Elmo the Butterfly

Success! I can't tell you how proud I am of this beautiful butterfly. I was so afraid something would happen to him before he made his appearance [i.e. we'd kill him.] But, no! We have achieved what millions of others before have achieved; we have raised a butterfly from it's larvae state.

Is he not the most beautiful butterfly you've ever seen? [Maybe I'm just a bit partial.]

We had a bit of a set back when we let him go. He had been in his bugbox all day and hadn't tested out his wings. We placed him on a plant that butterflies love, and checked on him periodically, but he was not budging. With thunderstorms in our forecast that night, we put Operation Butterfly Transfer in effect. We moved Elmo to our front porch, placed him on a potted plant, and hoped. The next morning, fearing the worst, Jonathan went to check on our baby. To our surprise, he was still alive, but seemed weak. The kids and I researched what we could feed Mr. Elmo, and fruit juice was on the menu. We tried to coax him onto our delectable cuisine, but he seemed irritated and tried to flutter off without success. We had to leave him for a while, and when we came back, we found him drinking away. After our second trip to town, he was gone...out on his own in the big wide world. I was so relieved and proud and sad and happy. [Is this what it's like sending your kids to college?]

Now that we're old hands at raising caterpillars, we've taken on another. Since finding Mr. Grover last Thursday, he has tripled in size, and is eating through as many leaves as we can provide.

We just hope Mr. Grover can thrive as well as his older brother.

As for the cocoon that is my growing belly, I just had a sonogram showing that this little Mr. is already weighing in at three and a half pounds.  He is above average, hence the extra large belly. I was hoping this would push my due date up a bit, but those doctors won't give a pregnant lady a break, or at least false hope! I got some new pics of my baby, though, and I can't help but smile each time I look at them [which  has been about a hundred times today.] I can't wait to meet this big boy, even if it means waiting a bit longer.

xo

nessa dee

Caterpillars + Boxes + Dragons = A whole lotta random

We've had a caterpillar invasion around here recently. After finding Elmo Yellow Tiger [and seeing five more of his friends the day before], the kids found this guy resting comfortably in the grass.

We almost kept him, but were forced to put him back outside by the authority [Dad] whose thoughts were along the line of "Let's see if we can keep the one we have alive before we potentially kill another." I don't blame him. And after researching this caterpillar to see what kind of beautiful butterfly it would turn into , I'm glad we didn't keep this guy. It turns out that these unusual looking caterpillars are Elm Sawfly larvae, a relative of the wasp. That would have been a bit disappointing.

Well, he was fun to look. As for an update on Elmo Yellow Tiger, he successfully turned into a cocoon about two hours after I snapped that picture of him. It was pretty amazing, and I wish we'd been watching him more closely. We've got about two weeks and Elmo should be a Monarch by then.

In other exciting news, we have our Fridays back now that our co-op is on break for the summer, which means that we'll be having Crafty Fridays again!! [or at least one this Friday.] This Friday's craft is going to be pretty awesome...maybe the most awesome craft we've ever done! Here's what you need to start gathering:

And finally, I found this dragon lurking in the hallways upstairs. He's wearing an apron, so I'm thinking he's one of those rare Chef Dragons with awesome culinary skills. I sure hope so because it would be nice to have someone cook a few tasty meals around here.  Plus the fire breathing gives food a nice smokey flavor.

Well that's it for random. Start gathering boxes of all shapes and sizes if you want to join us in some crafty awesomeness.

xo

nessa dee

IF: Time

Time to run!

I had a little problem with the whiskers and they need to be fixed, but I wanted to submit something this week.

ND

IF: Climbing

Meet Caterina. She's a fashion forward caterpillar who loves shoes and bright red lipstick. Her motto: Why wait for metamorphosis to look beautiful?

And what does this have to do with climbing? Well.... wait....

hold on....

There.

Now she's climbing a tree.

Nessa Dee