Field Museum

The Field Museum eases withdrawal symptoms for Shedd Aquarium addicts fans
by providing sculptures of giant squid and jellies next to the Eygptian tomb exhibit 

We started, per Chicago Mun. Code § 7-12-053 (Dangerous Animals - Display), with the mandatory photograph of small children with tyrannosaurus rex.

Uh oh - is Sue modeling some bad behavior for the girls?
Stay tuned...

We went on to visit the reconstructed mastaba of Unis-ankh.

Poor Unis-ankh, immortalized with a rabbit cartouche!!  Hasenpfeffer for all eternity.

(from The Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, by Margaret Bunson)

Near one of the displays of the Book of the Dead, we met a curator who was particularly lively and informative.  It turned out that he had also read and enjoyed Riordan's Egypt-based series (starting with The Red Pyramid) on the recommendation of museum-goers.

(Among his other tidbits, he mentioned that no two copies of the Book of the Dead are identical -- perhaps because the gods kept changing and merging as different deities fell in and out of favor.  And I suppose they didn't have a Nicene Council to establish the official canon.)  

You are under surveillance!  by order of Horus.

The goddess Bastet, I presume?

Nice kitty!!!

 Lee really liked the cartoons, with captions.  This was her favorite:

After this, we went to the Underground (soil) exhibit.  They have amazingly advanced technology at the Museum.  We all shrank down to a few millimeters!!!

A penny, for scale.

The girls were able to hitch a ride on some grubs.  We made it through somehow, and the Museum kindly restored us to original size.  (Or almost - I still seem to be a bit on the small side!)

We spent some time with the Amerindians as well:

 As they were getting ready to close down the Museum, Ruth and I sneaked up for a quick look at the jade exhibit.  Some pretty amazing sculptures:

You're welcome!