Butterfly Love

If you follow  my blog you will know how I love butterflies. This week I have been drawing the Orange tipped butterfly.  We have had some very wet days but also some bright sunny moments when I go for a walk.  On my travels around the village I keep seeing this lovely butterfly, it settles on a flower and I creep up to look and thats fine.  The minute the camera comes out it takes flight and a hide and seek game begins, before you know it has you here there and everywhere trying to take a photograph. We did manage one along the hedgerow.

the Orange tipped butterfly in the centre of the photograph

There has been so many this year, dancing around in my garden and everywhere I go I keep seeing them.  I managed to have a really good look at the beautiful pattern on the underside of the wings on a very still butterfly which settled in my garden. I really wanted to catch it and put it in a jam jar to draw but I knew it would never let me catch it... and even if  I could,  it would just feel too cruel and I would free it.

One of my favourite oak trees

After the interest in the Oak Galls I decided to try and find some of them to show you.  I tried the large oak tree pictured above and searched the ground hoping there might be some but with no luck. Later we found such a tiny tree with several still attached to the branches.

oak galls.

The gall is a wasp which lays eggs on a bud and the grub lives inside the oak apple or gall.  The ball is formed by the secretions made by the growing wasp.  Eventually the insect grows from egg to grub to insect and I expect eats its way out. The ink is made from the galls boiled and some source of iron.  Under this small tree I picked up the two tiny oak leaves. We found a different  place where lots of young oak trees have seeded from acorns from a larger tree.  The sun was shining and I loved seeing all the red glossy lady birds as they crawled in the oak leaves.

Two of the beautiful red ladybirds in the oak leaves

 We were lucky enough to see a birds nest,  well the expert spotted it and took the picture from quite a distance, but you can see the young birds.

A little face looking out of the nest

Of course it is bluebell time, so I took a slow walk through the  flowers and enjoyed the moment.

And the scented blossom on a Crab apple tree

So here is my page in my square book of the underside of the Orange tipped butterfly and the two little oak leaves and a single red berry which I found.  The berry is in such good condition having survived the winter. I found it in the grass under the Hawthorn tree which is now covered in fresh green leaves and buds ready to burst into the white flowers which will eventually be the red berries again at Autumn time.

  And I painted a butterfly on a brown tag.

 There is something so beautiful about a butterfly.  I have captured it using my acrylic inks and a number one   sable paintbrush.   I might finish my little butterfly patchwork one day, as seen in the first picture, I printed each butterfly using  fabric paints. Hope you like my page.
As always thank you for the lovely comments which I love reading.                                           Millyx