Bikini Bottom

Time for more Spongebob Squarepants!
Ryan & AJ's lunches: Spongebob macaroni w/Daiya cheese in a Thermos; raspberries; mini banana apple blueberry muffin; meatless meatballs; blanched spinach w/shoyu.
For the jellyfish picks I just attached cardstock stickers to toothpicks. Ryan wanted to know if he could eat them. Aaagh! Glad he asked! I'm not THAT good. But apparently he thought crystalized sugar could produce such a result, which is quite smart of him. I wonder if the stickers are non-toxic, LOL.
Gary is made of Tofurky, cucumber, & rice cheese. The floatie is soy cheese and red bell pepper.

Sunshine Burgers or Krabby Patties?

The boys love Spongebob, so no matter what type of burger they're being served, they're bound to refer to it as a Krabby Pattie. But this week they've gotten an education about burgers, and they've even called them by their actual names a few times. Regardless, if you have school-age boys, you'll probably get some good reactions to lunch by spiffing it up with Spongebob gear.

Ryan & AJ's lunches: Sunshine Burgers w/melted Daiya cheese, ketchup & lettuce on wheat buns (I'd have added pickles, but the store was out of the usual kind and I refuse to buy ones with added colouring AND high fructose corn syrup...I mean really, WHY?!?); french fries; broccoli; a side of ketchup.
So that wraps up a week of Sunshine Burger lunches for the boys! We received some cool hats and coupons from the Sunshine Burger company. If you know us in real life we'd be happy to pass along a few $1 off 2 boxes coupons...just let me know!

I was hoping to put together a giveaway this weekend as well, including some of the Sunshine Burger coupons. But of course things never go as planned, so I need to come up with some new items. Ryan and AJ were both in need of desk space for homework now that they're getting older, so I reluctantly gave up the bulk of my creative space to them. In the process of rearranging and packing up much of my craft supplies (:::sob:::) I misplaced my box of bento giveaway goodies. Horror! So I guess I'll have to go shopping. So keep a patient eye open...

Spongebob's 1st Day of School

It was Ryan's first day of 1st grade, and AJ's first day of kindergarten today. Sorry to disappoint, but AJ will only be going to half-day kindergarten, so no lunch needed this year! Horror! So I'll try to make Ryan's count extra...
Ryan's lunch: the centerpiece was a Spongebob made of yellow rice, garnished with white soy cheese, nori, tomato, & bread crust. To the left is leftover spicy baked tofu with mushrooms & onions. To the right is Spongebob's best friend Patrick made of Yves vegan bologna, on a bed of blanched spinach, with a few raspberries tucked in on the bottom. As a side treat I included a little container of corn nuts. And for special drink I bought Ryan a blueberry soymilk yogurt smoothie.












Not
trying
to fool
you,
this is
Nate's
lunch
for
grandma's
house
while
I take
AJ to
kinder-
garten
orient-
ation.
His
first
full
half
day is
tomorrow.
Nate's lunch: 1/2 pbj
sandwich; raspberries;
peanuts; a pickle;
blanched spinach.

He was very excited
about the new Spongebob
container, and I saw him
shaking it as he went out
the door, so there's no telling the condition it was in by lunchtime! If only I could photograph that! Oy.

On to AJ's walk to kindergarten...he was very eager to get going, running ahead with Dada...





















We'll see what he thinks
of it all after he's had a
few days to settle in with
his new teacher & friends!

Last Day!

If you want a chance to win a new Spiderman lunch set, today is the last day to enter my giveaway! I'll be closing the contest at 6pm and letting Nate will choose a winner from a hat. I'll post the winning entry tomorrow morning!

I'm now on the last days of summer vacation countdown before school starts here. 6 days for Ryan. 7 days for AJ. 19 days for Nate. (And about 384 for Maia! LOL)

It's always fun to get a little something new to surprise your child(ren) during the fall. So I ordered a few new bento items to excite the kiddos:Spongebob nestable containers were a great deal for us. The yellow 450ml size will work well for Ryan, who became hooked on Spongebob while we were in Florida this spring. He can use the blue 280ml size if he is bringing a Thermos of soup, ravioli, or ma po tofu. The orange 180ml size will be great for Nate's preschool snack, plus he loves the color orange. And the pink 100ml size is perfect for little Maia to carry a snack in.While Ryan will probably choose to use his lunchbox, I couldn't resist the set that included the Spongebob lunch bag. Then I chose some new food picks: letters (I probably should have ordered 2 sets to spell Maia's name and certain words, but they were a bit steep for plastic toothpicks), chicks & ducks, pandas, ocean animals (including a starfish, a la Patrick from Spongebob).
Should keep lunch prep and consumption lots o' fun!

But what if you're on a really tight budget? Or maybe you don't want your lunch decorated with colorful kawaii characters? Or maybe you like to pack larger lunches like salads that have a lot of air space? Then you can still create a beautiful lunch bento-style in a simple reusable plastic leftover container like the kind you find at the supermarket. Look for a variety in the plastic wrap, foil, waxed paper aisle, or in the cooking supplies aisle if there is one. Also check the $1 bins and lunchbox areas of stores like Target for good deals. Sometimes party stores, bed & bath stores, or Wal-Mart type mega-stores will also carry cheap lunch items. Craft stores and educational toy stores usually stock a few bento style items, often from Sanrio. And if you have a local asian market, check it out, you might be surprised.

SpongeBob

Ryan's lunch: 4-bean salad; snap peas; blue rice w/rice cheese Spongebob Squarepants...with embellishments of white soy cheese red bell pepper; nori pupils; bread crust "pants"; edible ink marker for the blue eyes and blushed cheeks & title.

So Ryan got stung by a wasp last night after dinner! You would've thought he'd been separated from an appendage with all the noise he made.
Ryan: (screaming) "I'm so ashamed!"
Dada: "Why are you ashamed?"
Ryan: (teary-eyed) "I don't know what it means!"

LOL. He never did come up with the right word. But a Nemo ice pack helped. And a bath with the new spider soap we got as a gift from a chicken pox visitor.

Sleep sucked last night. They're doing more water & sewer construction down the street, and they pile the dirt in the town land across the street from us. Apparently last night was one of their night shifts (it's a busy street, so big stuff often gets done third shift).
The lights and beeping, clanging dump trucks apparently woke up AJ. I heard the pitter patter of 5yo feet enter the room. He stopped and looked at the clock..."Only 1:50!" WAAAAHHHH!!!
So I sent Dada in to calm him down. Poor guy thought it was time to get up and was devasted to see it was still the middle of the night.

And a few leftover kid meal pics from the weekend and the past few days...












The boys have been
eating at their new
picnic table often.

Sometimes I have to
figure out acceptable
food for the neighbor
kids or friends too...
not always easy!

When we were out of
regular jam, I pulled
out some homemade
rhubarb jam my MIL
made for us, and some
vegan marshmallow
creme. Whew!