So the fear of things that buzz and fly is still going on. It’s been reduced since the first time I blogged about it in May, but it’s still present. I think the fear of bees is real. (For instance, we went strawberry picking earlier and she froze in the field when one buzzed around her. I dropped my basket, held her close for a moment, reassured her, and we moved on.) I’m not so sure the butterfly fear is real. Well, maybe it’s real, but I just don’t understand it because it seems irrational to me since butterflies cannot sting or bite. (Sigh!)
I asked Isabelle if she wanted to visit Hershey Gardens this past week. She said “yes.” When I asked her if she wanted to go into the Butterfly House, she said, “no.” I asked her if she was sure. She was. We didn’t go.
Therefore, I went to the next step of trying to work through this butterfly fear since this is more than literature and simple observations of butterflies can handle. I bought her wings. That’s right. Butterfly wings. With glitter. (A little piece of me felt like it was dying when I saw the glitter on the wings. It felt a little princess-ey to me. Considering Isabelle still doesn’t know who the Disney Princesses are, that kinda made me shudder.)
I strapped the butterfly wings on to her back last night and read her select poems from Seeds, Bees, Butterflies, and More: Poems for Two Voices by Carole Gerber and Bruce Yelchin. She was content to sit with the wings on for a few minutes, but didn’t want to fly around the house.
This morning, we tried the wings again, talking about butterflies. She enjoyed flitting around the house in them for about 15 minutes.
Perhaps a few more days of wing wearing and she’ll be ready to tackle the Butterfly House again.
Raising Literate Humans 
I love the combination of the wings and the pages of the book she is looking at. What a creative way to help her through this fear. Good luck!
I am going to try to find a link to an article I read about how scary it is to be a 2 year old. (I probably won’t be able to find it, actually!) The author talked about how everything is scary to a toddler because everything is possible. “The bathtub drain might actually swallow me!” Seems irrational to us, but to them. You know butterflies don’t bite, but your daughter doesn’t. My toddler was likewise terrified of ants and spiders. I had to get down and show her that ants can crawl on us and not bite and everything is ok. That helped.
I love the wings! And glitter is fun for everyone, not just for princesses! Well, and also not for school custodians. 🙂