Butterflies & Caterpillars

Caterpillars and butterflies (and moths) have always been a big deal in our household.  I love butterflies, and all my kids have loved both caterpillars and the adult moths and butterflies.  I have so many pictures of Jaden William with caterpillars over the last several years of his life, and I've started collecting quite a few of Trusten and Liv with the crawling creatures.

For years I've wanted to get Eric Carle's book The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and I just haven't.  I finally did, though, and the kids loved it.

I also showed the kids Youtube videos of the metamorphosis of caterpillars to butterflies and included a couple of videos with cute little songs about the magnificent creatures.

I used to make a lot of play dough creations for William when he was the ages of Trust and Liv.  We had so much fun.  I've recently started playing with play dough with Trusten and Olivia.  I make creations for them while they play with some by themselves.  Last week we had a session where I focused solely on making caterpillars and butterflies.  They used my butterfly cookie cutter to cut our butterflies, and they free played.

Trusten making balls as I had shown him how

Liv picking up her newly-cookie-cutter-cut butterfly

Trusten showing off his own caterpillar creation

My caterpillar

My butterfly (yes, with the lines from my hands, but they're like veins in butterfly wings!)

Liv using cookie cutter to make a green butterfly

Also during the week I made all of them a fruit snack that looked like the caterpillar in the Eric Carle book.

Not the prettiest caterpillar, but the kids love when I make fun snacks

Then I transformed my fruit, seed, and grain bar recipe into butterfly cookies by taking the dough and rolling it out thinner and using my butterfly cookie cutter.  That dough with all the stuff in it doesn't cut out cleanly, but we could still tell they were butterflies, and the kids loved them.

Super delicious with sweetened cream cheese (Trust likes jelly or plain)

For young, but slightly-older children than Trusten is, here is a good worksheet resource for The Very Hungry Caterpillar:  Activities and Lesson Plan for The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Until next time...