When a box this large shows up in your mailbox, people tend to get excited.
When an 8 year old girl spies this stamp on a box, suggesting time travel, she tends to get overwhelming excited.
So when History Unboxed sent us this awesome box to review, you can imagine the smiles on a couple of little faces.
Unfortunately, those smiles faded quickly when mean ol’ mom said we couldn’t immediately get started on the awesome activities. Instead, I made them wait until the next day. You would’ve thought I was torturing them.
The next day was GORGEOUS, so we grabbed the box and headed outdoors to indulge in the fun.
The China Unboxed set we received included a sticker for a timeline, 2 activities (a kite and a statue of Emperor Qin,) as well as a package of green tea.
We began by holding a tea tasting.
We have a gorgeous tea set that my parents brought me back from China a few years ago. What better time to use it than when sampling one of China’s most popular drinks?
I LOVED the fact that the green tea was simple enough for the kids to make, all by themselves. While they poured the tea, I read the educational information that came in the box with each activity.
The information was simple and easy to understand. All I had to do was read it, which was awesome! After all of the hours I put in, researching and finding educational information on everything we do, it’s nice to have it done for me.
I mean, it was really, really nice.
As for the tea, I’ll put it nicely by saying that Miss Bookworm wasn’t a fan. 🙂
Miss Manners finished her first cup, but couldn’t be talked into drinking another one.
Bear, however, drank 3 cups of the green tea.
Maybe his “tea party guests” made it more enjoyable?
After we’d cleaned up our tea, we got started on the painting activities.
Since we only had one box, each girl got to do one activity.
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Bookworm’s activity was a terracotta statue of Emperor Qin Shi Huang.
We learned how Qin was the man who began the building of the Great Wall and whom China was named after.
Her activity had very specific instructions on how to paint her statue, just as Qin gave detailed demands for the thousands of terracotta statues that guarded his tomb.
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Mss Manners’ activity was a watercolor kite kit. It was so nice to have all of the supplies, right there in the box for us. Except for the water for the tea, we didn’t use a single thing that wasn’t included in the box. Again, a great educational activity with NO PREP from mama is always a treat!
Right away she got hard to work.
It wasn’t long before she had a helper.
While they painted, I read the included information aloud.
Did you know that kites were first used by the Chinese military?
Made of wood and silk, the construction of this kite was awesome Miss Manners’ favorite part was the reel. It was fun to see a wooden reel, as opposed to today’s plastic reels.
She opted to hang her kite above our kitchen table, on display for all to see. She was afraid that flying it might rip the silk. We will eventually try to fly it, but for now, we enjoy the bird soaring above us as we eat dinner.
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Our experience of traveling through history with History Unboxed was an amazing one. With subscriptions starting at just $20 a month, it is hard to pass up! If you don’t want a subscription, you can just order a single box for $20-$25 each. Egypt Unboxed is currently calling my name. 😉
On a scale of 1 to 10, I would rate History Unboxed a “10“. I cannot think of anything they could do to improve it, while keeping the costs as low and affordable as they are. The “open and go” simplicity of the activities were amazing. No prep work, no running around gathering supplies and no internet searches for educational information have made History Unboxed the perfect addition to our homeschool.
The amazing and friendly people at History Unboxed have created a coupon code, just for Beyond the Bologna readers. Upon checkout, enter “BtheB” in the coupon box for a 5% discount off of your first month’s subscription or store purchase.
