Our Butterflies

We have been having the best time ever raising caterpillars into butterflies. It’s one amazing memory I have from growing up, and I was so excited to let the girls have the same one. We ordered this kit, and received six caterpillars. Over the course of 2 weeks, we watched them eat and grow. At one point, Dave was getting nervous about how big they were, and wanted to make sure they couldn’t escape. Eventually, they all made their way to the top of their little cup, and formed into chrysalises. Unfortunately, two fell off the top. One hatched just fine, and sadly, the other did not. The girls didn’t dwell on the sadness for too long, because they were so excited about the ones that had hatched. It was so cool to watch them emerge, and slowly open their wings. Watching them drink the sugar mixture was also a highlight.

Two hatched much earlier than the others, so we let them go yesterday morning, and are letting the others get settled into their newfound roles as butterflies. Letting them go was SO exciting. We all gathered on the deck, and opened their net. One flew out right away, and zipped past us a few times, before disappearing into the garden. The second one crawled into my hand, and then onto Peyton. Adaline loved this, and kept yelling, “Buhfee!!” While Peyton was super nervous the butterfly was going to crawl onto her face, she did love watching it crawl up and down her arm, and flutter onto her leg. After about an hour of playing with it, we decided to let it climb onto our cat mint plants, since we always see butterflies and bees around them. It took some coaxing to get it off of Peyton’s hand, but eventually he did. We sat for another 5 minutes watching him.

I’m actually surprised at how sad it was to say goodbye to them! It was such an amazing experience, and are excited to release the remaining few!

You can purchase the same kit we did with full instructions here.