Friday Morning Butterflies

One day when we lived in Nebraska, we were out in our backyard and in a span of about a half hour, hundreds of monarch butterflies made their migration down to Mexico through our backyard.  It was really, really cool.  I think we had three kids then and we just laid down on the soft Nebraska grass (oh, I miss that grass after the dry, poky grass of our Texas yard and the softer-but-not-as-soft grass of our new home in Florida).  Anyways, we laid down in the grass and just watched all of those beautiful butterflies flutter through our yard, not in a straight line passing through, but flying in waves and circles as they went.

So, I guess it's that time of year again because the Panhandle Butterfly House here in Navarre had a "Monarch Madness" festival this past weekend.  We decided to go on Friday because Chris and the boys had plans Saturday morning.  And we like to take advantage of the benefits of homeschooling by being able to do things when it's not so crowded. 

We had a great time.
There were so many great volunteers there that were really interested in teaching the kids the life cycle of the butterfly.  We've gone over that many many times in our homeschool curriculum and in reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar 2000 times, but to actually be able to look at the real things, was such a great learning experience.
They were able to tag their own butterflies with a tiny numbered sticker so if that butterfly happens to fly into the butterfly stations in Mexico, we'll be able to look on the internet site and see where it was found.

After we made the round of tables set up outside with the different life cycle stages displayed, we got to go inside the actually butterfly house.  The kids loved looking at the display cases and delighting in the different patterns on the butterflies.

Outside in the butterfly room were butterflies flying around our heads as well as pretty flowers and plants everywhere.

The kids also got to release more butterflies into the butterfly house area.  Gabe was too nervous to release the butterfly that he had tagged earlier, but there was a great volunteer inside that persuaded him to try it again.  He did, as well as Leah this time!

They also had butterfly crafts set up for the kids.  They divided them into different age groups and I was a little embarrassed that Gabe, who is our most vocal about his likes and dislikes, saw that he was in the younger group who was to color a picture and make a butterfly out of thumbprints, and plainly told them the he didn't want to "just color" because it's "boring".  This from the child who asks to print out 20 coloring pages a day to color.  After having him ask nicely if he could work at the older group's table, he made a butterfly life cycle mobile alongside Matthew.

Leah thought the butterfly thumbprints on the coloring page was fun though.

As did Anna, who only had to be told a few times to keep the crayons out of her mouth. 

Christopher had the older kids' station all to himself and made a pretty tissue paper and paint stick butterfly, learning about the smaller parts of the butterfly with the volunteer.

Afterwards, we walked a short ways along the boardwalk out back and the kids were just enthralled with all the turtles, and then this tugboat pushing a huge barge in the sound, under the bridge.

Fun times!