MSA Lunch

My oldest son has the first round of MSA (Maryland School Assessment) testing today and therefore we packed lunch with extra care today!

We packed home made snack mix (unsalted peanuts, white and dark chocolate chips), oranges, energy balls and three pitas filled with carrots, salad and turkey. Nestled on top are two small containers filled with mayo. We also packed a drinkable yogurt and ice water today to refuel.

I  packed a snack for the afternoon as well:

Lemon edamame, crackers and cheese and some apples are packed in our Lunchbot Trio.

Good Luck today!

Energy Lunches

Happy Monday! Hope everyone has a great start into the new week!

We made some no bake energy bites this weekend (recipe below) in preparation for state wide testing this week. They are filled with protein and a great snack for the days the kids need extra energy!

For my two older kids we packed no bake energy bites, all natural apple sauce and a chicken, mustard and salad sandwich with a Chobani Champions blueberry tube. They also packed ice water and a small orange juice.

My first grader packed a Chobani Champions blueberry tube in his yumbox as well as oranges, carrots, no bake energy bites, a protein cereal bar and a small treat.

We have been making no bake energy bites for a while and I first found them HERE. I still use the recipe from Smashed Peas and Carrots as a base recipe but I tweaked it a little bit.

Ingredients:

(it makes about 50 - 70 mini energy bites)

2 cups oatmeal

1 cup peanut butter 

2/3 cup honey

1 cup coconut flakes

1 cup ground flaxseed

1 cup mini chocolate chips

1/2 cup of sliced almonds or 1/2 cup of dried fruit

Add all ingredients into a large bowl and mix until a dough forms. 

Wet your hands slightly and roll into balls. 

I store mine in parchment paper lined tupperware in the fridge.

For a great picture tutorial visit Smashed Peas and Carrots :)

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss

Happy Read Across America Day and 

Early Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

We love Dr. Seuss and all have our own favorite books. I asked the kids what they would like for Dr. Seuss's Birthday for lunch this year and this is what they requested:

The Grinch from How The Grinch Stole Christmas:

We packed pretzels, green eggs made from chocolate and Unreal chocolate candies, red and white apples to represent The Cat in the Hat and a peanut butter sandwich covered with a dye-free spinach tortilla shaped like the Grinch with fruit leather details. My second grader also brought a yogurt and ice water.

Green Eggs and Ham from the book Green Eggs and Ham:

For my fifth grader, I packed Somersault Sunflower crackers topped with a green egg made from chocolate and an Unreal dye-free chocolate candy, green egg pita rounds filled with hummus and topped with a piece of cucumber and a green egg wrap (green dye-free tortilla, ham and eggs). He also packed ice water.

Max the dog from How the Grinch Stole Christmas:

I packed more Somersaults Sunflower seed crackers topped with a green egg and ham chocolate, apple slices and Max the dog with pretzel antlers and fruit leather details sitting on a cereal bar. My youngest son also packed ice water and yogurt.

Well, and when I asked my four year old she could not decided which was her favorite so we did a compelation of The Cat in the Hat, One Fish, Two Fish, The Lorax and Horton Hears a Who:

We packed our yumbox with a cereal bar topped with fruit leather spelling out "unless" form the Lorax, goldfish crackers representing One Fish, Two Fish topped with green eggs, there is also Thing 1 and Thing 2 taking a bath in vanilla pudding, carrot tartuffolo trees, a Horton holding the speck sandwich and the Cat in the Hat with apple slices.

And with that I am leaving you with one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Seuss:

Little Bites

Today's lunch is a variety of small servings of food packed to encourage the kids to eat a little bit of everything. I have noticed that sometimes their lunchboxes come back with one bite out of this and one bite out of that but nothing was really finished. Packing small amounts of a variety of different food groups hopefully will encourage them to eat more.

This lunch contains:

• Pirate Booty
• Apples
• Somersault crackers
• Carrots and celery
• a protein cereal bar
• and a graze apple&cinnamon flapjack

 They also packed yogurt and ice water.

And I added a special Lunchbox Love Note as well. It has been a long week already and two of the kids were out sick but they were good patients and hopefully we can end the week on a healthy note (:

What I used to make today's lunch:

A Happy Birthday Lunch

It's my Daughter's Birthday today and I had a very special lunch planned for everyone.
However, as it happens sometimes there was very little time this morning so I made this very simple birthday lunch for the boys and ended up taking her to lunch instead. Because she lunches now. She is so big. 4.

I packed Tangelos, a peanut butter sandwich and decorated with a few picks. They also packed yogurt and a cereal bar today. I am so glad for picks sometimes because they can dress up even the  most simple lunch!

Happy Birthday!

Funny Thursday

Simple sugar eyes and an air bubble in our bread made this lunch a lunch to giggle.

In addition to the funny bread we also packed crackers and cheese, strawberries and oranges and as always yogurt and ice water.

A snack for lunch

We packed lunch in our yumbox again today. This lunch is for my first grader who eats very little for lunch. He chose all the different foods himself and because I know that he will eat a warm snack once he is home I let him choose snacky foods today.

He chose popcorn, Berry Blossoms cereal from Kashi, a cereal bar, two mini grape jelly sandwiches and mini peppers cut up.

I found these cute mini cookie cutters on Amazon and I love how they came out!

I love using our yumbox at home as well. My 3 year old daughter wanted a lunch box lunch and what better box to use then our yumbox :)

We packed popcorn, apples, oranges, a small amount of vanilla yogurt to dip the apples in, pretzels, two mini strawberry jelly sandwiches and a half a banana. And now there is a very happy 3 year old munching on lunch :)