Butterfly Park by Elly Mackay is the story of a girl who moves to a new town that, unlike her old town, is seriously lacking in green space and community. She finds a gated and empty piece of her neighborhood with a sign out front that reads "Butterfly Park", but there is one problem. There are no butterflies. There are no flowers and plants to attract butterflies. The girl gets her neighbors together to build a beautiful garden that butterflies will love. I like the message of this story that team work and love of nature can change a dusty, dirty place into a space that has meaning and can be enjoyed by everyone who lives there.

The pictures in this book are so beautiful that calling them mere pictures isn't doing them justice. Anyone who grew up playing with paper dolls will fall in love with Mackay's style of art work. She meticulously creates and arranges paper figures to create this layered and intricate paper doll world that is both cozy and mesmerizing. Read more about her creative process here - http://www.ellymackay.com/process. It is fascinating to see how she works. Read Butterfly Park today and then go take a stroll through your local park to appreciate how lucky we are to have wonderful touchstones of nature in our lives!