The story of the butterfly

Wow did we ever wait a long time for this moment, three and a half years to be exact, and no it doesn't take that long for a butterfly to go through it's life cycle, we just had to wait for that long for a monarch butterfly to finally find the swan trees we planted that long ago. I would check the trees regularly for any sign of caterpillar existance but to no availe but just when I had almost given up we discovered two fat little blokes (or girls) curled up on some leaves. One of them was left outside to deal with what ever nature had planned for it (a sad ending unfortunately, something about a football, Joseph!) but the other we brought inside with great success as you can see. These wanderers used to be so common when I was growing up, we always had them inside watching them go through their life cycle but the last few years they have been really scarce, I guess it has a lot to do with environment, hopefull their return is a sign that our backyard a least is an insect friendly place..