The duo will bring the traditional Silk Road fables of The Goose That Laid the Golden Egg, The Stonecutter Who Was Never Satisfied, and The Lion and the Hare to life, with their own handcrafted, Muppet-style puppets, Marco Polo, Mr Camel and Abdul the Drummer.

Getting the show performance ready involved the whole Mettes family, with the pair's mother helping make the puppets and their father, who is affectionately known as the ''Alphpacker whisperer'' charming the family's alpacas into giving wool for Marco Polo and Mr Camel.

Marianne hopes the puppet show they've developed over the past eight weeks, filled with music and comic relief, will help children better relate to the stories within the Silk Road exhibit.

''It will balance each other nicely … maybe add a bit more flavour so it's not, you know, a history lesson, it's fun as well, and interactive, we'll get the kids singing along.''

The siblings have been working together on puppet shows for a year, since Marianne returned from studying puppetry in the United States and started PuppetOOdles.

Senior coordinator of family programs at the museum Kelly Robson, who commissioned the show, said: ''They're the first performance of the day, and they've made these characters really come alive.''

Puppetry isn't the only way families are being drawn into the Travelling the Silk Road Exhibition, with Ms Robson highlighting the other activities scheduled for Sunday.

''Lots of other things are happening on Festival Day.

''We've got craft activities, actual camel rides, belly dancing, belly dancing workshops, traditional Middle Eastern music and dance, tea ceremony, Arabic calligraphy, spinners and weavers and glass making,'' she said.

Festival Day is part of Travelling the Silk Road: Ancient Pathway to the Modern World, which features the role the Silk Road played in the development of the modern world, through the trade of goods and cultures.

The exhibition was organised by the American Museum of Natural history and will be open at the National Museum until July 29.