Jonni Thomas Models Her Butterfly Hat

The start of the Mariposa Butterfly Festival was the Friday night reception. 'A Taste of Mariposa'  featured wonderful hors d'oeuvres from many of the local restaurants in the Mariposa area. The 'Butterfly Hat Contest'  was the highlight of the night. The room was full for the evenings event, which was a great success again this year. There were over 20 entrants for the hat contest with many of the entries having traveled in from throughout  California. There may have been rain outside, but the  spirits were high and laughter was commonplace as the festivities were kicked off. The MC for the evening was Bob Perez. 

There was a lot of imagination and creativity involved in the making of the hat's for this years contest. Women's Best of show winner Geri Warren 'crocheted' her entire hat and Margaret Judkins won for Most Whimsical hat and was given an Honorable Mention for her 'Butterfly Net' that she created from a gold extension pole with a coat hanger and pipe cleaners. Barbara Eicker won for Best Theme with her 'Daffodil Dreams' hat and finally the Best Men's hat award went to Ken Pritchett.

For those who helped raise the butterflies there was a special treat in Marc Cutters hat. Marc made a fantastic hat that was very imaginative, not everyone realized what his grand creation was. Marc's creation was a Butterfly Chrysalis that he titled 'Late Bloomer', complete with the plastic lid that the Chrysalis was attached to.

The final event of the evening was the kickoff of the Butterfly Festival Raffle. The raffle is always held on all three days of the festival. The prizes were donated by many of the area businesses. The anticipation was high for the raffle to begin as there were many wonderful prizes to be won for the evening. 

For future information on the Mariposa Butterfly Festival checkout: http://www.mariposabutterflyfestival.org