The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum has been open in Lincoln Park since 1999, but I’d never gotten over there until this last weekend when Erica was doing a show there with Galileo Players (“Extreme Green House – Live!”). While they were doing their second show, I wandered around the museum. There are some nice exhibits like Mysteries of the Marsh and the Extreme Green House (unLive?).

But what’s going to have me slapping down my $7 (Adult) (or going on free Thursdays) in the future is the Judy Istock Butterfly Haven. About a thousand butterflies from 75 species. Butterflies. Everywhere. Flying freely around you. It’s pretty freakin’ magical.

And on the way out you can peek into the lab where they have rows of chrysalises and I got to see two different butterflies emerge from their chrysalis. Their wings are all little and curled up when they first come out! (They release the week’s hatches into the Habitat on Sundays at 2 pm.)

A bunch of pictures I took of butterflies.

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