It’s back to school week here on Wendolonia! I’m going to be bringing you a new article  focused on lunch-packing every day this week.

Today’s topic:  Lunch Packing Gear

I’ve written quite a bit about the boxes I use to pack my kids’ lunches, but I thought I would highlight some newer lunch packing products that have piqued my interest:

Laptop Lunches 2.0 Bento Kit

Laptop Lunches released a new line of their Bento 2.0 kits earlier this month and I’m dying to get my hands on one. I’ve been using and loving our original Laptop Lunches kit for over a year now. I like the fun colors and the cute bags that come with these new sets but what’s really cool are the reconfigured inner boxes. Three of the boxes have lids now and you can also buy an additional set of Bento Buddies that allow you a lot more flexibility when packing lunches.

Lucky Cat Bento Box

We already have a Panda box in this shape, but my cat-loving kids would go nutso for this Lucky Cat Bento Box. Plus, it’s red! So cute!

Eco Lunchbox Three-in-One

Eco Lunchbox makes this cool stainless steel box that’s kind of a cross between a stacking style bento and a traditional tiffin. It has two layers that are the perfect size for a kid’s bento, plus a smaller box that can be used inside the box to contain wet stuff or outside the box to hold an extra snack.

Totoro Bento Box

Our whole family loves the movie My Neighbor Totoro, and I’ve had my eye on this Totoro Bento Box for quite a while now. It’s just the right size for a preschool lunch and it comes with handy removable inner cups too.

So Young Mother Lunch Box

I love, love, love this scooter lunch box from So Young Mother! In theory, I have my eye on it for my toddler who is obsessed with our neighbor’s Vespas, but honestly I’d be perfectly comfortable carrying my lunch in it too.

Star Wars Cookie Cutters

These Star Wars Cookie Cutters have been around for awhile now, but I can’t get them out of my head. They make the best looking sandwiches, and they’re sized just right for a bento box lunch. Check out this fantastic Darth Vadar lunch that Melissa from Another Lunch made with them! The red honey stick/light saber gets me every time.

Niko Niko Face Punch

I love the face punches I’ve been using for bentos, but this Niko Niko Face Punch set is somehow even cuter than the ones I have! Use the punches to decorate sandwiches, rice balls, or just about anything.

Want more ideas for bento gear?

Here are a few other places to look for bento gear:

Amazon:

Amazon has really stepped up their bento offerings in the last few months! I have assembled an Amazon store with some of my favorite bento box supplies and a few bento related books, or you can also just dig around on Amazon on your own to see what you find.

J-Box:

J-Box also has a huge collection of bento supplies at their store in a range of prices. Some of my favorite boxes are from their store.

I should probably mention that I have affiliate relationships with J-Box and Amazon. If you follow my links to those stores and make a purchase, I will receive a small percentage of the purchase and you will be helping to support this website. Thanks!

More from this series:

• Monday: Lunch Box Ideas (with a free downloadable list for your fridge!)
• Tuesday: Lunch Packing Gear
• Wednesday: Sandwich Adventures
• Thurdsay: Kid-centric Food Blogs

It’s back to school week here on Wendolonia! I’m going to be bringing you a new article  focused on lunch-packing every day this week.

Today’s topic: what to pack in the lunch box!

The same scene plays out every weekday morning in kitchens across the country: a tired parent leans forward with one arm holding the refrigerator door open, eyes scanning the shelves for something to pack into a lunch box. What do we have in the house? What do we have that’s healthy? What do we have that he will eat?

I’m faced with the same daily questions and after months of starting from scratch — and getting into ruts — I finally decided to write down all the foods my sons like that can be eaten cold or at room temperature. I asked friends and blog readers to send me their suggestions as well and came up with a fairly comprehensive list.

Not all kids will eat everything on here of course (my son wouldn’t touch carrot sticks if his life depended on it) but even the pickiest eaters will find some things on this list that they’ll enjoy.

Make your life easier on hectic mornings Download a printable version of this list, print it and stick it to your fridge for instant inspiration:

Wendolonia Lunch Box Idea List – PDF

Carbs/Tummy-fillers

• whole grain crackers
• pretzel sticks
• mini-muffins
• goldfish crackers, cheddar bunnies or other snack crackers
• pretzel thins
• bagel chips
• mini-rice cakes or rice crackers
• cooked ball of rice
• leftover pasta — toss with some chopped veggies and vinaigrette or a little olive oil, garlic salt and parmesan.
• granola bars
• banana bread, zucchini bread, or other quick breads
• cereal bars
• dry cereal
• mini-bagels
• hot dog buns, hamburger buns or dinner rolls
• garlic toast
• pita bread — I usually toast these so they don’t get soggy. Mini pitas are fun or you can cut a big one into wedges.
• leftover pancakes or toaster waffles — mini-waffles go over especially well.

Fruits

• apples slices or chunks (dip in pineapple juice to prevent browning)
• berries — strawberries, blueberries, raspberries
• cherries
• grapes
• bananas
• melon chunks — watermelon, honeydew or cantaloupe
• dried fruit — raisins, dried cranberries, dried apples, banana chips, etc.
• canned peaches or pears — drain and rinse with water to remove excess sugar.
• applesauce
• pineapple chunks
• orange or clementine wedges

Veggies

• carrot sticks
• sugar snap peas
• red bell pepper strips
• cucumber slices
• celery sticks
• grape tomatoes
• steamed green beans
• steamed broccoli spears
• frozen peas — run them quickly under warm water to start them thawing
• frozen corn

Proteins

• leftover meat from dinner cut into chunks — you can send almost anything: roast chicken, pork roast, chicken legs and carne asada leftover from tacos are all things my kids have enjoyed.
• chicken or turkey sausage with bbq sauce or catsup for dipping
• deli meats — turkey, ham, salami
• beans
• peanut butter “sandwiches” made with crackers or graham crackers
• taquitos with salsa for dipping
• baked tofu
• quesadillas
• mini-burritos
• mini-pizzas — top mini-pitas with sauce, cheese and pepperoni
• hard boiled eggs

Dairy

• yogurt
• cheese cubes
• cheese slices
• cottage cheese
• string cheese, Laughing Cow, Babybel or other small single-serving cheeses

And then there are sandwiches, of course! But we’ll talk about those more later in the week.

Don’t forget to download and print this list! I’ve made it easy for you:

Wendolonia Lunch Box Idea List – PDF

What do you send in your kid’s lunch? Do you send something with your kids that I’ve left off this list?

More from this series:

• Monday: Lunch Box Ideas (with a free downloadable list for your fridge!)
• Tuesday: Lunch Packing Gear
• Wednesday: Sandwich Adventures
• Thurdsay: Kid-centric Food Blogs

On Sunday, the conference was officially over and my flight home didn’t leave until 7:30 pm. All alone in New York with a day to myself? What a lucky girl!

WARNING: photo-heavy post ahead! Go get yourself a cherry-yuzu soda or something while you wait for the photos to download. (This joke will make sense later in the post. It won’t be any funnier though.)

I loaded my iPhone up with a list of stores I wanted to visit and headed to SoHo to do some shopping.

First stop: Pearl River Market!

The Pearl River Market is three floors of bright colors and pure inspiration.

It’s jam-packed with imported Asian goodies and everywhere you look there are bright colors. Oh! The colors!

Paper umbrellas small and large, Japanese snacks, silk lamps, clothes, bags. It’s all so delicious!

I bought some of these butterflies to hang in our bedroom:

I also bought one of these beckoning cats. I’ve wanted one for years.

I spent over an hour exploring the Pearl River Market and I could have probably stayed another two hours.

My next stop was Muji. Muji is a Japanese store, but it’s the complete opposite of Pearl River. Where Pearl River is all bright colors and chaos, Muji is soothing neutrals and strict order. The two stores couldn’t be more different if the two owners coordinated.

I wanted to buy everything in the store to bring order and calm to my life, but I settled for some city stencils and a shrink wrapped scarf (the kids were amazed when I unwrapped it at home).

Next stop: Purl Soho! I’ve been reading Purl’s excellent craft blog, The Purl Bee for quite a while now and I couldn’t wait to see their store full of luscious yarns and fabric in person. Visually the store did not disappoint:

The wall of Liberty of London fabric samples was gorgeous. I had planned to buy some fat quarters but apparently I’ve never really looked into how much they cost because I was stunned by the prices. When I picked up a small bundle of fat quarters I thought the $95 price on the tag must have been a misprint but then I discovered that the fabric on the bolts was running around $35/yard and I realized that it’s just really frickin’ expensive fabric. I decided to by-pass that particular purchase.

Somehow I resisted this rainbow of wool felt, but I did end up buying a book about felt food written in Japanese. The pictorial instructions look pretty good, but we’ll just have to see how it goes when I sit down to try it!

After all that shopping and eye candy, I was ready for some lunch. I logged onto Yelp! to investigate restaurants in the area and decided to treat myself to a fancy meal at Mercer Kitchen. I didn’t realize it until after I was seated but Mercer Kitchen is one of Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s restaurants. As a celebrity chef stalker, I was excited to finally taste some of his food.

I started off with a salad of roasted red, yellow and white beets with big knobs of goat cheese. It was dressed in simple vinaigrette and had some kind of micro-greens scattered on top. It was very simple, but the flavors are some of my favorites and the ingredients were top-notch. Delicious!

To drink, I ordered the house-made cherry-yuzu soda. Wasn’t it a pretty color? If you’re wondering what yuzu is, it’s an Asian citrus fruit about the size of a small grapefruit. (I had to look it up.) It should not be confused with a yakuza which is a Japanese gangster.

My whole meal at Mercer Kitchen was great — the best of the many delicious things I ate in New York — but the entree was what really knocked it out of the park. I had sea scallops with pea greens ravioli in a bacon vinaigrette. The ravioli were not what I expected. I misread the menu when I ordered and I thought I was getting ravioli with a pea puree inside (have you been watching Top Chef? Are you sick of them saying “pea puree” a million times per episode?) but I was pleasantly surprised by what actually came. The greens inside the ravioli had a nice herbaceous flavor and they cut the richness of the scallop and bacon flavor perfectly. So, so delicious!

OK, the last thing I want to show you from Mercer Kitchen is the bathroom! There was a big skylight in there along with white-washed bricks and this cool arched door. When I noticed that it was devoid of any plastic toys it became clear that it was nicer than any room in my whole house and I decided I wanted to move in. Is that weird?

After my lunch, I headed back to the hotel. It was too early for me to go to the airport, but I didn’t want to just sit around in the lobby, so I went over to Central Park to relax for a while. I walked around a little at first and admired the views of the tall buildings rising up over the trees.

Then I parked it on the ground by a pond and watched the ducks. There were people everywhere and birds kept flying so close to my head that the back-draft ruffled my hair. After a few minutes a mom and a little girl around Augie’s age sat down next to me. The toddler was intent on petting a duck and her mom and I started commiserating about how hard it is to keep two-year-olds out of ponds. And that’s when I realized that really, it was time for me to come home to my boys.

New York — I’m smitten. I’ll be back as soon as I can!

I’ve already filled you in on the BlogHer ‘10 conference-y parts of my trip to New York, now it’s time to hear the rest of the story!

I got to the Oakland airport to fly to New York way too early. This was the first time I’ve flown without kids in years and I forgot how much less complicated everything is when you’re an adult traveling alone. Check-in at the airport goes quickly. Security goes lightning fast. Even buying a coffee and a magazine is easier.

At the gate, I met up with Lisa from Help a Mother Out (though she wisely arrived more than an hour after I did). We knew we were on the same flight so that part wasn’t a surprise, but we were psyched to find out we were sitting right next to each other on the plane. Good omen!

After flying by myself with both kids just a few weeks ago, the flight to New York was like a relaxing trip to the spa. I had time to read magazines, play games on my iPhone, goof around with photos on my laptop and even draw a mediocre picture of my pencil case.

And the best part was that I had multiple drinks on my tray table with no fear that they were going to get dumped on my lap. Very soothing.

Lisa and I shared a cab to the hotel and I oooooh-ed and ahhhh-ed over the bridges and the tall buildings the whole way there. You’d think after living in San Francisco for 20 years I would be immune to the effects of the the big city, but compared to New York, the Bay Area feels like a quaint little town.

When I checked into the Hilton, I was pleased to find that I was up on the 32nd floor. This was my view:

And this is what I saw when I looked down. If you look in the lower right corner, you’ll see a shwarma stand with a line of people queuing up for sandwiches. This stand is considered to be one of the best in all of New York, but unfortunately I never managed to get a plate of take-out while I was visiting.

After settling into our rooms, Lisa and I met up again to wander around the city a little and dig up some dinner. We were pleased to find that the Carnegie Deli was just a couple blocks away. We settled into our table and I was pleased to see we were seated next to Big Pussy:

After eyeing the plates on the tables adjacent to ours, we decided we’d better split a sandwich. The people to our left had plates with huge, delicious looking Reubens piled on them. Though they looked fantastic, neither of us thought it was possible to make a dent in one by ourselves. It wasn’t until we’d ordered one to split — along with a side of fries — that we found out they had were eating one sandwich divided into two servings! Yowza! Here’s a picture of our sandwich before we cut it up. Needless to say, we didn’t even come close to finishing it.

When I got back to my room after dinner the view out my window had transformed into this loveliness!

I spent all of the next day at the BlogHer conference, but in the evening Lisa and I met up again for dinner. We decided to walk by the park and just eat at whichever restaurant we passed that looked good. The park was lovely in the twilight:

And even the entrance to the subway was picturesque:

When we passed by the Plaza, we decided we needed to go in and check it out. So pretty!

We ended up eating a wonderful meal at a French bistro called Le Bonne Soupe. I didn’t take any pictures of my food, but I had a prix fixe menu with salad, mulligatawny soup, bread, creme caramel and a glass of wine. The food was yummy and the cozy atmosphere  of the restaurant was the perfect antidote to the overwhelm I was feeling from the conference and New York in general.

After dinner, I met up with Whitney and Heather and we finished the evening with hot chocolate and blog talk.

The next day was more conferencey goodness. Keynote, sessions, expo hall, more sessions. Then it was off to dinner at The Aspen Social Club with old friends and new.

Dinner was fine, but the conversation was better. After we ate, we hit the official parties in the hotel.

Next…Shopping and relaxing in SoHo!

I’m back from BlogHer ‘10, the humongous blogging conference that took place last weekend in NYC. It was my first time in New York since my high school trip 20 years ago and I absolutely loved visiting the city as an adult. As far as the conference itself went…well…it wasn’t exactly what I expected.

So what did I expect? Hmmmm…good question. And I’m not exactly sure what the answer is.

The BlogHer conference was unlike any conference I’ve ever attended. It’s this really weird mix of professional, social and consumer elements and even now, four days after I’ve returned home, I’m not sure what to make of it. I mostly went to the conference for professional reasons — I’m trying to drum up freelance writing projects and I’m also looking into the best ways to grow my blog and make some money from it. But I also went to New York planning to spend time with friends and hopefully meet some new people. My experiences were all over the map, so I thought I’d just talk a little bit about what I thought was really good and what I thought was not-so-good.

The Good

The Sessions

I attended all or part of seven different sessions in a variety of tracks (I sat through the beginning of two then moved on to others when I realized they weren’t for me). Some of the sessions were really great and I learned at least a few things from every one I attended. I particularly liked the Family Foodies session with Stephania from City Mama, Danielle from Foodmomiac and Sarah from Sarah’s Cucina Bella. They — along with the audience — offered lots of great suggestions for feeding kids and I came away with several new ideas that I’d like to try with my own family. I also really enjoyed Where’s the Line or the Lie: Storytelling, Memoir and Poetic License with BlogHer’s Jory Des Jardins, Jenny Lawson from The Bloggess and Julie Marsh from The Mom Slant. Honestly, I just went to this session because I wanted to see what The Bloggess was like in real life and she didn’t disappoint. She’s very, very funny and hearing her speak is just like reading her blog. And as someone who puts herself and her family out there on the web, I thought the discussion of privacy was interesting. Finally, I felt that the Little Fish in a Big Pond: Understanding, Accepting, and Loving Your Small Blog session was well worth my time. Unlike many of the people who commented in the session, I am trying to grow my blog audience, but a lot of points people made about staying true to yourself, your writing and your interests really resonated with me.

The People

Lisa (Help a Mother Out), Katherine (Dirt to Dish), Asha (ParentHacks), Whitney (Rookie Moms), Alma (Marketing Mommy), surprised Heather (Rookie Moms) and Meagan (The Happiest Mom) at dinner.

I met so many wonderful people while I was at BlogHer that there’s no way I can cover all of them. Some were people whose blogs I’ve read and admired for a long time. Others were people whose blogs were completely unfamiliar to me but who I will definitely be reading from now on. And I also got to spend time with people who’ve I’ve known in real life for a while now (special shout out to the Rookie Moms and my NY dinner buddy Lisa from Help a Mother Out).

The Keynotes

I attended two of the three keynotes: The International Activist Blogger Scholarship Recipients and BlogHer Voices of the Year. Both were inspiring in their own way. The International Activists were four women who blog with the specific intention of changing their countries and righting injustices in the world. They give voice to many woman via their blogs who normally wouldn’t have an outlet to speak  and they risk their lives and freedom to do it. Listening to them made me so glad that the internet exists and gives so many people a megaphone to get their messages out. The Voices of the Year presentation featured 15 bloggers who read their very best posts. Some made me laugh and many made me cry.

The Public Parties

Heather tries to eat the unicorn cake. No, Heather! Don’t!

I didn’t get to as many of the official parties as I’d hoped to, but I did attend Sparklecorn for awhile and spent a couple of hours at the CheeseburgHer party. Both were crazy and fun. The cake at Sparkelcorn was to die for and I had a lovely time dancing on a giant Cheeseburger bed with Heather and Alma at CheeseburgHer.

The Stuff

This is where the weird bits of consumerism come in. BlogHer is heavily subsidized by corporate sponsors and attendees get a lot of swag. The people who attend the conference tend to be the people who do the vast majority of purchasing in this country — let alone the fact that they all post their opinions of pretty much everything they encounter on the internet — and the companies who sponsor BlogHer are well aware of that. I was pretty choosy about what I brought home with me and I recycled quite a bit of stuff at the conference and I still ended up filling a large duffel bag with stuff. I particularly liked the Jimmy Dean alarm clock, the electric toothbrush and the Weebles, which sent me right down memory lane. There were also a lot of free samples in the expo hall, along with a certain amount of dreck. One of the most memorable moments of the weekend was watching a friend take a bite out of a sausage skewered onto a stick and then dipped in pancake batter. She ate it thinking it was a corn dog, and when she put it in her mouth a look of horror immediately crossed her face and she hastily spit it out into  the garbage can next to her. The stunned guy who gave her the sample said, “I can’t believe you just did that in front of me!” Awesome.

The Food

There were a lot of complaints about the food at BlogHer last year, and the organizers obviously took them to heart becaust the food this year was very good. There were healthy choices with lots of fresh fruit, grilled veggies, and fantastic salads at every meal. Considering they were serving over 2000 people per meal, I think that was pretty impressive!

The Not-As-Good

The Sessions

So like I said, many of the sessions were good, but I was a little disappointed with them over all. Maybe it was the specific sessions I chose, but I felt like a lot of them didn’t have much to do with blogging. They were interesting and all, but I had hoped to leave New York with lots of new ideas for improving my blog and I think I only came away with a few ideas.

The other thing I found surprising was that no one had slides! Every room had a huge screen and a projector, but they just sat there unused. Most of the sessions I attended were panels and I realize that the informal nature of  that format doesn’t always lend itself to a structured presentation but some of the topics that were discussed would have really benefited from having visuals. For example, I think the session about statistics  would have been much better if the speakers had shown screen shots of Google Analytics as they explained its various features. At the very least, it would have been helpful if every session had a slide up on the screen listing out the name of the panel and the presenters, their blog URLs and Twitter handles. I found I had to really dig around to get this information and I would have liked to have had it right there in front of me.

The Private Parties

The Mario pedicabs that I didn’t get to go in.

I wasn’t going to comment on this, but I really feel like I have to. There are a lot of invitation-only parties at BlogHer. Many of them are thrown by big brands and they involve some or all of the following:

1. Free drinks.
2. Boring pitches for boring products.
3. Product samples that are given out in hopes that you will write about said product on your blog.
4. Totally awesome experiences that you would probably never get to have in your normal life when your job is taking care of children who scream a lot.

I was invited to none of the private parties. This was my first year attending BlogHer and I’m a small blogger, so I didn’t have any expectation that I would get any invites, but the fact is that it sucks not to be invited to things. It sucks when you’re in jr. high and it sucks when you’re at BlogHer. It’s not that I wanted big swag or to sit through boring product pitches, but when everyone around you is hopping into a pedicab driven by Super Mario or getting tours of the Martha Stewart Omnimedia headquarters and you’re just trying to find someone to eat dinner with it kind of makes you feel like crap. Also, I very much like free drinks.

The Fashion Show

The blog posts and Twitter messages about what to wear to BlogHer before the event are out of control. It seems like that (along with the party chatter and the swag chatter) is all anyone talks about! Maybe it’s the women’s college graduate in me — or maybe it’s because I wear jeans and a t-shirt every day — but I found it stressful and weird.

The Elevators

Oh my God! The elevators at the Hilton were so freaking slow and packed like sardines. I waited for an elevator for over half an hour more than once. Normally I’d just take the stairs, but my room was on the 32nd floor so that wasn’t really an option for me.

So there you go. I’m still kind of mulling it over in my head, but mostly I think it was a good experience. I’ll talk more about my non-BlogHer New Yorking in the next few days!

I’m back from my fun weekend in New York and therefore, back to reality. Here are the boys’ bentos for this week:

Monday

I was not feeling creative on Monday at all, so Wyatt’s day camp snack was super simple: strawberries and a crescent roll. I was going to jazz it up just a little by putting jam in for the roll, but Wyatt was adamantly opposed, so we didn’t even get that excitement.

Tuesday

On Tuesday, August had peas, steamed carrots and some chopped turkey meatballs that I pulled from the freezer and reheated in the microwave. I also included some leftover spaghetti that I tossed with a little olive oil and garlic salt after I took this photo.

Wyatt’s snack was strawberries, snap peas and some flat bread that I spread with a little butter, sprinkled with garlic salt and toasted in the toaster oven.

Wednesday

On Wednesday the toddler’s lunch had leftover corn on the cob (that I cut off the cob), leftover chicken from dinner the night before, cantaloupe chunks and garlic flatbread (like his brother’s from Tuesday.

Wyatt didn’t have a snack box on Wednesday because I pulled him out of camp to take him to Six Flags for the day. I kept it a secret until we got there by telling him we were going to “a really nice library.” When we turned the corner and he could see the park for the first time, he asked “MOM? Are we going there??” I laughed and told him that we were, and I hope he didn’t mind me tricking him so he could have a nice surprise. Still totally stunned he said, “Oh my gosh, Mom! I’ve never been to a library with roller coasters before!!” Ha! His nutritious snacks for the day included a Starburst popsicle and blue cotton candy.

Thursday

Wyatt’s day camp snack on Thursday was blueberries, and turkey and cheese roll-ups.

Friday

I broke the cardinal rule of bento box packing with this snack: I didn’t pack the box tightly with food. When Wyatt opens this up later everything will be mixed together, but you know what? He totally won’t care. So…eh…whatever. I packed a stack of fake Triscuits with cheese stars on each layer and a cup of blueberries. Everything I thought up to put in those big empty spaces was given a thumbs down by my 5yo, so I finally just gave up and put the lid on the box. Life goes on.

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