On the Wing

"That was a butterfly," Jolena said.

"I thought that creature was called a moth," Charlotte replied.

"It looked just like the butterflies on my shirt," Jolena pointed out, "only yellow and black, not pink and silver."

"Let's ask Mandy!" both girls exclaimed together.

They found Mandy knitting. Mariah was reading to her as she worked. 

"Mandy," Charlotte began, "we have a question."
Mariah stopped reading, and Mandy took off her glasses and put her knitting down.

"We saw a creature flying around in the garden," Jolena said. "I thought it was called a butterfly, just like the ones on my shirt."
"I thought it was called a moth," Charlotte said. 

Mariah was interested, too. "I know there are some flying insects that have big wings," she said.

"I've heard them called butterflies," Mariah continued, "but I've also heard them called moths. I thought there were just two names for the same thing. I though a butterfly was just a pretty moth," she added.

"They are very close to the same thing," Mandy said. "That's because they are related. They are insects that belong to the order Lepidoptera (leh-pih-DOP-ter-ah), which means 'scaly wings,' but they are different from each other in some ways. You're right, Mariah. We think of butterflies as pretty, because most butterflies are prettier than most moths, but not always."

"If I don't know anything about what you saw," Mandy continued, "I would have to guess that it was a moth, because there are many more kinds of moths in the world than butterflies." Mandy paused and thought. "But if you saw it just now, and it was flying around, it was probably a butterfly," she said.

"You see, butterflies usually are awake in the daytime, like us," Mandy explained. "Moths usually come out at night, but there are some that like to be out in the daytime."
"It was definitely awake," Jolena said.
"We saw it flying around," Charlotte said, "so it must have been awake."
"Or flying in its sleep," Jolena pointed out. Then she giggled.
"Did it stop flying while you were watching it?" Mandy asked.
Charlotte and Jolena looked at each other and thought.

"Yes," they both cried at once. 
"It landed on a flower in the garden," Jolena said.

"Yes," Charlotte agreed. "It crawled around on the flower and then stopped for a little bit."
"Then," Jolena added, "it went to another flower and did the same thing."
"It was probably drinking," Mandy explained. "Most butterflies and moths drink nectar (NEHK-ter), which is a sweet liquid found in flowers. They drink it the way hummingbirds do. Now tell me, when the creature stopped, what did it do with its wings?"

The two girls looked at each other and thought. They tried to remember what they saw. They would have closed their eyes to remember better if they could have, but their eyes don't close, so they had to pretend. They remembered something like this.

"When the wings stopped moving," Charlotte began, "the creature sort of held them like this." Charlotte put her hands up over her head and back as far as she could reach.

Jolena nodded.
"That sounds like a butterfly," Mandy said. "Most moths rest with their wings covering their sides or flat against whatever they are resting on."

"What did its antennae (an-TEH-nee) look like?" Mandy asked.
"What's that?" Mariah asked. (As a writer, Mariah is always interested in new words.)

"Antennae are something like ears," Mandy explained, "but they do more than just hear. They can smell and feel. There are two of them."
Mandy asked Mariah if she could use her pencil and notebook. Mariah agreed and handed them to her.

Mandy drew two pictures on it. She drew a line with a little ball on top. It looked like a line with a little ball on top. Then she drew another line and some little lines coming off of it. That one looked sort of like a skinny feather.

She showed the pictures to Jolena and Charlotte, while Mariah looked on. 

"Did your creature's antennae look like this," she asked, pointing to first of the pictures, "or was it more like this?" She pointed then to the second picture.
Charlotte and Jolena both pointed to the first picture. They pointed to the one that looked like a line with a little ball on the end.

"Then it was a butterfly," Mandy said. "There are moths that are awake in the daytime and butterflies that are awake at night. There are moths that hold their wings more like butterflies when they rest and butterflies that hold their wings more like moths. There are moths with antennae that are more like those of butterflies and butterflies with antennae more like moths, but if your creature had all of these features, it had to be a butterfly."

"That's interesting," Charlotte said. 
"There's one more way butterflies and moths are different," Mandy went on. "You see, both of them start life as caterpillars."

"But caterpillars" objected Jolena, "don't look anything like moths or butterflies! They look like worms with little legs!"

"That's true," Mandy agreed, "but caterpillars are baby moths or butterflies. They change shape when they grow up. They both shed their skins several times as they grow. Then they go to sleep to change and grow wings."
"How do they do that?" Mariah asked.

"The caterpillar makes itself a little changing room," Mandy explained. "Here's another way moths are butterflies are different. The kind of changing room it makes depends on whether the caterpillar is a moth or a butterfly."
The dolls all looked at each other, trying to imagine a caterpillar in a changing room.

"A moth caterpillar will attach itself to a branch, twig or leaf in a safe spot," Mandy said. "It will spin a cocoon (cuh-COON) for itself."

"A cocoon is like a sleeping bag out of the moth's own silk," Mandy continued. "In fact, the silk we sometimes use for clothes is made from the cocoon of a very special caterpillar."

"On the other hand," Mandy went on, "after a butterfly caterpillar attaches itself to a branch or twig in a safe spot, it sheds its skin for the last time, and its outside hardens to make something called a chrysalis (KRIS-ah-liss)."

Either way, the caterpillar goes to sleep for a long time. When it wakes up, it has wings and a skinny body. During this in-between stage, while it's sleeping and changing, it's called a pupa (PEW-pah), no matter whether it is a moth or a butterfly," Mandy said.

"I wonder what it's like," Charlotte said, "to wake up and find you have wings and a skinny body."
The dolls thought about that.
"In poetry and stories,"Mariah said, "a butterfly is often used to mean the beginning of a new life. Now I think I know why. I guess that's because it starts out as one thing and changes to another."
"Yes," Mandy agreed. "It's like how a ball of yarn can become a sweater."

"It's like how waffle batter can become waffles," Jolena suggested.

"Or," Charlotte added, "how a bunch of notes on a piece of paper can become music!"

"Or how words we write can become a story," Mariah suggested, "like this one."

"Will we change into anything?" Jolena wanted to know.
"No, Jolena," Mandy said. "We will always be dolls. Our purpose is to help children change and grow up to be adults who can look after themselves and their families. We teach them to be kind to others, and to know how special they are."

"That's good," Jolena said. "I don't want to change into something else. I like what we are and what we get to do."

"That means we're special, too."

Cast--

Mandy: Götz Happy Kidz Katie 2015
Jolena: Götz Happy Kidz Lena in Aspen
Charlotte: Götz Happy Kidz Anna in Paris
Mariah: Götz Happy Kidz Mariah, "Chosen" from My Doll Best Friend


More information about butterflies and moths can be found here.

Photos from UnSplash.com are: First butterfly photo by Sean Stratton. Second butterfly (closeup) photo by Richard Lee. Moth photo by Tim Goedhart. Caterpillar photo by Sara Codair. Chrysalis photo by Suzanne D. Williams.

Silk cocoon photo by Emily Peters through UIHere.

Mandy's T-shirt design adapted from an image found on UIHere.

Note: No dolls were harmed during production of this blog. All dolls shown are Götz Happy Kidz or Classic Kidz. If you like these stories and are willing, please make a donation of any amount to a charity that supports pediatric cancer, such as CURE Childhood Cancer or St. Baldrick's Foundation
"The Doll's Storybook" is not affiliated with Gotz Dolls USA Inc. or Götz Puppenmanufaktur International GmbH.
Watch for the next story each Friday afternoon at 2:00 PM Pacific Time.


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Copyright © 2019 by Peggy Stuart