Cubby Finally Came Home

When I was a little girl I found a caterpillar while camping. I named him Cubby and brought him home and made him a nice house in a mayonnaise jar with holes poked in the lid. The day after we got home, I woke up to find a strange little thing in the jar and Cubby was no where to be found. Horrified, I poked the fuzzy ball and I ran into my parents room crying that Cubby was dead. My parents explained to me how a caterpillar turns into a butterfly, and that funny looking thing was Cubby's cocoon. Several weeks went by and we were loosing hope that Cubby was going to emerge from his cocoon. It seemed hopeless and we doubted he become a beautiful butterfly. Then one day I woke up to find Cubby had escaped his cocoon. He wasn't a beautiful butterfly thought. Oh no, he was a moth. I had raised a beautiful moth. As my Mom, Dad and I stood outside to send him off into this big world, I cried. Not just a little. I actually bawled and started to yell "Cubby come home. Cubby come home." To this day, I can't see a moth without thinking that maybe it's one of Cubby's descendants.

When we were in Iowa at Great Grandma and Grandpa's farm we found a caterpillar in the corn field.

We brought it home for Boy Wonder so he too could see the miracle of a caterpillar turning into a butterfly.

A few days after we brought home the peanut jar with holes in the lid, Henry made his cocoon. We waited and watched to see what was happening inside the jar. After 10 days, a Monarch butterfly hung upside down where the cocoon had been only hours before.

Boy Wonder handled Henry's release into the world better than I handled Cubby's realse so many years before. I was worried that Boy Wonder would be upset just as I had been and there would be tears shed. But there was none of that. He held Henry gently until Henry flew into a pine tree. After about two minutes of watching Henry, Boy Wonder asked if he could play baseball.