Happy Easter Egg Bento

This one almost didn't happen - I got a little distracted out shopping and got home late. Considered not bothering but pulled it out!

Strawberries with a flower pick, Annie's bunny crackers, a mini bunny sandwich, Easter egg sandwich and some carrots. I punched holes out of the egg sandwich then stuck a baking sprinkle in each hole (and for the bunny's nose).

See you tomorrow!

St Patricks Bento Lunch

Since there won't be any reason to pack a lunch tomorrow, I made a St. Patty's lunch for my leprechauns a day early for daycare and spring break camp.

I'm terrible at free handing things so for the shamrock sandwiches I lightly stamped a heart cookie cutter in 3 places so I knew where to cut the bread. Works best if you do each piece of bread then add the filling inside.

I briefly considered coloring the peanut butter green but figured that was one step away from "cool lunch, mom!" and one step closer to "call in her reservation for a padded room".

So we have veggie booty, cut up cucumbers and dip in a clover case, Sunrype Fun Bites in a green package, cheerios with a single Skittle (loot bag candy I had confiscated) and the shamrock sandwich with a shamrock pick.

Don't forget to wear your green tomorrow or my littlest leprechaun would be more than happy to give you a pinch!

Easy Animal Bento

This was a quick and easy animal bento for the 3 year old from the beginning of the week.

Veggie booty with a bear baran (divider) peeking over, small animal sandwiches, her favorite raw veggies with a rabbit container of dip, melon with animal picks.

Enjoy the weekend!

Happy Heart Day Bentos

Happy Valentines Day! OK, a day early but you get the idea. I personally love all holidays, how could you not enjoy a reason to celebrate? I was quite excited that my daughter was born on Cinco de Mayo, can't beat a double celebration!

On to the Valentines bentos. The pictures are weak - but no natural light and all that, this is the best I could do.

The 6 year olds:

Strawberries with heart picks. Little heart cookies. Babybel cheese with a heart cut out. A little heart container with dried cranberries. Sandwich with a kiss and a hug cut out of fruit leather.

The 3 year olds is nearly identical. Due to her dairy allergy though, she has red peppers cut into hearts instead of the cheese.

 Spent tonight cutting hearts out of honeydew and cantaloupe and putting them on popsicle stickers for the 6 year olds grade one class. I'll try and remember to take a picture before they head off to school. He did remind me it was also pink and red day and informed me that there was no way he was wearing pink - so he's sticking to red.

The 3 year old is having red day but we are going rouge - we are busting out the heart ruffles. They are covered in hearts, can't get more Valentines than those pants!

Hope you have a great day with the ones you love!

Winner + Panda and Penguin Bentos

First a big congratulations to Bina, winner of the Sweet Lunch Punch set! And many thanks to Lunch Punch for donating those for the contest. If you haven't already, make sure you check out their website to see all the cool sandwich punches they have! I personally can't wait to get the puzzle one for the 6 year old and the princess one for the 3 year old.

On to tomorrows lunches. The 6 year old is doing a unit on penguins in grade one right now. It's pretty cute as their preschool buddies are coming to their class tomorrow to work on a penguin project with them. Soooo of course we have to have a penguin lunch, just a given, right?

We have a penguin sandwich with fruit leather, icing eyes and a cheese beak and a little cup of fish friends for him. A cup of applesauce with a penguin made out of fruit leather, icing eyes and a mini M&M I broke up. Way to maximize a single mini M&M, huh! Then melon with a homemade pick - I didn't have any penguins so I dug out one of the kids foam stickers and stuck it on a random pick.

Now for the 3 year old, I wanted to use up the fruit leather scraps so for her, I went panda.

I used a teddy bear cutter and added some fruit leather eye rings and for the nose, fruit leather on half a mini marshmellow. I still had some bread scraps so the panda got some babies. Then melon with pandas and little cups of veggie booty and mini rice cakes.

If you notice the 3 year old gets mini rice cakes and veggie booty alot, you are right. She is in that annoying "I don't have much time to eat" stage and I know if I put a little of those in there, she will definately eat those. And let me tell you, she is not a child you want to not eat - when she doesn't, she turns into a miserable mush.  I myself am in that annoying "Can't stop eating" stage and am a mush as result of it - haha!

It's a Gumball Lunch Party!

We are having a gumball machine lunch party - wanna come?

After my kids saw the lunch punches that made their ice cream sandwiches, they couldn't wait to have the gumball machine. Busted that one out for their lunches tomorrow, it looks so cute!

So we have the gumball machine sandwich with mini M&M gumballs. The little detail is fruit leather. See the animal pick? He's stuck in the "gumball" that was cut out. Then we have strawberries with hats - (hey, it's a gumball party!) and a babybel cheese with icing eyes sitting on top of a couple mini rice cakes.

The 6 year old wanted to know if I put gumballs inside the machine - I'm good... but not that good!

Don't forget to enter to win the whole set of 4 Lunch Punch Sweet cutters - enter via Rafflecopter on the post below this one!

Ice Cream Sandwiches!

I know, I know, it's been a bit of a dry spell around here! Trying to get back on track after the holidays, here's hoping!

So before Christmas, Kiersten, owner of The Lunch Punch, sent me the cutest sandwich punch set. Love it. Like, super love. It's the Sweet set and has 4 different sandwich cutter - a gumball machine, a birthday cake, ice cream cones and a cupcake. They come packaged in this sweet (get it? haha) little box, all ready to use! The best part is that they are awesome for boys and girls. I love princessy things and so does the 3 year old but I can assure you, the 6 year old doesn't want anything princess related showing up in his lunchbox. But ice cream - who doesn't love it?



Aren't they adorable? You will love them too! Wanna get your hands on them? Keep reading!

So anyway, this is tomorrows lunch - isn't it sweet? (I'm wearing that one out, aren't I...) Ice cream sandwiches with sprinkles, fruit with ice cream pics and a cucumber and red pepper cupcake.




On to the fun part! So Kiersten also sent a second set for me to do what I wished with, no conditions attached. We love that around here, don't we! Here is your chance to win the exact set I have!

You can enter below and can get up to 12 entries.

• Earn 3 entries by posting a comment on this blog post.
  
• Earn 3 entries for posting something about Bento Diva on Facebook (prior posts do not count)
  
• Earn 3 entries by tweeting something about Bento Diva
  
• Earn 3 entries by following this blog. If you already follow this blog, just add that you already follow into that box.
  

(I'm not a tweeter so you are on your own with that one! ha!) To start, either log in with Facebook or your name and email. Good luck! Contest ends on Jan 22, 2012.

(Please give rafflecopter a few seconds to load, it can be slow) a Rafflecopter giveaway

Dolphin Days Bento

This is my last post for a couple weeks as we are off to the sun and warmth of the Bahamas tomorrow! The 3.5 year old has talked non-stop about meeting her "dolphin friends" as we will be doing a dolphin experience while we are there. So it called for, you guessed it, a dolphin lunch!

Both kids got the same only the 6 year old got the cheese pictured below.

Grapes with penguin and seal picks, goldfish crackers (kind of a given!) , dolphin sandwiches and fruit leather fish on the heart sandwich and Babybal cheese.
Now, just to keep you interested and coming on back, I'll let you in on a little upcoming giveaway. It's some sort of awesome, let me tell you. It's a brand new product from lunchpunch - and here's a clue... it might look a little something like this:


You know you want to rock the gumball sandwich! Stay tuned - giveaway coming up when we get home!

Lego For Lunch Bento

So I was lying on the couch - err.... doing something productive..... when I just had this compulsion to make the 6 year old a Lego lunch for tomorrow. Wasn't sure exactly how I was going to do it but it's usually easier to do girly lunches so when I have a good one for my boy, I'm all over it!

I knew for sure though, that it would involve this tool. I got this on a whim and man, I use it all. the.time! It cuts 2 sizes of little circles and an oval and white long thing pokes out what you've cut. I use it for eyes, the oval I use for mouths (cut one then cut another inside to make a smile)... it's very handy! You can get it at All Things For Sale for 4.99 - if you click the button on the left and order anything, I get a 5% credit voucher to use - just sayin' :)



Anyway, I got a little punch happy with it but knew it would be awesome for Legos!

For the sandwiches, I punched out circles out of the top piece of bread then little round tubes out of the cheese and stuck them in the holes.

Strawberries have fruit leather circles, as does the cereal bar. I cut up a Babybel cheese to look like a minifig and added eyes and a mouth with fruit leather - (remember the oval cutter above, that's how I made the mouth) I printed off some minifig pics to stick in there as well - you can see them better in the 2nd picture.



Pics are taken on our Lego table which I highly, highly recommend getting if you have kids that enjoy Lego.

Now if you think I was doing that again for the 3 year old, oh no - one time only deal! She got a flower theme (I know, it's like my old standby) with flower sandwiches with fruit leather detail. There are some carrot flowers, another mini sandwich in veggie booty and rice cake pieces and flower strawberries with flower picks.


In case I've never mentioned it, they get other things as well for snacks. They usually get their box plus yogurt for lunch. I don't take picture of the snacks because it's kind of boring. Usually a baked item (homemade muffins, granola bars or whatever), more fruit and something like sugar free applesauce.

Tasty Transportation

The 6 year olds grade 1 class is doing a unit in transportation. Decided he needed a lunch to go along with it - well, actually they both needed a lunch to go along with it as mama only has so many ideas!

Used the big Lock N Lock container with the inserts from my square Lock N Lock.

Strawberry boat in a sea of grapes. Babybel cheese in a car paper cup. I cut out an extra I had to put on top. Fruit twists with truck picks. Crescent pizza "wheels" with rocket picks. And finally, a train sandwich on a track made of crust.

The crescents are a fun lunch item. I had an extra thing of Pillsbury Crescent Rolls in the fridge so whipped these up. Take them out of their packaging and pinch them so it is one long piece of dough (it comes perforated for the crescents). For the 3 yr old no dairy chick, I spread with pizza sauce, sprinkle with meat and chopped peppers and roll width wise. Cut little slices, put on a baking sheet and bake until the bottoms are brown (usually 10-12 minutes). For the 6 year old, I skip the pizza sauce and do peppers, meat and grated cheese. They can be frozen in ziplock bags to have on hand.

For the 3 year old's dairy free version of this lunch, I replaced the Babybel cheese with red peppers cut out like boats and like I said above, no cheese in the crescent "wheels".

Beautiful Butterfly Bento

So the 3 year old and I were shopping at Safeway the other day - something I rarely do as I leave that up to my husband and the kids on Sunday mornings! So going to the grocery store is kind of fun for me - I always get sucked into new and fun items. (Yes, this is probably why I am not allowed to participate on Sundays - ha!)

Anyway, she spotted this butterfly sandwich cutter by Evriholder and of course we had to get it. We always seem to luck out for cute cutters at Safeway - and frankly, for $2.99, I couldn't resist!

It's unique in the fact that it cuts it into two pieces down the middle, unlike the other ones we've had.

Tried it out last night so here is her butterfly bento from today. Normally I make the sandwich then cut it all but this time I cut both pieces of bread separately so I could do the holes for the jam to show through in the top piece. The middle thingy of the butterfly (whatever the technical term is for that) is a long strip of red pepper. She enjoyed it but she did say at first she thought it was licorice. Sorry, sister!

In the left corner is half a Kashi cereal bar. It had a line up the middle so I cut a fruit leather flower and let the line be the stem. Stuck a pick in to hold it.

Then, cantaloupe flowers and a little square of mini rice cakes, all packed in the larger rectangle Lock N Lock box.

Happy Haunting Bento

The first Halloween bento! I decided I'd do at least 2, maybe 3 - because Halloween + bento = so much fun! So this is number 1 and both kids got the same thing.

Ghosty sandwiches cut with a cookie cutter with icing eyes and a Cheerio mouth. Spooooky, isn't it? You can buy a package of icing eyes at baking supply stores, they are cheap. I don't use them all time but my kids enjoy them as they feel like they are getting candy in their lunch.

Then, cantaloupe pumpkins cut with a small cutter and a black cat pick. A tip - I hide all the scraps under the cut outs so I don't waste it then layer the cute things on top.

Finally, had to have something orange and black so orange fishy crackers with black raisins.



I've got a few other ideas so I'll definitely make another on Halloween day and probably one more in between, depending on my time/energy/mojo/procrastination/laziness/general sloth like tenancies. Check back!

Just a small amount of cuteness....

Now, before you get any crazy ideas, not all of my lunches are cute. In fact, many are not so cute or even just plain boring.

This is the 6 year olds lunch from the other day. I was trying to throw his lunch together, leave for work and (oh crap, it's orange day) cover the 3 year old with orange stickers at the same time. Apparently no one in this house owns anything orange, who knew?

So I just try and add a little bit of cute on those days. Sometimes a little cute is better than no cute, right? I took whole grain alphabet pretzels (Blue Menu, from the Superstore) and pressed them into his sandwich to spell out his name. I added a hippo pick to his fruit and cut up his cereal bar so fishy crackers could swim around it. Quick, easy and done!



And speaking of orange day, Christine (who works at the 3 year olds daycare and is obviously much more organized than I am!) prepared this for her little boy:


Doing a one color lunch is always fun - or even a rainbow lunch!

Now, I need some comments on the following:

1) Halloween bento. Do I pack one on Halloween day because that makes sense or should I do it this week, so you can see ahead of time? Or maybe both? Let me know.

2) How the heck do I get people to post comments? I see lots of blogs and there are tons of comments so how do I get that happening? Do people not know how to comment? Or just too lazy like I usually am?? LOL I totally want this blog to be a network of sharing of ideas so I need to know you are out there! Random strangers, this means you too. Come on people, don't make me guilt you like this.

3) Finally, are there any themes you want me to bento? Any ideas? Tell me and I'll see what I can do. The rule will be I will only use what I have on hand so that I really have to use my old rusty noggin.

And what I did above is what one of the 3 year olds beloved teachers would call "the sandwich". Nice comment/yell at you/nice comment. HA! Is that not true, Krystal? And yet so fitting for a lunch blog!

Blast Off Bento

I bake a lot for my kids. I usually manage to cram it in once per week among my full time job, sports etc - sleep is over rated, right? Anyway, I like to bake and freeze - muffins, mini muffins, savory muffins, loaves, cookies - you get the idea. It lets me have a whole variety of things to pack for their school/daycare snack which is fruit and whatever I've pulled out.

Sometimes I get tired of making muffins hence why today I used one of my favorite pans - the multiple mini loaf pan! I had a new recipe I wanted to try and it ended up being so good as mini loaves.

Here they are, Banana Carrot with Raisins, yum.

And here is the recipe for you - this is to make it as a loaf:

1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 cup sugar (I used between 1/2 cup and 3/4 cup)
2 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt (I didn't use any)
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup mashed ripe bananas
1 cup grated carrots
1/2 cup chopped pecans (I didn't use any)
I did add about 1/2 cup of raisins

Directions

In a mixing bowl, combine oil and sugar. Add eggs; mix well. Combine flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon; gradually add to the creamed mixture alternately with bananas. Stir in carrots and pecans. Transfer to a greased 9-in. x 5-in. x 3-in. loaf pan. Bake at 350 degrees F for 55-65 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack to cool completely.

For my mini loaves, I baked them at 325 for 30 minutes.

Lunches were done early today as the kids went over to my mom's and are sleeping over. Love that Granny!

Now, before I start - the 6 year old is a pain lately and won't eat the veggies I try and pack in his lunch. I can get him to eat some at home (you know, with constant nagging, I'm not above it) but at lunch, they get returned every time. So I've given up. So while his sister is a veggie fiend, instead of the adorable veggies I gave her (as you'll see), he got a babybel cheese. I just thank my lucky stars (ha - goes along with the theme!) that my vegetarian kid isn't my dairy allergy kid!

So lunch for tomorrow is a Blast Off, space theme. I got some new cookie cutters and was dying to try the, aren't they the cutest? They cut the face out at the same time.


So we have a planet and star sandwich with mini cloud sandwiches to use up the rest of the bread. The cup is a rocket theme (that you can't see) with rice cake moons and fruit leather suns (ya, I know they look like flowers, I think they are LOL).

The cups above are grapes with space picks - I didn't have any suns so I used a lion turned backwards.

Finally planet veggies using the same cookie cutter and some randomly cut. I added a little thing of dip after the picture was taken.

Pictures of your bentos that you submitted will be posted tomorrow so check back!

Monster Love

Wanted to do something cute for the 6 year old. I always am careful to try and walk that fine line between cute and cutesy as frankly, I don't want to pay for the therapy down the road LOL

So what he got today was a very cute but not cutesy monster sandwich. What 6 year old boy doesn't like monsters? Especially the ones that come in the cheese and lettuce variety!


I've been using a larger Lock N Lock container (it comes with 3 rectangle sections) and just piecing together things with odd and random containers. Whatever works!

The monster sandwich I cut out with a large glass. He has pretzel rods with a piece of veggie booty stuck on each to make those monster.... whatever you call 'em? Horns? Ears? His eyes are fruit leather and the white thing is a baking sprinkle that I put a black dot on with an edible marker. His teeth are cheese.

Then he has some honeydue melon with spaceship picks (closest thing I had to monster) and the rest of his dried papaya he conned his dad into buying.

Maybe a good Halloween lunch for your little monster....errr.... child?

PS - thanks to those following this blog :) Makes me happy when you follow, repost on Facebook or comment - many thanks!

Mickey Monday!

This is for the 3 year olds lunch tomorrow so it's getting named Mickey Monday!

This lunch is packed in large Lock N Lock container but it didn't work with the 3 inserts so I just used some other random containers.

I made a PB&J sandwich and cut out the circle with a large cup (then ate the rest for my lunch today!) Stuck 2 mini rice cakes in as the ears. The eyes and nose are flattened out raisins and the mouth is a strip cut out of a piece of fruit leather.

I totally admit to the cucumber Mickey being kind of freaky but hey, it's the thought that counts! Cut up cukes and peppers with a Mickey sauce container that has salad dressing for dipping. The other container is strawberries with a red bear pick that we will pretend is a mouse because it worked with the Mickey colors!



Feel free to repost this on FB and I always love your comments!

A bit big for bento....

We had the 6 year old's class party today. The main thing we had for lunch was a huge hit so I thought I'd share it, even though it's not small enough for bento!

The theme of the party was pirates so we had 2 of these baguette pirate ships - great for a party or even just a playdate! Super quick and easy and got gobbled up! We did one cheese and lettuce and one jam to play it safe.

Cut the baguette, put whatever you want inside, stick pretzels along the sides for oars, throw in some sails and you have a great pirate ship. The best part is that 99% of both got eaten, it was a nice change from regular party food and they served as centerpieces!

Can't take credit for the idea though, saw it on a website and thought it was great. You can download the pirate sails for free here! I printed them out on cardstock and used heavy duty wooden skewers.

Here's our cheese and lettuce version!

Peanut Butter Piggy, Perhaps?

Welcome to tomorrows lunches!

Peanut Butter Piggy

For the 3 year old. A little too cutesy for the 6 year old!

Making the pig: Cut 2 circles of bread and punched out 2 holes for the nostrils. Spread with PJ&J (you see the jam peeking out through the nostrils). Squished the 2 together. Cut a triangle cracker in 2 for the ears and red pepper for the inner ear and mouth. Eyes are a combo of a baking decoration (white thing) and raisins.

Then we have grapes with fellow farm animal picks and some fishies in an animal cup. Oh and some veggie booty as it reminded me of curly pig tails!

For the 6 year old

A Whales Tale

Punched the whale and water out of a piece of bread with small cutters. (Uses the same set you can win below! Don't worry - yours is the new and unopened set!) Made his favorite cheese and lettuce sandwich letting the cheese show for the whale and the lettuce show for the water. Fishy crackers to swim around the whale.

Cut up grapes with a whale and fish picks.

Small bowl of water (OK, berry sugar free applesauce) with a seal on a "rock" (aka strawberry). Picture taken before the lid was put on for the applesauce container, I'm not that wild and crazy!

If you've enjoyed these lunches, please take a second to comment! Gives me motivation to keep posting if I know people are diggin' them :) Also feel free to tell your friends, re-post of facebook (I totally love that) and don't forget to enter the contest a few posts down!

TGIF Lunches

Today's lunches..

Strawberry Garden

For the 3 year old:

Strawberry PB&J sandwiches - I poked in a few of those red cake decorating sprinkles to make it more strawberry like. Hulls of the strawberries are veggie booty.

A couple flower mini sandwiches so not to waste the rest of the bread, veggie bootie and grapes with flower picks.

The Letter M

The 6 year old asked for "M" sandwiches so that's what he got. Made them cuter by polka dotting them with fruit leather.

Grapes with robot picks, a cereal bar cut into 3 and speared with a pic and a few pretzels.

Bentos from the past...

Robot bento.

The 6 year old loves a good robot. Cheese and lettuce sandwich with pretzel arms, crust mouth and circles cut out of fruit leather for eyes. Strawberries and the rest of the fruit leather speared with robot picks and a few fishy crackers.


Number 3 Bento

Leftover pancakes with jam inside - for the 3 year old (bet you figured that out!) Grapes with animal picks, fishy crackers and bear cereal things from the health food store.

Pirate Bento - dairy free version.

The 3 year old has a dairy allergy. Her pirate sandwich uses red pepper and cucumber peel for the face. Veggies on people picks (she loves those), strawberries with animal picks and some raisins and veggie booty.

Pirate bento.

Pirate sandwich with with a cheese face and cucumber peel and red pepper features. Homemade granola bar (remind me to post the recipe!), strawberries with animal picks, raisins and veggie booty.

Bear Bento

Quick bear sandwiches with raisins and craisins for the eyes and mouth. Strawberries with bear pics. Honey fishy crackers (bears like honey, they do match the theme!) and raisins in a bear cup.

French Toast Bento.

Leftover french toast (breakfast for dinner, yum!) rolled up with jam. Strawberries, whole grain rice cakes and cucumber people.