Friday, September 27, 2013

It's Good to be Seven

Happy Birthday Shannon! 

I can't believe my little boy turns seven today.  He got his name on the school sign and was very excited about it.  He also got to choose the lunch for the whole school.  He decided on an "MGC McMuffin" with sausage, egg and fruit with cake for dessert.  Quinn was excited about the cake, less so about the McMuffin.


Instead of packing his normal healthy snack, I played super mom (for one night only) and made him a special birthday snack.  He saw this magazine cover:

and thought these would be great to bring in.  After reading that you make them with pre-made Rice Krispie treats, I agreed.  So, one trip to the grocery store and about $30 later, we started making little monster treats.  It took around two minutes for Shannon to become disinterested and ten for Quinn to wander off leaving me alone in the kitchen dipping rice treats in melted chocolate, twisting Oreo cookies in half, applying Junior Mints and M&Ms as eyeballs and finally applying mini M&Ms as colorful decoration.  All in all, they didn't turn out nearly as neat and cute as on the cover (things rarely do) but they were still cute.

Quinn did make another appearance to do the mouths (and eat the leftover halves of Oreos and M&Ms.)  The one on the bottom right is singing and the very squiggly ones are supposed to be moustaches. 

I'm sure after this the teacher will hate me for sending in something that probably covered the kid's hands in a chocolate, sticky mess.  Maybe that's why I send in so many rolls of paper towels though at the beginning of the year.


Sunday, September 15, 2013

Hello Kitty Meets Bento Lunch and More

A mock Hello Kitty sandwich served on a bed of pretzel rods with a side of string cheese and apple sauce made Quinn super happy one day.

 Another day was whole wheat heart waffles, half an apple with a little cinnamon cereal.


Wanting to try out my newly arrived fun animal food picks and condiment holders I went simple with Shannon's snack doing a cut up cheese stick with grapes and simple again with Quinn's lunch doing carrot sticks with ranch dressing in the cute bunny cup, a cut up turkey dog and a cut up apple that sadly turned brown very quickly.
More fun with the picks!  Shannon got turkey, cheese tortilla roll-ups and grapes.

All in all, it was a fun week.

Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Bringing Dinner Back

When I was a kid we ate a dinner my mom made every night at the kitchen table.  My kids?  Well, first off, we don't have room in our kitchen for a table.  Then there's the fact that I don't cook dinner every night.  My mom was a teacher so she got home from work by around 3:30pm each day so I think that made it a little easier for her to get dinner on the table every night vs my getting home somewhere between 5 and 6 each night.  Also, I think back in the 1970s, it didn't occur to my mom to make excuses to not make dinner.  She had grown up in a world where the woman cooked dinner every night whereas my world doesn't quite work that way and I find it immensely easy to find reason after reason to not cook.  Not that my kids are going hungry, but you know what I mean.  The husband and I can throw something together for the kids without making something for ourselves and they can eat at their little chairs in the living room without me having to clear off spaces at the dining room table.

When we had Shannon I envisioned us all sitting down as a family at some point for family dinners every night, just like I had done as a child, but when he was just a baby it didn't seem necessary.  As he got older and I started thinking more about it but then I got pregnant with Quinn and I thought I would wait until she was no longer a baby.  Then I got pregnant with Sully and I thought I'd wait until he was no longer a baby.  Then I got pregnant with Maren and I thought I would wait until she was no longer a baby.  Then one day I thought holy crap, Shannon is almost seven and we're still not sitting down to eat dinner as a family.  Now is the time!

I'm happy to report that we sat down at the dining room table every night for over a week now.


Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Bento Times Two

Tomorrow Shannon and Quinn both don't want hot lunch so I packed up lunch for each of them along with a snack for Shannon.
Quinn gets panda bear cheese sandwiches, champagne grapes, goldfish crackers and a whole wheat chocolate chip cookie and Shannon gets a frog turkey and cheese sandwich, raspberries, goldfish crackers and a cookie.  For a snack I toasted a whole wheat waffle, cut it in half, spread some peanut butter on it to make it into a little sandwich and then cut it up to fit into the little snack cup.  On the other side are tiny champagne grapes.

I need to figure out something useful to do with the bread crusts as I feel like I'm wasting a lot.  I'm also beginning to wonder if I keep this up if the kids will ever accept a normal looking sandwich again.

Monday, September 2, 2013

Going Bento

Quinn's first day of all-day K4 is tomorrow.  Where has the time gone?  Not just the summer but four and a half years?  Although she has the option to take hot lunch, given her limited likes and numerous dislikes, I figure most days she'll be taking a bag lunch.  In anticipation, I purchased a few different lunch containers, a few fun food cutters and some silicone baking cups.  With that I give you my first ever bento lunch:





One cheese sandwich cut into a heart shape, pretzels, carrots and a little container of ranch dressing.  Nothing super fancy but Quinn helped put it all together and we had fun doing it and I hope she has as much fun eating it.