Preschool Bentos - Weeks 20 & 21

Sometimes when I throw food away, whether it's in the kitchen trash or down the garbage disposal, I actually envision money flying out the back door.

Now, I'm not particularly frugal when it comes to shopping and my budgeting skills leave a LOT to be desired, but I really hate throwing away perfectly good food. It's just such a waste!

The fact that I almost never have to throw out uneaten food from Andrew's lunchbox makes me so happy. Some days I do have food leftover from the actual prepping of the lunch - mostly the extra bread on cut sandwiches, but I justify this by knowing that he'd probably toss the crust anyway.

And if it's scraps of cheese, turkey or peanut butter and jelly, well, they never see the trash! I usually scoop them right up and add them to my breakfast for the day - ha! Or often I feed cheese pieces to Caroline. She's never met a cheese she didn't love.

So while we might waste way too much food in some areas - does anyone really excel at meal planning? If you do, please tell me about it! - my kids' lunches are not one of them.

I've also found that this bento style lunch prep has spilled over into our dinner foods. If it's one of those nights where I've failed meal planning 101, I can give the kids a little bit of this and a little bit of that, jazz it up with some cute cuts or a little food pick, and they're happy to come to the table!

Caroline is a toddler so some nights make me want to pull my hair out, but for the most part they eat really well. And I'm so thankful for that!

Tuesday, February 19

We are solidly in a Cutie phase and I love it. They're so yummy and Andrew loves them. At home I let him peel them, but I do it for him for lunch. Also, it's way cuter. :)

Thursday, February 21

This meal was a bit of an experiment  He loves little smokeys, but we limit them. And he hadn't ever had them cold so he wasn't sure he'd like them. So I sent a pb&j too just in case, but he ate it all. I don't know if we'll do them again or not though. The little stars are just a fruit strip. I have to stick them to the bread with a little jelly, but they stay!

Tuesday, February 26

Whoa! I sent Caroline to Mother's Day Out! She hadn't been in ages, but she had a blast. Her sweet teachers were happy to see her, and I think she was excited to go. She wasn't even sad when I left her behind. I love that I can use these little flower cups with Caroline. Somehow I don't think Andrew would appreciate them as much. :) She had ham roll-ups, grapes and strawberries and raisins, goldfish and yogurt melts.

Andrew had superhero sandwiches. He's on a huge superhero kick right now, with his Superhero party just around the corner. He also had grapes, yogurt covered raisins, pita chips and ketchup for dipping inside the little Lego box.

Thursday, February 28

I got a few new cups for food packing this week and they're all nice primary colors. They'll be great for boy lunches! They're from this big box I ordered on Amazon. There's no way I'll use them all so I'm sharing half of them with my sister. Sharing is a great way to help cut down on the cost of some of these items that come in big packs.

Andrew loves apples slices with peanut butter so I included some today but I soaked my apples in lemon water before I packed them. He assured me they were still delicious at lunchtime!

As always, almost all of my bento supplies are from Bento USA.

Happy lunching friends!