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Butterfly Project landing in Grand Rapids

Updated: Tuesday, May 22 2012, 09:17 PM EDT
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (NEWSCHANNEL 3) - A major project is setting out to teach kids about one of history's most horrific events through a message of hope.

It's called The Butterfly Project, and it has a connection in Grand Rapids.

The Holocaust Museum in Houston will use the 1.5 million handmade butterflies that The Butterfly Project hopes to collect, to symbolize the 1.5 million children killed during the Holocaust.

The hope is to display the butterflies in an exhibit scheduled to open in 2014.
Megan Sierz helped make the Grand Rapids Children's Museum a collection site for butterflies.

"For the past year and a half, two years, we've been collecting butterflies here at the museum for the project," said Sierz. "To date, we collected more than 3,000 butterflies."

Lots of area organizations, especially ones for kids, have contributed to that total.

Sierz said discussing the Holocaust, and the millions upon millions of people killed with children is obviously difficult, and that's part of what the project is about.

"That's a terrible thing, and really overwhelming for a child to understand," she said. "But if they can see a butterfly and see a symbol of hope in that butterfly, if they can learn kindness or compassion through that project, then that's the lesson they should take away."

The Grand Rapids Children's Museum is collecting butterflies through June 1st.

After that, if you want to get involved, you can send a butterfly to the museum in Houston directly.
Butterfly Project landing in Grand Rapids