We are big into butterflies right now. Maia runs around the yard with her butterfly net trying to catch them, and bemoaning the fact that she can't (or, at least, hasn't yet).
Our plan is to raise our own this year in one of these butterfly houses. Have any of you tried this? You send away for for the caterpillars, feed them, then watch them grow and form chrysalises and finally emerge as butterflies. We are so excited! And I like this way better than the roly polies (otherwise known as pill bugs or armadillidiidae as we found out when we looked them and their food supply up) that Maia's been keeping in a jar in her room.
For a recent art project, Maia and I created a butterfly mobile that now flutters in the cross-breeze of our dining room windows. We used watercolors over a white crayon-resist design for the wings with clothespins for the bodies. Very easy!
You can see the tutorial in my arts column for the May issue of WNC Parent. The online version is here. (Type 34 in the page number search module at the top of the screen, then click on the page itself to view it larger.)
In addition to the crayon-resist butterflies, I have instructions for painting cookies and talk a bit about process vs product. Please take a look.
