Monthly Archives: August 2012

Aug30

Beach Bento: An Adventure in Disposable Lunchboxes!

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Beach Bento: An Adventure in Disposable Lunchboxes!

Our family has just completed our very first East Coast beach vacation!  The timing is fitting because we’re celebrating our one year anniversary of our big, cross-country move and the kids are between camp and school right now.  We teamed up with some awesome friends to spend a few days together in Bethany Beach, DE.  We loved the beach and the pool.  We also loved the kids club!  How nice to get a break from the kids so the adults could relax a bit too!

The kids club ran from 10 to 2 daily and required a “bag lunch” for each child enrolled.  One of the things I love about my style of packing lunch is that I minimize waste.  I’d prefer that my kids not make a single trip to the trash can, so I send them with their own utensils and cloth napkins. I want them to re-use as much as possible.  We talk a lot about the 3 R’s and how we can make better choices to Reduce, Re-use, and Recycle. I thought this beach trip would be a great exercise to demonstrate a way to re-purpose something that could otherwise end up in a landfill.

I was inspired by a few of my bento blogger friends’ field trip lunches earlier this year and planned ahead to save plastic containers when I purchased strawberries and blueberries from the supermarket.  I also saved a plastic egg tray for poolside snacks.  I found that Nick Jr. has a spot on their site where you can make personalized labels with your child’s favorite characters and print them from your home’s printer. Armed with some plastic containers, scrap paper (I printed on the reverse side of my kids’ daily camp reports), and some extra cupcake liners, I set out to make a couple of cute disposable bento lunches.   I am pleased to report that they were a hit!

Check out this strawberry container that I turned into a personalized bento box!

This bento had a goldfish bread PB&J, orange bell pepper strips, half a banana, a juice box, a cheese stick, and a package of Annie’s Organic bunny grahams.

 

Here’s another that was a gigantic blueberry box in its former life:

This bento had a goldfish jelly sandwich, orange bell peppers, a pluot, a frozen Capri Sun (which acts as ice pack while it defrosts), a babybel cheese, a small pack of M&Ms, and a package of Annie’s Organic bunny grahams.

 

Fun, right?  It was easy too and just took a few minutes.  I did rely more on convenience foods than I would for my regular packing, but I was very pleased with these lunches I made with minimal supplies on hand.

And this will not earn me many adult fans, but check out my complete junk-food pool party snack tray:

Kid dream/parent nightmare! Peanut M&Ms, Candy Fish, Popcorn, Gummy Worms, and Skittles. Heinous junk food, but in small portions and shared among 5 kids who had very healthy lunches!

This was a 24-egg carton that I turned into a feast of candy and popcorn to the delight of the 5 kids in our group.  Luckily they had plenty of time to burn off all that candy-crazed wildness with swimming and other pool tricks.  Girlie is a fabulous swimmer after a month of camp and spent all her time in the deep end without any floaties.  She could even jump in and swim underwater pretty easily. I was so impressed with her improvement this year!

Want more inspiration on packing disposable bento lunches?  Two of my bento heroes have written great articles on the topic and have some excellent advice to share.  Please check out Biting the Hand That Feeds You and BentOnBetterLunches to see the field trip lunches that I used as inspiration for these meals.  If you’re a fan of pinterest, here’s a great board to follow for disposable lunches.

Have you tried making a lunch box out of something you salvaged? I’d love to see your creations!

 

 

 

Aug27

Super Smoothie!

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Super Smoothie!

I’ve finished my first full month of P90X and I am anxious to see what the second month has in store for me.  I lost a ton of weight in the first two weeks, but now it is coming off at a crawl.  On the other hand, I am down a clothing size and my body is already much stronger and more flexible, so I can’t complain about the scale.  I must actually be building some muscle!

I am not following the P90X diet program, but I am using its principles in my own hybrid version of P90X/Weight Watchers.  I am eating almost entirely fresh fruits and vegetables, with beans or low-fat or fat-free dairy (Greek yogurt, cottage cheese, milk, etc) for protein.  I used to rely a lot on soy products, but I am trying to stay away from any kind of packaged goods, so I am using those sparingly right now.  I have dramatically reduced my consumption of processed foods.   Most importantly, I have been very focused on eating to fuel my body, particularly with all this amazing exercise I am getting.  I do closely monitor my points allowance, of course, but I splurge a lot less on treats and wine in favor of extra protein.

I shared my favorite new breakfast a couple of weeks ago.  Now I have a smoothie recipe for you to try.  I am sure you will read this and think it sounds awful.  It really does sound terrible from the list of ingredients.  However, if you give it a try, you will find that you don’t taste the kale at all and the banana mellows out the grapefruit.  It is filling and invigorating.  It is my new favorite pre-workout meal.

Ingredients (in order of how I place in blender):

  • 1 cup chopped kale (I actually just rip it with my hands)
  • 1/2 cup skim milk
  • 1/2 cup fat-free Greek yogurt
  • 1/2 cup ice (here is a great ice recipe if you need one – be sure to read the reviews!)
  • 1 cup frozen berries
  • 1 small banana
  • 1 grapefruit

I blend until it is completely smooth.  You can still see little bits of kale, but it doesn’t give off any flavor.  Instead, it has a light citrus taste that gives a real pick-me-up.  This has enough calories to constitute a meal for me, but I sometimes split it in freezer ball jars to make it snack size.  I also use those freezer jars for sweeter green smoothies that I send in Girlie’s lunchboxes.  She loves them!  I just use oranges instead of grapefruit.   Here is a picture of a freezer jar ready to go:

What is your favorite work-out smoothie recipe?  Do you use powders? I’d love to hear your ideas and suggestions.  P

Here are the freezer ball jars on amazon if you’re interested in giving those a try:

Aug24

My Second BOC Revealed

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My Second BOC Revealed

I can’t explain how I have gotten so lucky two times in one summer, but I scored another Bag of Crap!  I posted all the excitement of my first bag of crap last month and you can read all about that here for comparison (and an explanation, if you require one). I am a little surprised about how different the crap was from one bag to another.

I scored on Tuesday’s Dealgebra “Be-True-To-Your-Crap” and once again received a super-sized bag of crap.  You are supposed to receive ONE bag of some kind and THREE crappy items. Check out my loot:

I received the following craptastic items in this shipment (clockwise from top left):

  • Multi-Purpose Wipes (8pk) -Says $1 right on the package.  Not a big fan of cleaning, but I can use these.
  • Simley Face Sandwich Box – Also says $1 on the package. Did woot! know that I am a lunchbox enthusiast? Great job! My girlie has already laid her claim on this.
  • Sewing Kit (30 pcs) – Also says $1 on the package. I don’t sew, which means that on the rare occasion something needs to be sewn, I can’t find the right stuff to do it.  I’ll keep this one someplace conspicuous, so I can find it again when I need it next time.
  • The bag that holds the crap: A recycled tote by Gwen’s Nest.  Just like the one I received last time, but purple!  I’ll use this!
  • T-Shirt – A medium woot! shirt that fits me.  Now Girlie and I have matching woot! shirts!
  • Red Colander – This has already been used as  hat by the kids and could someday be put to its intended purpose.  This one has a $2 label on it.
  • Camelbak Groove Portable Filtration System – This is a nice looking water bottle that will be perfect to use on vacation next week.  Fill it up in the hotel and take it to the beach.  These retail for around $20 on amazon.com.

My crappy thoughts: Well, I am glad that woot is making more BOCs available so we can all realize our dreams of obtaining one.  On the other hand, if they are just going to the dollar store and filling up boxes, it isn’t so much fun.  I like it much better as a lottery of the crap that they couldn’t otherwise offload.  My last BOC had damaged goods and plenty of stuff that I’ll never use.   This one was actually full of stuff I can put to use, but just seemed so boring in comparison.  Once again, I cannot complain – I got more than what they promised.  I put my $8 out there and I got my crap.  You know I will do it again at the next opportunity too!

In other woot! shopping news, I also got my new Lock & Lock lunchboxes, which I am excited to try out and my new Magic School t-shirt, which I am absolutely certain was designed with me in mind!  Check out its awesomeness:

Here is the amazon.com link to the Camelbak Groove(and the one I just bought for Little Dude’s lunchbox yesterday, by coincidence) if you are interested:

Aug20

Make & Freeze Recipe: Mini Pancake Bundt Cakes

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Make & Freeze Recipe: Mini Pancake Bundt Cakes

I’ll admit it…I’m more than just a little addicted to pinterest!  I love that I find real ideas there that I can actually re-create myself.  I especially love when I find something fun like this to surprise my kids with.  I found this particular idea linked to The World According to Eggface and decided to adapt the recipe so it would be gluten-free and in a fun shape.  I had inherited the mini bundt cake pan a long time ago and it had never been used before.  It’s time has finally come.

First I mixed up some batter using Pamela’s Ultimate Baking and Pancake Mix.   We’re experimenting with gluten-free and I thought pancakes might win over the family.  After I poured the mix into the muffin cups, I added frozen berries to some and sprinkled cinnamon sugar on the others.  Here’s a picture of it about to go in the oven:

I baked according to package directions and they came out perfectly.  The kids could not wait to try them.  Girlie ate at least 6 right away.  The berries were bursting and so flavorful and the cinnamon sugar ones were sweet with just a hint of spice.  Little Dude was not quite as impressed, but he’s funny about textures and these were a little different than a muffin or pancake.  I thought they were really good and an excellent convenience recipe for the school week.  You can make a couple of batches on the weekend (in whatever shapes or designs you want) and freeze them for later.  Simply microwave defrost for breakfast or place a frozen one into a lunchbox to thaw and be ready to eat at noon. Here’s the final product:

What foods do you like to make ahead?  I’d like to get better at doing some of the work on Sunday and having things done in time for the weekend.

Aug16

Pinwheels and Veggies!

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Pinwheels and Veggies!

Last night we were in a hurry to get to an event at Newtown Athletic Club (our home away from home), but naturally, I was running late from work.  This always feels ironic to me, since I work from home, right upstairs in my loft office, but I frequently am running late to work, or am late “getting home” from work. It was also raining like crazy outside, which added to the chaos and almost caused me to change my mind about going.  I mulled it over for a minute or two and decided we could all use some fun and exercise, so I threw a couple of bento dinners together and rushed us into the car.

I really only had about 5 to 10 minutes to make 2 meals, so no characters or special cutouts.  Just by adding a variety of colorful fruits and veggies, I made kid-pleasing bento that could be eaten in the car. Check out this EasyLunchBox:

I made veggie bologna and cheese tortilla pinwheels.  My kids love these much more than regular sandwiches!  I simply place a slice of cheese on a tortilla and microwave for 30 seconds to warm the tortilla and melt the cheese a little.  Then I add a slice of bologna, roll, and slice.  I made rows of veggies using red bell pepper, sugar snap peas, carrots, and cucumber.  I have grapes and cherries in the fruit compartment and trail mix in the small compartment.  Girlie ate every single bite of this (though she did eat it on the way there AND on the way back).

The kids had fun playing at the gymnastics open house and showing me all their skills.  I am amazed at how much they can do!  Girlie is fearless on the high beam now and is a tumbling pro!  Little Dude was working on some floor moves, but mostly preferred the bounce track.  He could bounce all day.

What activities are your kids signed up for during the school year?  So far we only have gymnastics.  I am wary of adding any more to our already hectic schedules, but I do remember lots of good times at T-Ball.  I am thinking maybe we’ll start that one next year.

Welcome to all the new readers who found my blog this week!  I hope you’re enjoying my posts and finding new ideas.  I love to hear from you with comments and suggestions, especially if you try something new!  I do get some ‘fan mail’ from time to time from people who have tried making a healthy bento lunch for their kids and had great success.  Check out this one from Maria in Sprinfield, VA:

Maria packed heart sandwiches for her preschoolers, spicy noodles for her adventurous kindergartener, and chicken lettuce wraps for her hubby. Check out the sriracha heart on his chicken! <3

 

Send me a picture of your bento lunch creation and I’ll gladly share it on my page too!  You can post it on my facebook page or email it to me at rachelbeard1111 @ gmail dot com.   Or tag me @rachelbeard1111 on instagram.

I know some kids are already back to school or are going back next week!  I hope you’re all off to a good start.  I am a bit nervous for school to start up again on Sept 4 for my kids.  It seems like a big  year for both of them.  I’d love to hear any tips for adjusting a 3 year old to a new preschool classroom as well.   Thank you and have a great weekend!

Aug14

Work Lunch Upgrade: Hubby’s Lunch Makeover!

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Work Lunch Upgrade: Hubby’s Lunch Makeover!

You would not believe my shock when I stepped into the kitchen this morning and discovered that my husband had packed his own lunch! He said he threw it together “in about 8 seconds” and he chose an Easy Lunchbox, so I was very proud of him. My guy likes to eat out. He’d eat out 3 meals a day if it was realistic to do so, but thankfully for our waistlines and budgets, having 2 small children makes that impractical!

While he generally likes to go out for a hoagie, an authentic Philly cheesesteak, or a Chipotle burrito, he’s become inspired by recent weight loss to make a diet change and pick up some momentum to lose even more.  We’ve been doing P90X together for about two weeks and he’s already lost 7.5 pounds without even making a change in his eating habits.  Meanwhile, I have been strictly following a nutrition plan and doing the workouts, and I have lost 6.5.  Not fair, right?!?  Well, I am very close to goal weight and I have less to lose, so it is actually a victory for me too!

Back to today’s lunch… I was expecting that he’d go out as usual, but then I found this sitting on the table:

The ‘Before’ Lunch

My first thought was “Wow! I am so proud of my man for doing this!” and my second thought was “Where are the veggies???”  Since he was trying to turn a new leaf, I just couldn’t live with sending him off with a boring 2-color lunch (white chicken and cheese, pink peach).  While he was getting himself ready to go, I snapped a before pic of his lunchbox and then got busy working on the makeover.  Check out the after photo:

The ‘before’ lunch was so light comparatively… this lunch is a bit of a clunker. For having added a mere 60 calories or so, I added a lot more nutrition, eye-appealing color, and fiber for satiety.  The upgraded lunch has 3 pieces of grilled chicken breast on top of a bed of lettuce.  I added carrots, 2 laughing cow lite wedges, sugar snap peas, cherry tomatoes, strawberries, and cheddar cheese hearts.  This should make his lunch a little happier today and keep him out of the company’s cafe looking for more.

I keep lots of ‘easy’ prepped veggies like this on hand, so it really took only a minute to drop it in the lunchbox and maybe 30 seconds to cut some cheese hearts with a cookie cutter.  So, with a combined effort of 2 minutes, he’ll have a nice and healthy lunch instead of a greasy hoagie!  Score!

A lot of my bento blogging friends pack grown-up lunches all the time.  Here are some fun examples for you to check out if you want to make one for yourself or your partner:

What’s in Mom’s Lunch Bag: Clerks 2

Beneficial-Bento: Greek Salad

Lunches fit for a Kid: Pasta

Bentoriffic: Rice and Beans Wraps

Biting the Hand that Feeds You: Spinach Salad

Keeley McGuire Blog: Typical Work Lunch

iPackLunch: Stunning Salad

Keitha’s Chaos: Turkey & Cream Cheese Roll-up

What’s For Lunch at Our House: Sushi Bento

BentOnBetterLunches: Super Cute Salad

Mommy & Me Lunch Box: Taco Salad

Pretty impressive, huh?  You can click on any of the images to go to their corresponding website. I hope you found an inspiration for something new to try.  Who do you pack lunches for?  I’d love to see any of your exciting creations too if you want to comment with the link.

Want an EasyLunchbox of your own?  They’re 4 for $13.95 at amazon.com.

Aug9

Back to School: Start Smart – Pack a Rainbow!

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Back to School: Start Smart – Pack a Rainbow!

Camp is winding down in the next couple of weeks and back to school is on everyone’s mind.  Every time I log on to facebook or pinterest, I see a slew of articles on how to prepare, how to commemorate the first day, and how to pack a great lunch.

I have already provided some lunch-packing tips on the FAQ section of this site, but today I want to focus on one of my favorite lunch strategies: packing a rainbow of fruits and vegetables for a diverse nutrition profile.  The lunch I have packed today is very simple and clean and took less than 10 minutes to prepare.  I did not use very many special tools or extra touches – everything I used was purchased locally at the grocery store or at Michael’s.  The highlight of this lunch is the colorful and bite-sized pieces of fresh fruit and vegetables.  Check out this beautiful EasyLunchBox:

The small compartments hold the rainbow of fruits and veggies.  I have red tomatoes, orange bell peppers, yellow pineapple, green cucumber, blueberries, and purple grapes!  In one silicon cup, I have some rolled up deli meat skewered with orange bell peppers.  The other silicon cup contains sliced cheese that I cut with a star cookie cutter.  There are some gluten-free crackers included, so my daughter may make her own lunchable-style cracker sandwiches.  This lunch can be totally gluten-free or vegetarian, depending on what type of deli meat you choose.  This bento has my Girlie’s current favorite – Tofurkey Bologna!  This lunch is also peanut free and dye free, making it a safe-bet for classrooms with allergy restrictions.

I pack our EasyLunchboxes in an insulated bag with a reusable water bottle, cloth napkin, silverware, and an ice pack.  This also enables me to model for my kids that we need to create less trash.  Everything I pack for them comes back home to be washed and used again.  I truly believe that the nutritional and environmental habits I enforce through what I pack for them is creating a standard that they will live by as they grow to make their own choices later in life.
Your homework: Pack a Rainbow!  See how many colors you can cram into a lunchbox.  Note if your kids eat more of the good stuff, when presented with variety.  I’d love to hear if this works for you and you find it worth the effort.
If you’re looking for more great EasyLunchBox ideas, definitely check out this article on HOMEmakers’s Challenge!  They featured my website and a few others this week!
Products I used to make this lunch:

Aug6

Fit Breafast Recipe: Egg, Cheese, and Spinach Stuffed Pepper

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Fit Breafast Recipe: Egg, Cheese, and Spinach Stuffed Pepper

It seems like I can bracket out a lot of my life into times when I am ‘on plan’ and times when I am ‘off plan.’  My plan of choice is generally Weight Watchers, running three times a week, and weights twice a week.  I always see a great result with this plan and I can lose weight, build muscle, and feel awesome.  I know I need to think about this as a lifestyle, more than a plan I can opt into or out of, because I frequently get derailed and gain 10 or 15 pounds before i rein it back in again.   That’s where  I am at now.  I lost 15 pounds earlier this year and got back to goal weight, and I’ve gained that same 15 pounds back again already.  It is frustrating, but I am in the process of fixing it and trying to make permanent changes to break the cycle.  And while that 15 pounds is a constant battle, I am maintaining the loss of another 30 pounds that I disappeared 4 years ago and have never returned!

When I am working out a lot, I think more about my food being fuel for my body.  I try to eat cleaner with less packaged items.  I try to eat more protein and complex carbs, but less sugar and fat. Breakfast is a critical meal for me and I need the meal to be prepared quickly, but have the right nutritional balance to be filling and keep me energized all morning.  Here is a picture of my new go-to breakfast meal:

This beauty takes 5 minutes total to create and uses only a few ingredients.  I use 3 egg whites, 1/4 cup of low-fat cheese, 1/2 cup of frozen spinach, a splash of hot sauce, and half of a bell pepper.  Here are the steps:

  1. Coat the inside of a mug with cooking spray.
  2. Put 3 egg whites in the mug.
  3. Add 1/4 cup low-fat cheese.
  4. Add some hot sauce to taste
  5. Add the frozen spinach.
  6. Stir.
  7. Microwave for 1 minute.
  8. Stir again.
  9. Microwave for 2 minutes.
  10. Empty the contents of the mug into the bell pepper half.

The whole process takes me about 5 minutes. It looks and tastes great!  I believe this is 3 Weight Watchers points.  I get the lowest number of points allowed to be assigned, so I need to make every point count.  This really helps me.   Try it!
I have done a week of P90X now and it is going very well so far. I am amazed that I can keep up with the video for the most part.  So far, my favorite workout was definitely Plyometrics. I really liked the cardio!  I had the most difficulty with YogaX because I just don’t have the flexibility.  My least favorite was the Chest and Back workout because of the endless pushups and pullups.  I am actually surprisingly strong in both of of those exercises, but enough is enough at some point! It went on forever.  And THEN Ab RipperX after!

I am down 3 pounds for week 1, which is an outstanding start for me.  I need 13 more to be in my maintenance zone again, but of course I’d be happy to lose a few more if I could.   I think if I push myself, I can lose the weight in 3 months or less.  I’ll keep you posted.

What’s your favorite fitness-fuel breakfast?  I’d love some other suggestions!

Aug1

Sabertooth Sandwich!

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Sabertooth Sandwich!

There has been a lot of talk about sabertooth tigers at our house this week!  We took a family trip to go see Ice Age – Continental Drift, which stars Diego a Sabertooth Tiger and his new love interest!  Also, we have reached #7 in the Magic Tree House Series, which is called “Sunset of the Sabertooth.” There is also a non-fiction companion guide, Sabertooths and the Ice Age, that we picked up at the library, which has provided us with a good deal of information about what the sabertooths were really like.

To celebrate our new fascination with this amazing creature, Girlie and I decided on a sabertooth bento for musical theater last night.  Here is the EasyLunchBox that I made for her:

The sabertooth sandwich is veggie bologna and cheese inside, with a cheddar cheese face on top. There are candy eyes, a green bell pepper nose, red bell pepper lips, and Swiss cheese teeth and fangs.  She also has apple slices and a small piece of brownie from the batch we baked the night before.  She was so excited when I presented her with this lunch in her car seat as we were getting ready to head to her 6:30 class.  She loves her weekly indulgence of a bento in the car!

In other exciting news, Girlie has reached a few new milestones this week.  She is nearly 6 and was thrilled to report that she has mastered the monkey bars! She can go from one end to the other, turn around without touching her feet to the ladder, and go all the way back.  She also passed the level 2 swim test and is swimming in a deeper section of the pool! She’s been talking a lot about starting kindergarten in the fall.  She is very excited and a little bit nervous too!

Little Dude is blowing through milestones these days too.  He’s talking much more and making a lot more sense too!  He’s had some interest in the potty and has been overall better at following directions.  I feel like he changed so much over the course of the summer.  Both kids seemed to grow up a lot at camp.  I am actually a bit nervous about making the transition back to school.  Our old preschool was year round and while I can see some benefit in giving everyone a break, I am wary of the extra transitions involved and maybe some back-to-school blues.

I’ve been seeing a lot of back-to-school blog posts, so I can tell this is a topic on everyone’s mind.  I’d love to hear your tips for getting the kids off to a good start!

Also, Magic Tree House fans, I noticed that the Sabertooths and the Ice Age book is listed as #12.  I just did a little research and discovered that there are other companion guides I’ve been missing out on.  Would you recommend we go back and read those too before we continue on the series?  Or are they just a ‘nice to have?’   We are enjoying this fun series and are excited to read all of the books!

This post is linked to Read.Explore.Learn.
Shibley Smiles