Well, the time is flying by! I’ve been on the road since Thanksgiving and have not had the opportunity to pack many lunches for the kids.  Vacation (which I still need to write some posts about) and a couple of business trips and the kids’ classroom parties are depriving me of my bento outlet.  I think I should channel that energy into planning some fun lunches for after the new year.  Until then, here are just a couple of quick and easy lunches I’ve sent in with the kids over the last few weeks:

This healthy cowgirl lunch was made with tortilla and cheese roll-ups, skewered with grape tomatoes, using these adorable cowboy hat and boots picks.  I added some sugar snap peas, carrots, and a mini-dipper of low-fat ranch.  The small compartments have apples, berries, and some frozen Greek yogurt.

While I was away on one of my recent business trips, my husband had the opportunity to take the kids grocery shopping after school. Instead of complaining about that (I would’ve whined a bunch) he got the job done and even let Girlie buy me these Christmas cupcake picks she found in the baking aisle.  Girlie knew that I would love to use these in her lunchbox and she was right!  In this bento, I used the picks to make Christmas characters out of tortilla & cheese roll-ups and grapes.  I also hand-cut a 15 to show the number of days left to Christmas.  It is funny because we were already celebrating Hanukkah at that point, and I was simultaneously fielding Christmas requests from both.  It must be nice to spoiled with both holidays, huh?

Today’s lunch was a CuteZCute piggy sandwich, accessorized with the Christmas picks in grape tomatoes.  I also packed clementines, baby carrots, and Chobani Champions yogurt, dotted with 8 blueberries for the Christmas countdown.

I am actually home all week this week!  If I am lucky, I will get one more bento post in before the end of the year and start publishing my Disney Cruise vacation info in installments.  I have a lot to share about our trip, including some good tips on cruising with kids.  If you’re planning a trip and have any questions, send me a comment and I’ll gladly answer.

This is the first year I have two kids eagerly awaiting Santa’s arrival and it has been much more complicated than I ever expected.  Their requests are soooo unreasonable and I am running out of excuses for why Santa cannot make them happen.  Girlie wants a pouch of pixie dust like Izzie has in Jake and the Neverland Pirates.  Little Dude informed me that Santa is going to turn our car into a rocket ship so we can go to outer space.  It is so fun to watch them believe in the magic of Christmas, but I don’t know how to set their expectations appropriately so they won’t be let down.  If anyone has some suggestions on fielding these types of wishes without just killing their dreams, I’d love to hear it! I somehow never anticipated all these ideas and questions!

Products I used in this post:

This lunch is linked at: