, oh the things I talk him into.) Training has begun! Get some inspiration... Shield Designing is first. Every good knight needs a personalized shield! Well done! Now it's time for the Battle Training. Get your gear! Take one bow... (straw) and strap on a pack of color-coded arrows! (Q-tips) Now choose your castle to take cover in. The serpent castle on one side or... or the dragon castle on the other! Load one arrow into the bow,aim and fire (blow)! Repeat again and again! Good work! Even the king got in the middle of this battle! That's the spirit! Time for Catapult Assembly Training. Head to the supply table. Gather what you need. Follow the directions carefully...you don't want a faulty catapult! Don't forget your ammunition (marshmellows)! Load up the catapult with marshmellows...I mean ammo. a little target practice. Take teams, ready...fire! Aim for your target! Get your mask on for protection! Now, just what you've been waiting for... it's time for Sword Fighting Practice. You'll need some energy first, eat up. OK, you're ready, careful now... Do a little practice first, then... get on those 'horses' and knock your opponent off! <><><><> <><><><> <><><><> You've got it! Great jousting! Try not to enjoy it too much, this is serious training! Good work! Your training is complete. Your knighthood has been officially granted by the king! Time for the Celebration Banquet! -Corndogs on a stick (knights love anything that can resemble a sword!) Fruit Kabobs (yes, they're on a stick as well!) Round Table Snack Mix (Round pretzels, round soup crackers and cheddar popcorn) Flaming Arrows -Chocolate dipped marshmellows with red sugar sprinkles! (Oh, look- they're on a stick too!) Shield cookies- rectangle shaped cookies with a frosted petite cookie on top. To drink, Knight's Fuel otherwise known as juice pouches. And Birthday Cake! Happy 9th Birthday, Jacob! Before leaving, all knights receive their reward for good training. Payment in gold (chocolate coins), RingPop (from the king) and little knight figures. A reward well deserved! Many thanks go out to the grandparents for their help! The paper decorations were ordered from Birthday Express and the foam swords were ordered from Amazon. Catapult directions were found at the Knight for Hire website. Costumes, hoppity horses and various props were brought from my mom's friends. The king's robe and crown were borrowed from our church. A big thank you (especially from my child) to Lowes for their many appliance boxes and helping me stuff them into my car! (I drove home with my seat as far forward as possible and cardboard over my head! The things we do for our kids?!) Now the hard part...getting those thank you notes finished! Linking up to: MyInsanityPartyParty
Adult Party Ideas for a Medieval Birthday
My husband bought a medieval wax seal before we were married and never used it. I jumped up and down and said,
This year Captain choose a “Medieval Knights, Dragons and Castles” theme for his birthday celebration! I thought it was a perfect theme, especially since we had just finished studying the Middle Ages this past year for History. ~ Decorations ~ I enjoyed making birthday banners for our recent Lego and Nesting Doll birthday parties, […]
One mama looking for magic in the everyday--Adventures with four children, nature, waldorf education and the big daddy.
Change the way you look at fun homeschool projects and plan a Medieval Celebration for your family that isn't stressful!
Give the kids something to shoot at that doesn't involve a video screen. Help them make a mini catapult then use marshmallows or pom-poms to shoot at targets. To make it easy, we've provide a numbered target you can just download and print.
Much of Western cooking, and especially Mediterranean cooking, descends from Roman cooking. To cook like a Roman today you need to use only ingredients that were available to the Romans, adapt your cooking techniques somewhat, and learn to...
"King Richard's Faire"
Learn how quick and easy it is to make a tissue paper torch. They make great decorations for medieval, Olympic, and other parties.
DIY Embossed Pendants!: It feels great to wear handmade jewelries and feels greater when you make your own jewelries :) In this instructable I'll show you how to make embossed (look alike!) gold and silver pendants in 5 easy steps. I'm sure you'll have fun making these pen…
Check out these fun medieval crafts! Learn about the middle ages for kids with these fun crafts. These medieval crafts are great for kids of all ages. Try
Our Scout troop recently had our yearly Blue and Gold Banquet over the weekend with a kick-A Renaissance theme. No detail was left out in creating this amazing event! Each boy had a tunic and hood made by the amazing Teresa (You're incredible!) The decorations: Mostly made from rolls of butcher paper, black sharpies, cardboard, streamers, tissue paper and rolls of blue wrapping paper. And those incredible banners?? All made by the inspiring Melissa (pictured with Grandson) I'm in awe of her talents! You remember last years Western theme and Wanted posters? Well, to keep up with tradition I made each boy and the leaders a "decree" using pictures I took of them in a stockade printout one of the leaders found online, then turning it into a pencil drawing (tutorial here) and doing a little Photoshop design work and the Cub Scout Core Values. These were some of my favorites... Love how they turned out! And each boy got to take their's home with them. The meal, in true Renaissance style was to be consumed sans silverware. The kids loved it! Behind the scenes: We enjoyed a slide show of Scouting events past A very special presentation of the colors and Pledge of Allegiance With all the lights off, and a single spotlight on the flag, the Scout (my Connor), read each line of the Pledge separately And in between breaks, the Scout Leader (my Mr.), read beautiful and patriotic examples and definitions for each line. It was really amazing! The awards: With their awards, each Scout got one of these really cool wooden swords Made by the amazing Ron! So. Cool. They were a big hit. Literally. At the end they let the boys who will, this year be eligible to start attending Scouts, come up and get a sword too. Oh, except that big guy in the middle, he's 10, he's actually a Weblos Scout ;) (Scouting starts at the age of 8 in The Church Of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and "The Church uses age instead of school grade to determine membership in Scouting programs. Separate age-group units are encouraged to maintain quorum integrity, identity, and lines of authority" You can read more about the LDS Boy Scouts of America guidelines HERE. And no, you do not need to be a member of the LDS church to join one of their affiliated troops). Scouting ROCKS! The boys had a blast!! Ok, so we did as well! HAPPY CREATING EVERYONE!!
You know something? When was going through recovery after my tonsillectomy, I thought that having two whole weeks to have nothing to do would be a great time to catch up on some of the books that I have been neglecting to finish. Surprisingly, however, I didn't feel like reading. I felt like doing... nothing. So that's what I did. So, I'm quite behind on my books. :P I am only now beginning to read books for the first time in maybe 4 weeks. Trust me, friends. IT HURTS NOT HAVING TIME TO READ. But anyways, I have been enjoying quite a few random things lately, being happy, staying positive, and all that. So here it is, just a small list of things that have been making me happy lately. ~A Few of My Favorite Things~ (as of late) Call the Midwife ~*~ Novelty make-up items ~*~ Happy Planners ~*~ Returning to my job after being sick ~*~ Typewriters ~*~ Seven unread (soon to be read) books on my shelf ~*~ My (adult) coloring books ~*~ Vintage jewelry ~*~ Hebrews 11:6 ~*~ Clear, golden, late afternoon skies ~*~ Benedict Cumberbatch ~*~ Monthly Adam Young Scores ~*~ French pastries (don't ask... :D) ~*~ Reading all of your lovely blogs! ~*~ There you go! What sort of things would you put on YOUR happy list? I hope you have a good day, and I got a couple tags to catch up within this next week, so until then, BYEE!! -Phoebe
When you teach children about ancient Rome or Greece, you can make the lessons more exciting and stimulating my showing the kids how to create a topical craft that is related to the curriculum. For example, make an ancient scroll using a few basic materials that can be purchased at any arts and crafts supply store.
For a few short hours, we ate like medieval kings. We lifted our glasses and leaned into the past. We learned through living. Here's a list of the books and recipes we used.
Happy 449th to William Shakespeare! We hope you'll check out our birthday party activities and free cupcake templates for ideas on creating your own party for the Bard! To celebrate today, we're taking a trip back in time with some Medieval and Elizabethan recipes: soda bread, cheese tarts, salmagundi, and rice pudding. Yum! (Clicking on the recipe will bring you to the original recipe source, where you can find even more interesting menu options.)
This is the recipe used by Sayyid Abu al-Hasan and others in Morocco, and they called it isfîriyâ. Take red lamb, pound it vigorously and season it with some murri naqî*, vinegar, oil, pounded garl…
Melody had a Brave themed birthday party and these mini bow and arrow sets were one of the hits of the party. And, the best thing about them is that the arrows are safe and you'll never run out of them because they are made from Q-tips!! How clever!! Here's how we made them.... supplies: Popsicle sticks, dental floss, knife, q-tips Step 1: Make notches on both ends of the Popsicle sticks with a knife (you may have to zoom in to get a better look). Step 2: Soak the Popsicle sticks in water for at least an hour (to help them bend) Step 3: Snip off one end of the Q-tips to make the arrows (I used a sharp pair of scissors) and did this while the Popsicle sticks were soaking Step 4: Wrap a long strand of floss around one end of the Popsicle stick a few times and triple knot it. Then gently bend the stick and wrap the floss around the other side a few times and triple knot it. Cut off any leftover floss that is hanging off. Viola!!! We gave each girl who came to the party their very own bow with 3 little arrows in a Ziploc bag. They had so much fun with them. I know we will be making plenty more of these soon - my boys want their own as well! What a fun, easy craft! (a big thanks to the Brooding Hen for sharing her tutorial)
One of the things that I really like about the 13th-early 14th century are the many varied ways to wear you hair - and headwear. Contrary to popular ideas hair was not always totally cover4d, not even on married women. I've written some about it on the page about my 13th century outfit with a Barbie pink gardecorps, but I thought that it would be nice with a blog post which focuses on this and show some more period examples. Unmarried women I'll start with (presumably) unmarried women, who are often seen with their hair hanging or, much more rarely, braided. Braid with gold ribbons and a circlet from the end of the 13th century, ow maybe her hair is just wrapped in ribbons and not braided. In any case it's not hanging loosely. Lausanne, Bibliothèque Cantonale et Universitaire U 964 - Biblia Porta fol. 178r On of the young women ion this awesome French 13th century image of the Devil tempting both sexes to have fun same-sex sexuality, also has a single braid or possibly unbraided hair wrapped in ribbons. Wavy/slightly curly hair was popular. Here with a circlet. ca 1300. Codex Manesse/Grosse Heidelberger Liederhandschrift Here we see mother and daugher, showing the difference between a married woman with her chin strap and fillet and the daughter with a circlet in gold, tied with red ribbons. Codex Manesse/Grosse Heidelberger Liederhandschrift Loose hair and circlets in France c 1250. The Maciejowski Bible It is of course hard to be sure about the marital status of all these women, but this woman wearing a hairnet is also probably unmarried, like her friends, since she's wearing only a circlet with her hairnet. It appears that the white wavy fillet and chin strap was a thing for married women. And don't be fooled by all the women with white fillets and/or veils being courted by knights - adoring a married woman was a thing in Courtly Culture. (A book tip: Courtly Culture by Joachim Bumke, a German historian. It is really,really good.) This image show the death of Nabal and what I presume is his wife and daughter, indicating that the white cap today mostly referred to as the St. Birgitta cap, was worn also by unmarried women. You also see that already in France c. 1250 married women wore a chin strap and fillet with loose hair under it. But, really, "everyone" already knows that unmarried women wore their hair uncovered in the Middle ages. The most interesting thing may be the image of the woman at the top with her hair braided in one single braid. This is not a style that we generally associate with the 13th and early 14th century, and one that I will get back to now that I turn to the married women. Married women I promised myself that this post wouldn't be about veils, so I will try to refrain from showing images just because I like the veils, filelts or chin straps. there has to be some hair too. We have already seen that a white fillet, often with a wavy or decorated edge (I write more about that here) was worn by many women together with either a chin band/barbette, or maybe a Birgitta cap under it; the image above could for instance show a cap insted of a strip of linen. On the other hand there are written sources telling about long strips of linen, called gebende, wound many times around the head (Bumke 2000 p 152) and the image may well show this instead. This is a lovely detail shot of Markgrafin Uta from the Naumburg cathedral, showing her wide gebende decorated with gold, but also some of her wavy hair at the temples. Photo from Wikimedia commons A much less well-known figure from the same cathedral is countess Gerburg von Brehna. She's not as pretty, but she has a braid! So, like Uta she has a crown with a pill box cap, a gebende wrapped around her head, and wavy hair showing at the temples, but, since we can see her from the side we also see that she has a single braid hainging down her back. Furthermore, if you look at my favourite of the Naumberg ladies: the happily smiling Reglindis you see that she also probably has a hanging braid. Image from wikimedia commons Oh, what I would give for a side view of Uta's head :) Narrower chinstraps were worn with a fillet and hanging hair as you have seen in the example of the motehr and daughter from the Grosse Heidelberger Liederhandschrift above. The Weingartner Liederhandschrift, which is contemporary to it, but much less fancy seem to favour a slightly...sloppy approach to the white linen fillet. Image from wikimedia commons You also find many examples of hanging hair under a veil in the Grosse Heidelberger Liederhandschrift. With veil and a circlet on top of it. And another one: And one with a pink veil draped over what appears to be a gold coloured band of some kind. No chinstraps as you can see on these images, but veils indicating married status anyway. Hair nets came in many colours, and were frequently worn with chinstrap and white fillet. Two examples from the Murthly Hours, a French mansucript fro the 1280s, show a green and a blue net respectively. And we also see that while prossibly shaped it is defintiely not a cap the woman with the green hairnet is wearing, which makes it less likely that it's a cap in the image of Nabal's death from the Maciejowski bible, since it looks just the same, except that we can't see the top of her head. Detail from fol 6 recto This is a gorgeous manuscript, which can be seen in its entirety at the web site of the national Library of Scotland. Lots of inspiration for illumination there. Another be-netted, fillet wearing...snake. From MS K26 at St.John's College, Cambridge. And a Norwegian early 14th century example, showing decorated hairnet, chin strap and fillet. So, hairnets are definitely an option, for married as well as for unmarried women - there are also quite a few of them preserved. This one is from the church of St. Truiden in Belgium, dated to the 13th century (link to museum site): And the same goes for this one, from the cathedral of St. Paul (link to museum site). As you see, they are first knotted and then embroidered. I'm ending this post with an image from the Rheims Missal 1285-1297, showing maybe a "Birgitta cap" with a fillet with wavy or dagged edge and a gebende. And wavy hair at the temples.
Find out what name you had, probably in your past life.
A Simple DIY Pool Noodle and PVC Pipe Sword makes a great toy for little boys and girls!
Here you will find a collection of Tudor worksheets to print for your children, both at home and at school. Compare Tudor fashions, plot the routes of Tudor explorers, find out about Tudor food and table manners, compose your own newspaper pages, and much more!
