Patriotic Star Lunch

*Today's post is part of a blog hop! Click on the 4th of July icon at the end of the post to take you to the next blog in our Patriotic Blog Hop!*

I made Eliana this Patriotic Star Lunch to celebrate the 4th of July:

This Patriotic Star Lunch was super easy! I made a very similar, almost identical, lunch for Eliana last July (shhhhh don't tell her) and she loved it both times! :)

The star is an I M Healthy Creamy Soynut Butter With Honey with extra honey (Eliana loves honey!) sandwich with a red bell pepper star on top.
The little stars are strawberries 
And to show the star "flying" I added blueberries :)

Eliana's new favorite PB substitute is I.M. Healthy Soynut Butter! It is very easy for us to find, and I'm liking it too! We have had a lot of fun trying all the PB substitutes and I'm just thankful that there are so many varieties and substitutes for us to even try :)

So head on over to the next blog (and the next, and the next) for over 20 awesome Patriotic themed creative food ideas!! Click on the 4th of July button to hop on over to What's In John's Lunch Bag! (the blog hop should be fully live by noonish!)

Creative Food Supplies:

Linking up here :)

SlimKicker Digital Scale Giveaway

**This Giveaway is now closed**


I know this blog is mostly about the lunches for my daughter, but I couldn't resist posting something that is more for us parents, or adults in general :)  I find it very important to give my daughter healthy and balanced meals-- especially at lunch time.  It was always so easy to just give her a jelly sandwich since that was all she wanted to eat (she loves bread and could live off of bread alone.)  So I began to present her fruits and veggies in a fun and creative way to encourage her to eat them. This has worked tremendously since I began-- and it also has encouraged her to try new things :)


It also works for me too. And no, I don't mean that I make myself flower sandwiches! When I pack my lunches I try to present my food in a way that makes it all look so enticing :) Presentation is key! And honestly, if it looks beautiful I will eat it. (for the most part lol)


Since I can go from sorta hungry to "oh-my-goodness-i-feel-fatigue-and-will-drop-over-and-die-now-unless-you-can-feed-me-NOW" in a matter of seconds/minutes (don't mess with me when I'm hungry) it is smart to pack my lunch ahead of time. Because honestly if I don't pack it I will end up eating whatever I can find. So one of my daily goals is to pack my lunch.  Sounds simple right? But not necessarily.. It is always so much easier for me to pack my husband's lunch and even Eliana's lunch and then somehow forget about myself! When I do pack my lunch I use EasyLunchboxes, for example:

A ham and cheese wrap with veggies for lunch :)

So when Sue of SlimKicker contacted me and asked if my readers would like a giveaway I said YES! 

SlimKicker is a healthy living/fitness app and blog.  The goal is to help motivate you to stay healthy by turning your health and fitness goals into a level up game with points, rewards and challenges ((i.e. my own challenge of packing my lunch every day!))

SlimKicker is looking for new challenge ideas and wants you to help! SlimKicker will pick their favorite challenge idea and then also use it on the site! The winner will also receive a digital kitchen scale!

Want an Ozeri Touch Professional Digital Kitchen Scale? You got it! ;)

Leave one comment: One suggestion on a fun and creative fitness or diet challenge  ((no more than one to two sentences. i.e. pack your lunch daily, or no soda for a week)).  This giveaway will end on Monday July 2nd at 11:59pm EST. Slimkicker will pick their favorite suggestion and I will announce the winner as soon as the winner as been selected!

**US mailing addresses only**

Good luck!! :)

**This giveaway is  now closed and SlimKicker has picked its winner! Check out the winner here**

Summer Blog Hop

*Today's post is part of a blog hop! Click on the Summer icon at the end of the post to take you to the next blog in our Summer Blog Hop!*

Today is the first official day of summer!! And goodness it is going to be a hot one for us today! It may possibly hit high 90s! We made this crab lunch last summer and because I was lazy and didn't make lunch yesterday it was so cute I had to share it again for the start of this summer ;)

you can find the original post here. All I did was touch up the picture so it wasn't as dark! :)

The crab is a ham and cheese sandwich on a sun-dried basil tortilla.

The Palm Tree is a pretzel rod with sugar snap peas and raisin "coconuts".

The sun is cut from yellow bell pepper.

The "ocean" is blueberry gogurt

The sand is crushed graham crackers.

Super easy, quick and perfect for a summer's day lunch!

So Please hop on over to the next blog (and the next, and the next) for some awesome Summer themed creative food ideas! (The blog hop should be fully live by noonish!) Click on the Summer icon to hop on over to Crystal's Ramblings!

What I used to make this lunch:

Umbrella Lunch

This month has not been classic summer weather! June has been such a wet month it almost feels like spring most of the time-- we have had a lot of rain and it hasn't been that hot.  Last week we had another rainy day and since we were stuck inside we decided to make an umbrella lunch :) *perfect* for a rainy day!

The umbrella is a SunButter, honey and banana sandwich on wheat sandwich thins (I cut the umbrella shape with kitchen scissors).

The mini umbrellas are organic fruit leather cut with a mini umbrella cookie cutter.

The "wet grass" are frozen green peas.

And of course you can't forget to add some blueberry raindrops :)

This umbrella lunch was so easy to make and Eliana loved it! We both loved the SunButter and banana combination! This was by far our favorite SunButter combo! Eliana wanted to add honey to her sandwich since she loves honey and she did finish most of her sandwich this time (which is awesome since before she wasn't eating basically anything that looked like peanut butter or had the nutbutter consistency! Since she allergic to PB we have been exploring other PF and NF options for sandwiches). Of course while we were making it she snacked on frozen peas so I'm sure that is why she didn't finish the entire sandwich-- but I love the fact that she loves vegetables and wants to snack on them so it's all good! We will definitely be making more SunButter and banana sandwiches! I'm thankful that Keeley gave us that idea :) I used to do the same combo with PB and loved it-- don't know why I didn't think to do it with SunButter! :)

Thankfully this week the weather looks gorgeous! Hot and sunny-- so we probably won't be making more umbrella lunches anytime soon! :)

Here's what I used to make this lunch:

I link up. Check it out!

Easy Flower Bento

We have been going through our peanut free and nut free samples that my girl Keeley sent us and we have been loving everything and I am so thankful to be introduced to all these new products! :) We made this super simple flower bento packed in an EasyLunchboxlast week:

This lunch was so simple! The flower sandwich was a crunchy SunButter and grape jelly sandwich cut with a flower sandwich cutter (Eliana asked me specifically for crunchy SunButter and grape jelly). Aside the flower sandwich there are two mini diamond silicone cups filled with Enjoy Life Foods Beach Bash Trail Mix (one of the samples we got). Eliana was so excited to try the peanut free/nut free trail mix, especially since it was trail mix we were eating when she had an allergic reaction and I basically had nixed buying trail mixes for life after that (yeah.. I know.. slightly dramatic). However this trail mix is peanut free and nut free, and Eliana loved it! Which for us is good to know, especially since it is very difficult to find any trail mixes that are peanut free and nut free! So now we can buy some trail mixes and have peace of mind :)

In the top right are blackberries and cut up strawberries, with a cute flower stem pick

In the bottom right are sliced cucumbers and a grape tomato with a flower stem pick (of course just noticed now it is backwards hehe still cute though)

So the verdict so far is that Eliana still isn't too big on the SunButter, but this was the first time she ate a few bites of it--which I take as a huge success :)  I have also been eating the same/similar type lunches with her so that we try everything new together.  She hasn't always been the most daring with trying new things (foods), but I think that calling it an adventure and talking about "trying new things" everyday has really helped.  She of course prefers her ham and cheese sandwich for lunch, but I try to switch up her lunch routine every once in a while and have her try the different PB substitutes.  And if she doesn't like it I don't make her finish it, I just ask that she try it :)

From the peanut free samples we are really liking the Enjoy Life brand! Enjoy Life products are free of the 8 most common allergens, and everything is made in a PF and NF facility and so there are no concerns of cross contamination.  I love that extra assurance, especially since I started reading all food labels and it seems that PB is in everything (so frustrating) !! Eliana loved the trail mix, and actually we tried some of their yummy crunchy cookies too. No picture of that being that they were "tested" the day we got the sample package ;)

Here's what I used (or similar) to make this lunch:

The Very Busy Spider Lunch

Eliana wanted a Very Busy Spider lunch, so last week we made this lunch:

I tried to make it looks as close as I could to the book version :)

A closer view of the spider :)

This lunch looks complicated but it really wasn't that difficult--I promise!  We packed it in an EasyLunchbox:)

In the top left is thinly cut celery with a cute flower pick

In the top right she had a babybel cheese "sun" that Eliana drew a smiley face on :)

I ran across this tutorial on how to make candy spider webs and decided it would work perfect for this lunch! Check out the tutorial and see how Mom Endeavors explains how to make the spider web snacks :) 

I made my spiderweb out of pretzel sticks and melted vanilla candy melts and stuck it in the freezer for a few minutes to get hard.  It actually was super quick and easy and Eliana loved it. She had fun arranging the pretzels with me and of course eating it all :)

The spider is a strawberry body, grape head, confetti eyes (pupils drawn with edible food markers), strawberry mouth and organic fruit leather spider legs.

The fly is a raisin with sliced almonds. (Eliana is not allergic to almonds. She wanted them as the wings, but didn't actually end up eating them lol)

The spider and spiderweb sits ontop of a SunButterand honey sandwich.  

Ever since we found out Eliana is allergic to peanuts, cashews and pistachios I've been looking for peanut free (PF) and nut free (NF) products. It can be overwhelming when looking at every product and double checking there are no peanuts or specific nuts, or any cross contamination issues. It is almost easier to just forget the nuts! We will transition our pantry products to at one point having very little to no nuts.  While Eliana isn't allergic to all nuts there are so many cross contamination issues that it isn't always easy to find something completely PF. Goodness peanuts are in everything! But my girl Keeley sent Eliana and I some samples of peanut free samples (Thank you Keeley!!!!) I was sooo thankful to receive these samples! That made it super easy for us to try out some products and easily see what we like or don't like! Among these peanut free samples was some SunButter!  Eliana is still not keen on it, but I am thankful to try it, and well actually I like it. 

I also am looking for peanut butter substitutes for myself and David too. I'd rather not have peanut butter in the house and so the peanut butter substitutes are good for us all to try.  Right now Eliana doesn't seem to like anything that is similar to a nutbutter consistency, but that could change in the future so I am trying to teach her to keep an open mind while we taste all these new products! :)

I link up. Check it out!

Mars On A Plate

We made another simple and easy Mars Lunch last week, this time on a plate:

Mars is a ham and cheese on a sun-dried basil tortilla, cut into a circle.  

"Mars" is cut out of cheese

Sliced starfruit and Goldfish Space Adventures finish off the simple details :)

This was really quick and easy to make and Eliana loved it! (That always makes me happy!)  It was just as easy as the other Mars lunch we made, that Eliana loved too.

This was a light lunch, and for kids with bigger appetites it could even be a snack!  We had gone on a nice long walk earlier in the day and she had a snack in the stroller so this worked out perfect for lunch. Nope no veggies in this lunch, but don't worry, she had plenty of veggies for dinner that night :)

Here is what I used to make this lunch:

I link up. Check it out!

Mars

We made some pretty cool space lunches last week.  I figured since we have already done the planet Earth that we could make the other planets and learn a little about them while we were at it. We started with Mars.

So did you know Mars is often called the Red Planet due to its red color? (trying to keep the Mars facts simple for a four year old!)

And if you didn't know that, well now you know. ((You are welcome)) ;)

This lunch was super simple and easy to make! And Eliana chose what she wanted :)  I made it in an EasyLunchbox so we could easily transport it and eat lunch with Bee-Baga (Great Grandpa) :)

The planet Mars is a ham and cheese sandwhich in a sun-dried basil tortilla, cut with a circle cookie cutter.  "Mars" is cut out from organic fruit leather and the details are Goldfish Space Adventures.

In the top right we have cucumber stars (the outsides or the "leftovers" of the cucumber stars are underneath so no waste. we eat it all.) with a "space bear" food pick (as Eliana called him) 
In the bottom right she has blackberries with cheese stars and a "space monkey" food pick

Super simple and quick to make :) We also made another Mars lunch on a plate that I will share later this week :)


I link up. Check it out!