It didn’t work! So disappointing! About three years ago I found a butterfly wing in the driveway. I couldn’t bear to let it go so I pinned it to my bulletin board. For the past three years, it has gently fluttered on my bulletin board every time the furnace or air conditioner kicked on.
I needed a little butterfly for the project I’m working on and thought it would be sweet to cut the butterfly wing up to make a smaller butterfly. The first “alas!” was trying to draw cutting marks on the wing using a permanent marker. The marker bled rapidly into the wing, ruining the beautiful yellow. The second “Alas!” was when the butterfly wing shattered when I pressed an x-acto knife on it. I tried to cut the wing using sharp manicure scissors and that fared better but the wing is beyond use and the beauty that I have enjoyed for three years is gone.
Craft Fail - Cutting a butterfly wing did not work
What I learned:
1. Do not try to mark a butterfly wing with anything, just cut freehand.
2. Use sharp manicure or embroidery scissors to cut butterfly wings.
3. If the wing is really beautiful, don’t do anything at all to it. Just pin it to a bulletin board and enjoy it, especially if it flutters in the breeze when you walk by.
All Sparkled Up 
Oh no.
Butterfly wings are too fragile. It’s very very hard to cut them into a complex shape.
Next time, try to make basic shape pieces, then stick them on a board to make what you want. It would be much easier.
By the way, you just remind me about my very first days practicing butterfly wing art. Thank you.
Thank you for the tip about cutting basic shapes. If I ever find another wing, I will keep that in mind. I had no idea there was such as thing as butterfly wing art. That is fascinating! I found these interesting links while searching for butterfly art. http://butterflyartistry.com/details.php?gid=49&pid=251
http://inhabitat.com/art-made-from-thousands-of-butterfly-wings-sells-for-2-million/
http://www.etsy.com/shop/neile
Thank you for the URLs. I learn many new things from that.
There are actually many types of butterfly art. Jewelry, mounted framed art, bottle display, laminated, mixed media artworks, to name a few. Butterfly artists often raised the butterfly themselves or buy from butterfly farms.
It would be quite rare to find an undamaged piece of butterfly wing out there. Ants and gems are quite fast.
I just wrote about this topic a couple days ago. If interested, you may find it here:
http://exotixarts.wordpress.com/2012/07/04/why-the-ants-hate-butterfly-wing-painting-artists/