Wordless Wednesday: Aveda Butterfly Garden

You have about 2 1/2 weeks left to enjoy the Aveda Butterfly Garden at the Minnesota Zoo before this attraction closes for the season. We always enjoy seeing so many different kinds of butterflies there.

Try It Tuesday: Coffee Filter Butterflies

This is a super fun and easy project for kids and uses dot markers.

Supplies Needed Per Butterfly:

• 2 round coffee filters
• dot markers
• 1 pipe cleaner
• spray bottle of water

Directions:

• Flatten out the coffee filters
• Make dot marks all over the filters 
• Spray down with water
• Allow to Dry
• Pinch each of the filter to the center so that one creates the top wings and the other creates the bottom wings
• Fold a pipe cleaner in half and twist the bottom (folded part) inch together
• Place the pinched coffee filters in between the pipe cleaners on top of the twisted part
• Twist over the top of the wings to secure in to place
• Curl pipe cleaner ends to make antennae

You can also try using washable makers like we did in this butterfly craft.

Try It Tuesday: Cute Caterpillar Craft for Kids

This is fun and easy and can be done by preschoolers as well as older kids.

Supplies Needed:
 Clothespins
Pom Poms
Googly Eyes
Glue

Directions:
Start out by gluing eyes on your head pom pom. For younger kids you might want to do this for them ahead of time. Next put a strip of glue along the top of the clothespin and let kids pick out which pom poms they want to add to there caterpillar.

Check out all my other ideas for Butterfly and Caterpillar Crafts!

Try It Tuesday: Butterfly Life Cycle Hand Print Art

Time for another fun and easy project I did with my kids. We were on a butterfly theme which wouldn't be complete without a hand print butterfly. But we took it further and made finger print caterpillars and chrysalis's. I always like to do hand prints crafts because it can be a kind of keepsake, plus you can see which is done by my 7 year old and which is from the 3 year old based on the hand print size. My son had to make a pink and purple butterfly because right now pink is his favorite color (because it WAS sister's), which is why she chose to make her butterfly blue and green. LOL!

If you are looking for other butterfly life cycle crafts, then try out the Easy Paper Plate Butterfly Craft I shared last week or this Coffee Filter Butterfly Project. And don't forget to check out my Preschool at Home Theme of The Very Hungry Caterpillar, which is loaded with activities and art projects!

I started out having them paint the grass on the construction paper and then paint the tree. If you see my paint trays above, they are just styrofoam containers that held fruit that would have gone in the trash.

Next I had them make their finger print chrysalis followed by the fingerprint caterpillar. After I wiped their fingers clean, they switched colors (because who has ever saw a caterpillar that was the same color that it was when it turned in to a butterfly?) and painted the palms of their hands.

We glued in to place colored popsicle sticks for the butterfly bodies and used some glitter glue for antennas on the butterfly and caterpillar and of course we glued on some googly eyes on both the caterpillar and butterfly.

Try It Tuesday: Balloon Print Caterpillar

This will be your first introduction to the Preschool Theme for this week, which is "The Very Hungry Caterpillar". That post will be live on Friday and you can get ideas for a variety of activities, crafts and worksheets to do that preschool theme at home.

 

 My son had a great time with this project because it was fun to paint with something out of the ordinary. I blew up 2 water balloons (one red & one green so he was easily able to know which paint to dip it in) and had him start with making the head of the caterpillar followed by prints for the body of the caterpillar.

Next I let him glue on on googly eye and some antenna that I cut from some craft foam.

 Finally, I had him draw on the caterpillar legs. I got a kick out of watching him draw all the legs and he was trying so hard to draw them the same length.

Wordless Wednesday: Monarch