Someday She'll Have A Butterfly Tattoo

Curly Girl is obsessed with butterflies. I believe this obsession came about last summer on an evening's walk. We came home to find at least a hundred butterflies nesting in the lower branches of the tree at the end of our driveway.

This July 4th, the obsession began anew, when one butterfly kept landing on my shoulder or my hair as I played with Curly Girl and Boy in the back yard.

Soon, Curly Girl was demanding "Find butterfly, land my arm." This is her 2.5 yr old speech for "Mom, find me a butterfly to land on my arm."

So, being the marvelous mama I am, we began a butterfly hunt. We didn't have a net or a basket or any other gear, but we did have an improvised Butterfly hunting song! Sung to the first two lines of the chorus of "Dwelling In Beulah Land", here is our song:

Oh we're hunting for butterflies to land on Girlie's arm

Yes, we're scouting for butterflies, and we won't do them any harm

Later on I added these lines:

For we love those pretty butterflies who flutter 'round our lawn

Oh we are hunting for butterflies.

When we couldn't get a butterfly to land on Curly Girl's arm, she desolved into tears. This was not one of my favorite things, but I was able to stop the tears by asking "Would you like to paint a picture of a butterfly?"

Fingerpainting is one of Curly Girl's absolute favorite activities, so she skipped inside, completely happy to paint a butterfly picture. That picture is on our dining room table right now. I'm searching for just the right frame to hang it in her room.

I've also written this story out in my journal of "Things I Don't Want You To Forget" (where I record my wisdom and little stories for my kids to enjoy when they're older and I'm not around, hopefully a long long time from now).