Butterfly Farm

Today was our first field trip with our new preschool homeschool coop. It turns out we have a butterfly farm 5 minutes from our house! We've drive by it on our way to the park all the time and never knew it was there. They did a great presentation for the kids teaching them all about monarchs. Thanks Nora- great job! They were hanging on every word and jumped in with quite a few answers.
Then they got a chance to get in on the action and demonstrate the lifecycle of the butterfly. Carter was so proud of his caterpillar...
They all made great assistants....
Ginny was the brave volunteer to dress-up as a butterfly. We learned that they taste with their feet, hear with their knees, smell with their antenna, drink through a straw, and can see in front and behind at the same time.
Then it was off to the butterfly house- WOW! They were everywhere. They had a table up front with eggs, chrysalis, and newly hatched monarchs. Here are two waiting for their wings to dry and the one on the far right is about to emerge- you can see it all scrunched up in there!
Here's a butterfly laying eggs on the milkweed plant. You can see all the eggs on the leaves- little white dots.
Here's the caterpillars munching. They grow 90,000 times their egg size!!!!!
Each of the kids was given a sugar water pad to catch and feed their own butterflies. Carter was in absolute awe! He's so gentle and interested. It warms my heart to see his sweet spirit.....
It was a treat to see them up close....
Here's Carter and his friends- all 3 with a butterfly. They were cute comparing their "catches". Did you know the males have 2 black dots on their wings and the females don't?
Then we went outside for a picnic lunch and playtime. Some people wash their kids' hands before lunch.....we just put ours through the kid wash!
After lunch they each drew a picture of their favorite part of the day.......
The little ones loved the freedom to roam. Allison, Claire, and Julia were off exploring....
The farm is in the flight path and at least a dozen planes flew overhead. Here's JuJu and Claire waving hello to Daddy (He's on his way to Florida.).
And we brought home a new friend. We're now the proud owners of our very own caterpillar. Carter named it "Cookie", after the caterpillar the bug family adopts on Miss Spider. So wish us luck that Cookie grows up to be a beautiful healthy butterfly :) We now have a refrigerator full of milkweed. Apparently growing 90,000x your birthweight requires a lot of eating :) We look forward to watching God's miracle unfold right before our eyes. Carter wants to plant milkweed and a butterfly bush in our front bed so they have lots to eat.

He said he wants to be sure and tell Cookie her name when she 's bigger and make sure she knows our names and where we are so she can always come back. My sweet boy! I hope this doesn't involve too many tears.