A butterfly in the hand ...

… is an impossible task for a 4-year-old.

Belated news again (since I’m slacking on the blogging, but getting caught up on household chores), but yes, darling, we got our butterflies.

It was Thursday afternoon when we arrived home from a busy day of work and play. I noticed something flutter inside the butterfly cage. Sure enough, our caterpillar experiment succeeded in a batch of five Painted Ladies.

“Mommy, look! The cocoons are all broken!” was the first response from my son.

Excitedly, we did our best to take care of the butterflies (lest they starve in the net). We picked several flowers, got a small cup of water and mixed some sugar in it. Then we sprinkled it onto the flowers (as per the kit’s instructions).

My darling boy continued to be fascinated with the butterflies, carefully watching them flutter about in the cage. Then he said good night to them before bedtime.

My husband, the darling red-headed biologist, decided that the butterflies would have to be released, though he had a few qualms about it, since he can be very adamant about the proper biodiversity, would have preferred to release the correct, native species. Our version, it seems, is more common to Europe and Africa.

Nonetheless, it was time to say goodbye and my son didn’t seem particularly heartbroken about it. He seemed to understand that they needed to be out in the world, finding other butterflies.

When the moment came, he seemed wary of touching them and was content enough to let someone else do the dirty work. In this case, it was Nana who sent them on their way.