Janelle Visits: Butterfly World

Our next full day with Janelle in town, we decided to spend the morning at Butterfly World.  We are loving our membership there and have gone multiple times now.  Each time we see different gorgeous butterflies and unique flowers.  We knew Janelle would love it there!

My niece in Seattle, Katrina, asked me to be a part of her kindergarten project "Flat Stanley."  She and each of her classmates "flattened" themselves and then chose a long distance relative to send their "Flat Stanleys" to.  I was super excited when I got my "Flat Katrina" in the mail.  I was asked to fill out a booklet on Florida and then take Flat Katrina with me on some fun adventures.  Janelle was a sweetheart to help take pictures!

Flat Katrina enjoying Butterfly world...

We were once again able to see hundreds of gorgeous butterflies.  With over 20,000 butterflies in the aviary, every visit is different.  Janelle, Daxton, and I had a blast watching them fly around us, land on branches, and even on our fingers.  It was a great day!

Daxton had so much fun searching through bushes and tree branches for the butterflies.  We worked with him on being soft and not touching them, just touching the leaves that the butterflies were on.  He did really well with being soft, especially for a toddler!

Touching the leaves, not the butterflies...

So many different patterns and colors!

Janelle and Daxton were inseparable.  It was so cute to see Daxton grab Janelle's hand and lead her to new things he wanted to see.  Janelle was so sweet and patient with Daxton, you can tell that she's used to the favorite aunt position!

Butterfly World has several different emerging butterfly displays where we were able to watch them hatch from their chrysalis.  Janelle and I loved all the teaching moments we were able to have!  Gotta love traveling with teachers and their love of learning.

We also loved the colorful unique flowers everywhere.  We found the most interesting ones blooming in the trees.  They looked like vibrant fuzzy caterpillars of some kind.  Daxton was too creeped out to touch them.

Stopping to smell the flowers...

Snuggles with Auntie Nellie...

Teaching my little man how to smell the flowers...

After the butterfly aviary, we explored the passion flower gardens. Daxton was so funny with everyone he met.  He became instant friends and wanted them to be his buddies.  He followed around this sweet grandma as she took pictures of the flowers, until he got distracted by some bugs in the soil.  He's quite the social little guy!

Just a few of the gorgeously unique and colorful passion flowers we were able to find.  Each time we've visited we've seen new flowers blooming.  They're all truly beautiful.

Loved the green fly in the center of the flower below.

A couple weeks prior when we visited the ceilings were draped with dangling jade chandelier flowers.  This time the chandelier flowers were yellow and red.  It was crazy how different everything looked, especially in such a short amount of time.

More beautiful botanical gardens...

Our last adventurous stop at Butterfly World included feeding the Lorikeets.  Janelle was pretty freaked out at the beginning but warmed up quickly...

I LOVE all of Daxton's facial expressions while we fed the Lorikeets.  He thought they were super fun and waved hello to them til one squawked really loud in his face.  I told him to squawk back at it though, which made us all start laughing.  I love my silly little curious boy so much!

Last but not least as we were exiting Butterfly world...

SELFIES!

Butterfly World was so much fun!
It was a great start to a fun-filled day!