It's Monday!

Today my sons class is having a pizza party so I only made bento for my daughter. It is pretty much the same that as what I made yesterday. Flower turkey dogs, green beans, steamed rice in a bear cup with a nori face and hot dog piece for the nose. Then she has apples with peanut butter in the little container!

My Daughters Vegetarian Bento #1 For The Week!

I took this pic with my cell phone so it is not all that great of a picture. My tamagoyaki did not come out very good at all this morning. That is what I get for rushing through it!!! I put steamed rice into a triangle shaped side dish cup and added a nori smiley face! Then cut out cheddar cheese hearts, sliced some Fuji apples and added some organic green beans to get some veggies in there!

My sons bento was the same except his had some rolled ham on food picks.

"In The Garden" Bentos

Today my daughter had her 2nd vegetarian bento for the week. A "garden" of flower tangerines, flower carrots, carrot crumbles, cheddar and monterrey jack cheese flower, apple flowers, edamame bushes and a rice cloud that I colored with organic all natural food coloring from Seelect.com
My son's "garden" had tulip hot dogs on edamame "grass" and chopped apples. Then he has steamed rice with a edamame and tangerine flower on top!

Smile Bento

For my son I made the same sandwiches as I did for my daughter and put some edamame in a little silicon cup under the sandwich to fill the gap there. Then I added chopped apples and tangerine with a cheese smiley face on top!

A Little Girl For My Little Girl Bento:)

I took a little extra time and made my daughter a cute "charaben" bento today. A little girl made of ham and cheese on top of a ham and cream cheese sandwich on wheat bread. Along side the sandwich is edamame, sliced persimmon and flower apples!

Today's Bento

Today the kids had turkey bacon and cheddar cheese wraps, heart apples, sliced kiwi and of course edamame:)

Yesterday's Bento

I did not get around to posting this bento yesterday. Time got away from me!

The kids had honey & butter rolled tortillas, turkey flower dogs, hard boiled quail egg, shelled edamame and half of a tangerine!

Tamagoyaki Bento #2

My sons is basically the same with a couple of changes. He does not like carrots or cherry tomatoes, so I had to leave those out. Instead I added mushrooms w/soy sauce which he does like and I added an extra tamagoyaki and an extra hot dog flower to his. He wanted the mochi in his snack box for snacktime so that is not in his bento either. "Hey people, I am just doing my best to please a 4yr old here...LOL! Take this out...put that in...yada yada yada! Boy, the things we moms do to make our little rugrats happy! ;P"

Tamagoyaki Bento

This my 6 yr olds bento for today. I made tamagoyaki using

Claudia's
Recipe from Cloud 9 Food (click for recipe)

Then I made the flower hot dogs, added carrots, edamame, cherry tomato, apples and some pineapple mochi there in the bear cup!

CRAZY Morning Bento!

Well this morning was CRAZY! We woke up late and I had to scramble to get everyone ready and out the door for school! So today's bento for the kids was ALL about speed.

PB&J sandwiches, tangerine, edamame and a little jello. Tomorrow's bento will be better. No more oversleeping:p

Healthy Lunch Tips For Our Kiddos

As you pack up your child’s lunch, take the opportunity to pack in nutrients as well. Two important goals for ensuring your child eats a healthful lunch:
*Include as many food groups as you can as whole, unprocessed foods.
*Make it as appealing as possible, both visually and tastefully (an uneaten lunch isn’t doing anyone any good).

Children who eat processed foods and sugars for lunch may:
*have a harder time maintaining the rigors of the school day
*lose concentration
*feel sluggish during the afternoon

A proper child's lunch should ideally include:
*one portion of carbohydrate
*one portion of protein
*a calcium-rich food
*fresh fruits and vegetables

Turkey, Turkey, Turkey

Here we have my sons bento for Thursday this week. He has rolled turkey bacon on cute little animal picks surrounded by sliced turkey franks, cup of shelled edamame and steamed rice. Also he had a side car of chopped apples (not pictured).

As you can see, my son is our meat eater. He is not big on veges at all. THANKFULLY he does like edamame and mushrooms:) I can also get him to eat green beans from time to time:p

Star Fruit Bento

This was my daughters bento on Thursday. I love this one! It was SUPER easy and took all of 10 minutes to put together. I already had the rice pre-made, so all I really had to do was shell some of the edamame and cut the star fruit then assemble! My daughter would much rather eat fruits and veges any day rather than meat of any kind so this bento was right up her alley!

Fast, Easy, Cute!

The kids lunches today were SUPER SIMPLE and FAST which was really important this morning. It was a busy morning and I needed to put together their bentos as fast as possible without the CUTENESS factor suffering too much! So behold the star shaped chicken nuggets and An Pan Man potato faces from my local CO-OP supermarket! I just popped them in the oven this morning for about 10 minutes and they were ready to go. I already had the rice made so it was just heat and go! Of course the edamame is easy, no preparation there, straight from the bag to the bento box!

ONIGIRI is the theme of todays Bentos!

My sons bento has a musubi inspired onigiri, a green tinted molded car egg, sliced carrots with ranch dressing in the cute bear sauce bottle and in the cat container there are a few M&M's!
For my daughter I put in a salmon onigiri, sliced carrots with ranch dressing there in the cute sauce bottle and a yellow tinted Cinnamoroll molded egg! For dessert I put in a tiny box of Meiji chocolates;)

Bentos Made The Night Before...

The kids bento had to be made the night before because I have a VERY hectic schedule in the morning!

For Reyna we have a flower shaped PB&J with a nori smiley face sectioned off with a pink baran divider. Next is a row of fresh cucumbers along with sliced apples and rolled ham on a teddy bear skewer! Then we have the EVER so CUTE Candy Sushi Roll! (See recipe below)

For Nico we have turkey & cheese sammies, diced apples and smiley face cucumbers! Nico got the candy sushi in his snack box to be eaten at snacktime after naptime. Naptime for him is directly after lunch so I try to limit his sugar intake at lunch!

Candy Sushi Rolls

Items Needed:

Fruit Roll Ups

Large Marshmellow

Twizzlers

Take one large marshmellow and poke a hole all the way through the center. Next cut a small piece of the Twizzler and insert it into the center of the marshmellow. Wrap the marshmellow with the Fruit Roll Up!!! THAT'S IT! Not much to it! EASY and CUTE!

Monday's Bento

My daughter's bento for today is breaded chicken, carrots, cherry tomato and heart shaped apples in the bottom tier. In the top tier she has shells & cheese! All of this in her favorite bento box!
In my sons bento today he has breaded chicken with cute animal picks, shells & cheese and heart shaped apples!

Field Trip Picnic Bento

This is my sons bento for today. A monster PB&J with cheese eyes and apple eyebrows. The bottom section of his sandwich box has apples, string cheese and edamame!

Today was Reynas field trip to the Benimo Field and I was one of the volunteer chaperones. So I packed us a picnic bento for the trip. In the first tier there are pearapples in the shape of hearts and kyoho grapes. Surrounding that is edamame and flower shaped carrots!

This tier has turkey sandwiches and yummy garlic gyoza!

Ham & Cheese Roll Bentos

The kids bentos today were again packed full of fruits & veges! Nicos bento pictured above had ham and cheese rolls, edamame,spongebob crackers and apples! Reynas bento pictured below has ham and cheese rolls,carrots,edamame,broccolli alfredo fettuccini noodles topped off with broccolli and a heart carrot!

Lots of Veges and Fruit!

Since I got my Fresh in Oki delivery yesterday I decided to pack the kids obento full of fresh fruits and veges! I also made star shaped onigiri with steamed rice that I tinted with yellow food coloring and put in little quail eggs for some protein! The star onigiri is accompanied by edamame and flower shaped carrots! In the bottom tier of my daughters bento is heart shaped pear apples, fat juicy grapes, 1 quail egg and fresh Okinawa pumpkin that I seasoned with a little cinnamon and brown sugar! In the bottom tier of my sons bento is the same, minus the grapes! (He does not like them) The food picks are cute little animals that I thought would add a little more cuteness!!!