Growing butterflies at home is easier (and more fun) than you might think.  Get the butterfly party started by ordering a butterfly growing kit.  We chose this butterfly kit on Amazon. 

The butterfly kit arrived with a mesh butterfly enclosure, an instructional booklet (with a ton of great information and butterfly-related activities), a feeding dropper, a chrysalis holding log, and a voucher for 5 free caterpillars.  The caterpillars are free, but the shipping is $7.95.  

The butterfly voucher was simple to redeem.  The website is listed on the voucher, along with the redemption code.  Within 3 days we received caterpillars in the mail.

For a few days, we watched the caterpillars move around the caterpillar enclosure.  Once they formed their chrysalises, we carefully moved them to the butterfly enclosure.  The action was pretty non-existent for the next 5-7 days, but it was still fun to check and see if they had emerged. 

It was interesting to me how noisy a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis actually is.  I could hear the rustling from the other room.  Over the course of 2 days, all the butterflies had emerged.  We fed them and watched them flutter around a few days before letting them free outside.