Dear Caleb,

My mama tells me that you know a lot about butterflies.  In fact, she says that everything she knows about Monarch butterflies, she learned from you!  That’s pretty good considering you are seven and she’s 34!  So she told me that I could ask you to help me figure out what kind of butterfly this is.

Here’s the first picture (you can click on all the pictures to make them bigger):

We were on vacation in Deep Creek Lake (in western Maryland) with Baba’s family.  This day, we were in the Swallow Falls canyon, swimming.  It was awesome!  While we were eating lunch, Mama saw this butterfly and considered trying to catch it to send it to you.  (Actually, every butterfly we saw on that whole trip, she kept saying, “I need to catch that for Caleb!” Silly Mama.)  But she didn’t have a net so she settled for taking lots of pictures of it.

Here’s a couple more pictures of it:

Isn’t that a beautiful butterfly?  Do you think you can identify it from these pictures?  My mama is really curious to know what kind of butterfly it is!

I hope I get to meet you and your brothers and sister some day soon.  Mama says to tell you to tell your mom that she misses all of you a lot.  I think I’m going to have fun chasing butterflies with you once I know how to run!

Love,

“Cousin” Ellie