I have to pack him a lunch.

I swear, that’s not why I chose this daycare!

He’s going to be going on Tuesdays and Wednesdays so I’ll be posting photos of his lunches on those days along with Wyatt’s. Packing a bento for a toddler is a little bit different from packing one for a preschooler or kindergartner. One big difference is that they’ll heat food up for Augie at his daycare, so I can pack stuff that doesn’t necessarily have to be eaten cold. I’m hoping to make some batches of meals ahead of time to freeze to make lunch-packing go a little more quickly. The other difference is that I need to do a bit more chopping up of fruits and veggies and whatnot so there’s less room for cute-ification (not to mention the fact that the cute stuff goes right over Augie’s head). Still, it’s kind of fun to be able to mix it up a little. Augie eats almost everything we give him so it will be nice to branch out a little.

Monday:

I tried to do too much before  Wyatt’s school drop-off on Monday and I found myself really pressed for time when putting his snack together. He begged me for chips and bean dip and I figured it wasn’t the worst snack in the world, so I gave in. Just so you know, I co not recommended packing bean dip this way! It got everywhere inside the bento box and Wyatt still had bean dip on his hands when he got home from school. I also sent an applesauce along.

Tuesday:

Wyatt’s lunch and snack were: more chips and bean dip (I put the lid on the red container which worked pretty well), a mini-tangerine, banana bread, fresh pineapple chunks, rice and deli ham roll-ups.

Augie’s lunch box had leftover carrots from dinner on Monday night, rice, peas, tofu chunks, more rice and pineapple.

When I picked Augie up from daycare and checked in on how his day went, the daycare provider told me, “Wow! You did an excellent job putting his lunch together!” I had to work really hard to keep from laughing out loud. Little does she know about my secret life as a lunch-obsessed crazy lady! Bwa ha ha HA!

Wednesday:

We broke out the jelly bean lunch box for Wyatt on Wednesday. The top layer had a couple of mini-tangerines in it which made Wyatt really happy. This batch of them has been perfect — sweeter than candy. I also put in a jelly sandwich cut into the shape of little men and some ham roll-ups on skewers.

Snack was a cup of pineapple chunks and some graham crackers. I also packed a yogurt tube, but forgot to put it in the photo.

Augie’s lunch was rainbow colored again. I packed peas, chopped grape tomatoes, tangerine wedges cut in half, rice and leftover curried chicken from dinner Tuesday night.

Thursday:

I loved how Thursday’s lunch looked — almost entirely straight lines with the chaos of the tangerine wedges breaking it up a bit. This Mondrian-esque lunch featured a half banana, a hot dog bun with strawberry jelly inside, tangerine wedges, Triscuits, banana bread, green beans, and salami.

As always, when I’m particularly proud of a lunch, Wyatt likes to keep me humble. Here’s what I found when I was unpacking his backpack last night:

It looks like he ate the salami, the banana bread and a few tangerine slices.

Friday:

This hastily assembled snack was a jelly sandwich and a tangerine.

Monday’s snack box contained a buttermilk biscuit decorated with the Batman logo (I used food safe markers). The monkey box has a little bit of strawberry jam to spread on the biscuit. I rounded it all out with some dried cranberries.

Tuesday:

Tuesday’s lunch and snack were packed together in the big box. It had pineapple, cantaloupe, two mini blueberry muffins, chicken Italian sausage slices leftover from dinner on Monday night, and pepperoni pizza leftover from dinner on Sunday night.  I had to cut the pizza into strips to get it to fit in the box and Wyatt found that so bizarre that he wouldn’t eat them. Or maybe he doesn’t like cold pizza. I dunno.

Wednesday:

On Wednesday, I packed a banana chunk, some grape tomatoes, a mini muffin, baked tofu and more pineapple. Those pineapples go a long way.

For snack, I sent cantaloupe chunks, another muffin, pretzel thins and a yogurt tube.

Thursday:

Thursday’s lunch/snack combo was packed into the laptop lunchbox. It contained: a half banana, pretzel thins, garlic toast cut into star shapes, salami, pita bite crackers, and peaches with sprinkles.

I usually make Wyatt’s lunches while I’m giving the kids breakfast, fixing my own breakfast, nagging Wyatt to put on his shoes, and all that other morning stuff. For the first time ever, I made this lunch from start to finish all in one shot and on a whim, I got out a stop watch and timed how long it took me to make it. The result: 12 minutes and 4 seconds. I had no idea what I was going to put in the box when I started the timer, so part of that time was spent staring into the refrigerator tapping my foot and trying to get inspired. It probably would have been more like 10 minutes if I’d planned a little better because at the end I had all the boxes filled except for the yellow one and I had to take the time to make the toast. If I’d thought of it sooner, I would have just popped the bread in the toaster oven at the beginning and cooked it while I was doing the rest of the lunch.

I’m curious: How long does it take you to pack a lunch for your kid?

Friday:

On Monday, I discovered that biscuits are a perfect canvas for drawing with food markers so I couldn’t resist drawing a kitty face on another one for today’s snack. I also added a couple of orange wedges from Wyatt’s aunt and uncle’s tree. I love how this orange looks like a sparkly jewel.

Phwew! After a week off school, I was completely out of the habit of making lunches and snacks for school! I totally forgot to put something together until 5 minutes before we had to head out the door so I threw together this quick snack of ham cubes and one of Wyatt’s beloved buns. I added a lion pick to snazz it up a bit and to give him something to use to eat the ham besides his fingers. The lion pick was chosen to match the lion on the lid of the bento box:

I’m all about the coordination, folks!

Tuesday:

Tuesday was Laptop Lunchbox day. I put in a couple of Chessman cookies, pretzel sticks, dried cranberries, peaches and pears with sprinkles, a whole wheat bun, ham cubes and apple slices. As usual, he didn’t eat the apple slices but I like to put them in now and then just in case he decides to try them.

Wednesday:

Lunch on Wednesday was sweet Italian chicken sausage rounds, a lone cherry tomato, banana bread and pineapple and blueberries arranged to look like a bumble bee (though I didn’t really realize that until I was reviewing the pictures).

The Italian sausage is a new food we’re trying. As you’ve probably gathered by now, Wyatt is a sausage lover, but he’s always declared Italian sausage to be “too spicy”. I bought these sausages for a lasagna I made on Tuesday night and he was eating the chunks almost as fast as I could put them into the pan so I decided to try them out for his lunch on Wednesday.

I packed an applesauce crusher, pretzel thins and dried cranberries for his snacks.

Thursday:

Thursday’s lunch had wedges of whole wheat flat bread that I toasted and spread with a smidge of butter and garlic salt, blueberries, pretzel thins, banana bread, pineapple chunks, grape tomatoes and a block of baked tofu with his name in it.

Friday:

Today’s snack was some blueberries and a hand full of pretzel thins.

Lunch in a Box — This is the blog that started me on my bento hobby. Biggie doesn’t make super-arty bentos, but she does make attractive bentos quickly which made me think, “Hey, I could do that!”

Mr. Bento Flickr Group — My first bento box was the Mr. Bento set that my husband bought me for Christmas. I used to fill it dutifully every day to take to work with me and I would photograph my lunches and post them to this group. Since I got laid off, poor Mr. Bento has been collecting dust, but if I’m ever gainfully employed at a job that requires me to work on site again, I’ll be pulling him out and putting him to work again.

Sakurako Kitsa’s Flickr Stream — Sakurako Kitsa makes my absolute favorite art bentos. They’re whimsical and adorable and I pour over her photos trying to figure out what she used to make the various elements of each lunch.

Happy Little Bento — Sherimiya always has something fun and delicious-looking to share.

Adventures in Bentomaking — all of Pikko’s bentos are gorgeous, but her Lost bentos are my favorites.

Anna the Red’s Bento Factory — Anna the Red posts cool geeky bentos.

Hawaii’s Bento Box Cookbook — Susan posts fun, do-able bento boxes inspired by her book, Hawaii’s Bento Box Cookbook.

I forgot to take a picture of Wyatt’s snack on Monday so you’ll have to use your imagination to visualize it. It was mini blueberry muffins and blueberries. Can you see it?

Tuesday:

Tuesday’s lunch/snack was garlic toast, cut into a heart shape, carrot sticks, blueberries and clementine wedges, a mini blueberry muffin, craisins, ranch dressing for the carrots (in the little yellow box), skewers of pork tenderloin chunks, and pretzel sticks.

Wednesday:

The main event in Wednesday’s lunch was a thermos filled with garlic butter noodles (not pictured). I packed an extra big snack box to supplement: two skewers of shrimp, blueberries, clementines and some graham crackers. I also threw a yogurt tube in the lunch box. Wyatt has been coveting these for a while because a lot of kids from school bring them, so when I saw some at Trader Joes, I picked up a box.

Thursday:

On Thrusday, I sent a WALL-E lunch. My attempt was kind of lame compared to some of the WALL-E bentos I’ve seen online, but I gave it my best shot. Really, the only thing that makes this a “WALL-E” bento is the hard-boiled egg decorated to look like Eve (I used food markers). Oh, that and the banana with the word WALL-E written on it. I chose the banana to write on because it’s yellow like WALL-E. See how much thought I put into that choice? The rest of the box was packed with dried cranberries, graham crackers, clementine wedges, a whole wheat dinner roll, and cubes of ham.

The first time I saw an Eve egg was in Anna The Red’s famous WALL-E bento. If you’re not familiar with Anna the Red’s bentos, you really must check them out. They feature fun subjects and are beautifully prepared. I was recently reminded of this excellent idea when I visited Fuzz Food and saw Mrs. Fuzz’s cute WALL-E bento. Both of these guys did a much nicer job with their WALL-E and Eve lunches than I did.

Friday:

No photo of the snack today either because I was running around like crazy trying to get Wyatt’s valentines packed and nagging him to get his shoes on while I was packing his snack. Besides I ended up sending something  super-fast and easy: a banana and a yogurt tube. Not really photo-worthy.

Monday:

Monday’s snack had a cup of blueberries and clementine wedges, a half a mini baguette and a little monky box with strawberry jam for the the bread.

Tuesday:

Lunch and snack on Tuesday was Pirate’s Booty, more baguette and jam, clementines, blueberries, rice balls with happy faces on them and salami.

Wednesday:

Wyatt is totally ga-ga for the laptop lunch box right now, so it went back to school with him on Wednesday with many of the same items: bread and jam, whole wheat pretzel sticks, blueberries, clementines, a strawberry cereal bar cut in half and stacked, and baked teriyaki tofu.

Thursday

Thursday’s lunch was crackers, salami, clementines, dried cranberries, and half a hot dog bun. Wyatt has informed me that he doesn’t like sesame seeds, so I just sent the bottom of the bun.

Snack was Pirate’s Booty and I didn’t think it was worth photographing.

Friday:

Friday, I sent pretzel sticks, blueberries and a clementine.

Monday’s snack was quick and dirty: tortilla chips and pineapple salsa (in the pink box). I also included a red heart candy because I love him.

Tuesday:

Tuesday’s lunch/snack was: a half mini baguette, strawberry jam (in the little blue box), a hand full of grapes, blueberries, some Pirate’s Booty, a little red heart candy (in the yellow box), a square of cornbread and cubes of pork tenderloin. You’ll be happy to know he was able to eat the Pirate’s Booty with no interference from the teachers at the club house.

Wednesday:

For Wednesday’s lunch I sent baked tofu cut into giraffe shapes, grapes, blueberries, a square of cornbread and ranch dressing and sugar snap peas.

I have to crow a little about the peas and the ranch dressing. This is one of my favorite snacks and I have offered some to Wyatt every time I ate it for years. I’m guessing that I started asking him if he wanted some when he was 2 years old. Usually he just flat out refused to try it. Very rarely he’d try it and tell me he didn’t like it. But I kept asking  just in case he changed his mind. The other day he was willing to try it, which in itself was a big deal. But then…

He ate it all!

And then he asked for more!

I don’t have the crazy expectation that he’ll eat it every time I give it to him just yet, but it’s a start! Keep the faith, people!

For snack, I made a blueberry muffin and banana monster. Raaaaahr!

Thursday:

One of Wyatt’s friends at school has a Laptop Lunchbox, so he’s been requesting that I use it to pack his lunch and snacks more frequently. Now that he’s eating more, it makes a lot of sense to use it and it’s pretty easy too, so I’m happy to oblige (when it’s not in the dishwasher, that is.). Thursday’s box had whole wheat pita wedges, toasted, spread with a smidge of butter and sprinkled with cinnamon sugar, leftover pasta with red sauce from dinner the night before, blueberries, baked tofu cut with cookie cutters and colored with a food marker and a chunk of banana.

Friday:

Friday’s snack was a bun with a bunny drawn on it (BUNny! Get it? Ha ha! I amuse myself.) and some clementine wedges.

No school on Monday because of the MLK day holiday!

Tuesday:

Tuesday morning, I completely forgot to take a picture of Wyatt’s lunch! That doesn’t happen very often. We weren’t even in a big rush or anything. I snagged his lunchbox when he got home and managed to get a picture of it before he started snacking on it. Have I ever mentioned that he is strongly encouraged to eat anything he leaves in his lunch box as an after school snack? I always check to be sure it is still cold and safe to eat, of course.

Anyway, this lunch had: grapes, a whole wheat dinner roll (all gone), Pirate’s Booty, peaches with sprinkles (all gone), baked tofu (partly eaten), a slice of cheese (invisible behind the food divider), and dried cranberries.

I was shocked that the Pirate’s Booty was untouched and I asked Wyatt why he didn’t eat it. It turns out that the teachers at the club house (day care) wouldn’t let him eat it until he ate his “growing food”. This was super-annoying to me because:

a.) I specifically packed it so he could eat it at snack time and told him about it, so he was disappointed that he didn’t get to eat it.

b.) Everything I pack in Wyatt’s lunch box is nutritious and meant to be eaten at any point in the day. If the bulk of his lunch and snacks for the day are whole grains, fruits, and lean proteins it’s not going to kill him if he eats 100 calories worth of Pirate’s Booty before he eats the other stuff.  It’s not like his whole lunch is full of potato chips and candy bars. And I also know that he’ll eat everything if he’s hungry enough.

c.) I feel like I’m pretty stingy with the treats most of the time, so if I’ve got something a little less healthy in there now and then the kid should get to eat it.

d.) Finally, I’m his mom and I make the decisions about what he is and isn’t allowed to eat. If I put it in his lunch box, it obviously has my seal of approval.

Wednesday:

Lunch on Wednesday was a whole wheat dinner roll, peaches with sprinkles, a chicken apple sausage and a little bit of catsup (in the yellow box).

His snack box had graham crackers and a half banana in it.

Thursday:

When I went to pack Wyatt’s lunch on Thursday it felt like we were out of everything but somehow I managed to put this lunch together. I sent garlic toast (made with the last slice of bread) grapes, and four slices of salami.

I packed two boxes with snacky stuff. The photo above shows the Pirate’s Booty — which they let him eat this time. I also packed another box with a half banana and some pretzel sticks and I forgot to take a stinkin’ picture of it. I’m sure you can use your imaginations on that though.

Friday:

Trader Joe’s had big boxes of fresh blueberries when I went to the store this week, and after weeks and weeks of bananas and clementines, I was powerless to resist the call of the sweet little blue fellas. So this snack box had a nice little cup of berries and two mini blueberry muffins. Of course I had to pack it in a blue box.

Monday Wyatt didn’t eat much lunch before school, so I packed him a fairly big lunch. It had salami, a clementine and some cheesy crackers. I packed it in one of the new snack boxes:

This box is kind of plain, but I really like how you can see through it. It’s the little things in life that make me happy.

Tuesday:

I had a heck of a time getting Wyatt’s lunch together on time on Tuesday. We woke up late (7:30 — woo hoo!) and then I couldn’t find Wyatt’s thermos which was a problem because I had planned to give him spaghetti with butter and garlic for lunch. Augie likes to get into the cupboard with the lunch supplies in it and carry them all over the house. I found the thermos lid under Wyatt’s bed, but I couldn’t (and still haven’t) found the jar part anywhere. I have a really bad feeling it was thrown in the garbage and is now clogging a landfill. But I digress….

I was really depending on the spaghetti for the bulk of Tuesday’s lunch and try as I might, I couldn’t dig up anything else substantial so I packed it anyway and hoped he’d eat it cold. That was wishful thinking, of course. I also packed clementine wedges, graham crackers and some salami and I tucked a small carton of yogurt right into his lunch box.

When I cleaned out the lunch box that night, this is what I found. Wyatt opened the yogurt, took one bite and then put it back in his lunch box where it gooed everything up. Yuck! Do you guys find this kind of stuff in your kid’s boxes?  I can’t be alone on this one.

Wednesday:

Wednesday’s lunch was a clementine, grape tomatoes, baked tofu cut into teddy bear shapes and decorated with food markers and a slice of plain, white bread.

I packed graham crackers and Pirate’s Booty for the snack. The graham crackers wouldn’t fit in the container I picked, and I had to break off the corners to get them in box. I told Wyatt they were special Battlestar Galactica crackers, but I don’t think he got the joke.

Thursday:

Thursday was Laptop Lunchbox day. I packed Pirates booty, dried cranberries, a maple caramel that Zach brought back from his recent trip to Montreal, clementine wedges decorated with a piece of fruit leather that I cut into a bear shape, some American cheese that I cut into strips, whole wheat garlic pita wedges and some chopped chicken leftover from dinner the night before. I was very proud of Wyatt because he asked me to put the chicken, pita and cheese in this lunch — all three foods that he not only tried, but admitted that he enjoyed this week. The chicken is HUGE because he’s been saying he hates chicken for two years now.

Friday:

Friday’s snack was salami and clementines again. It was packed in another new snack box, this one procured from the dollar bin at Target:

In other lunch-related news:

I came across a very interesting link today that I thought my fellow lunch-obsessed parents might be interested in:

Fed Up: School Lunch Project

This brave teacher is eating a school lunch every day in 2010 and recording the experience. It’s fascinating and horrifying to see the meals she is served. When will the people in this country value children — all children — enough to spend the money to fill their tummies with healthy and delicious food? For so many children, school lunch is the biggest and most nutritious meal they are served all day. For far too many it is the only meal they eat. I do appreciate that the school lunch programs are doing the best they can with the money and resources they have to work with — it’s nice to see that this school sometimes serves fresh fruit and whole wheat bread — but with just a little more funding and/or the willingness to try some of the more innovative programs that have been popping up, I wonder what they could do for these kids.

OK — I’ll hop off my soapbox now.

Wednesday:

First up is the new bento box that I sent Wednesday’s lunch in. This one is a double decker box that’s long and skinny. I’ve never seen one this shape before, so it’s kind of fun. This lunch had a dinner roll, some chicken on skewers, two clementines and a half banana. I also put a message on the roll that was written with the best of intentions, but that, in retrospect, seems a little rude now.

The snack also went in a new box (we left a bag with 3 bento boxes in it on the plane so I had to replace them). The snack box had some dried cranberries, cheesy sandwich crackers, and the other half of the banana. This box broke when I was washing it Wednesday night and I had to get rid of it after only one use. Drat.

Thursday:

I broke out the big cute-ification guns on Thursday. I finally remembered to pick up some nori at the grocery store so I got to use the new face punches I ordered from JBox a few weeks ago on some rice balls. Are those insanely cute or what? I  also bought some little alphabet cutters at Ichiban Kan and I used those to cut Wyatt’s name out of baked tofu. The rest of the lunch was a clementine, sesame sticks, peaches with sprinkles and dried cranberries. I was sooooo proud of this lunch that I almost wanted to keep it for myself.

This is what came home. Seriously. That kid sure wants to keep me from getting a big head.

The rice balls…they…um…what the hell did he do to them? None of them looked like they even had a nibble taken out of them. So what’s up with the faces? Did he just scrape random facial features off? Why would he do that? I’m baffled.

Anyway, this just goes to show that no matter what you do to a lunch, you can’t make a five-year-old eat anything he doesn’t want to eat.

Friday:

Friday’s snack was fairly simple — just a few clementines and some graham crackers. It was also packed in a new box. I’ll try to take some pictures of the whole thing (with lid) next week.

Until then, have a great weekend!