Announcing the winner of the Kids' Chopsticks!

Last week, y'all could enter to win this pair of kids' chopsticks ...

And the winner is ... Melanie!

Thanks to all for entering. Well, my parents are visiting this week, so I'm taking the week off to enjoy as much time with them as possible. Hope to be back again next week!

Kids Chopsticks and a Give-Away

Do you ever have a hard time eating with chopsticks? I certainly do sometimes. But you know what? There's a simpler way ... well, for kids at least. They are called "training chopsticks", and seriously ... they should come in adult sizes as well. :)

Why do I show you these on a lunch blog? Well, the other day, I was chatting with a friend of a 3-yr-old and she was explaining that while the food battle was getting better, it was still a struggle sometimes. After that conversation, I thought back to having preschoolers, and I realized that sometimes having fun utensils, interesting shapes or colorful dinnerware can make all the difference in the "Not Trying VS. Eating" food battle.

Chopsticks are great for eating so many different foods - noodles, salad, finger foods. Almost everything except soup!

A pair of kids' chopsticks is a great stepping stone to your own collection of fun kids eating utensils. SO ... I'm giving this pair away!

How do you enter? Leave a comment below, telling me
(1) Either post has inspired you the most
(2) Or what type of lunch would you like to see on my blog

On Thursday, I'll choose a winner. Happy commenting!

Ps. Perhaps you find these chopsticks so adorable that you need to own a few pairs ... they were purchased from my very favorite online bento store - Bento USA. (I've also referred to them as "AllThingsForSale.com")

Post Holiday Lunches

In our house, we are not big on the preparing the traditional American Easter dinner of ham and all the fixings. Why? Because it's a lot of work, and because my husband is not an avid lover of ham. He doesn't mind it, but ham isn't his first choice of meat. So this year, we enjoyed Pike Place Clam Chowder in bread bowls. I didn't have to cook, and there was hardly any clean-up! A delicious decision!

Only problem ... there weren't any left-overs, and we were running on low on lunch foods, since I hadn't been to the store in a few days. What's a mom to do? Especially a mom with a LUNCH BLOG? I put together lunches with what was in the refrigerator.

So LoveBug, who adores celery, received left-over homemade pizza and celery sticks with a side of Tapatio hot sauce. (My kids insist on having burn-your-tongue hot sauce; it must be something they inherited from both my husband and my dad.)

And SuperBoy, who does not prefer celery, enjoyed a ham-and-tortilla roll-up with last cucumber slices that were in the refrigerator veggie drawer.

To round out the nutrition of their lunches, I also put a string cheese stick and a clementine into each of their lunch boxes.

What do you find yourself packing for a post-holiday lunch? Leave a comment below.

Ps. Tomorrow, I'm doing a give-away. Check back, and enter to win!

Review of Chopped Salad

Earlier in the week, I had posted my "recipe" for making the chopped salad that I was craving. So here is my review of my mason jar chopped salad.

While it was beautifully layered and full of delicious-tasting healthy food, it fell a bit flat. I think that the balsamic dressing was not as flavorful as I had hoped. Perhaps next time, I'll find a recipe and make my own.

What I did love: SO many good-for-me veggies, plus a bunch of protein (chicken, mozz and salami). And the croutons (kept separate in a snack baggie until lunchtime) added the perfect crunch.

So, this particular creation did not satisfy my craving for a tasty chopped salad. BUT that just means that I have to tinker with my "recipe" and dressing. Once I get it just right, I'll repost a delectable one. Watch for it sometime.

Frozen Cereal - April Fool's!

Last year, on April Fool's Day, I made my kids a breakfast of an sunny-side-up egg. Which was really a dollop of vanilla yogurt with an apricot half on top. Click on the link above to see their reactions. Heehee!

This year, I froze their cereal. Last night, I poured bowls of Cheerios and milk, sticking them in the freezer overnight. This morning, right before breakfast, I poured a bit of milk on top to cover the frozen bowl of milk-and-Cheerios.

As you can see, they were quite confused as to WHY they couldn't eat their Cheerios! Though SuperBoy was pretty determined to hack his way through breakfast.

Once we had a giggle, I gave them a fresh bowl of Cheerios with regular, refrigerated milk.

The Blooming Marshmallow Tree

Last year was the first Spring that our family had spent in our new place, and little did we know that we had a rare-blooming Marshmallow Tree in our front yard! In fact, it is SO rare-blooming, that it only happens once a year - on the first day of April.

Well, the weather has been unseasonable warm, and everything is blooming and leaf-ing (yup, I made that up) much earlier this year. The kids were a little concerned that the tree wouldn't bloom.

Surprise! It did. With ice-cream cone marshmallows. What a treat!

Chopped Salad. Mason Jar-style

We've been trying different pizza joints around the area, and several of them have a "chopped salad", which I'm loving! So I decided to reimagine that salad in a mason jar.
Lunches for the whole week, prepped and packed all at once.

Here's the beautifully-layered finished product.

I prepped all of my ingredients ahead of time, which makes assembly SO much easier and faster! For my chopped salad, I diced, chunked and chopped celery, chicken, red bell pepper, cucumbers, salami, mozzarella and iceberg lettuce.

Here's the order of layers in my chopped salad:

#1 - about 2 Tbs. of balsamic vinaigrette dressing into the bottom of my quart mason jar.

#2 - A small portion of chopped celery.

#3 - Diced red bell pepper.

#4 - Repeat with chopped onion.

#5 - I drained canned garbanzo beans, and added a few tablespoonfuls.

#6 - Cucumber chunks.

#7 - Baby spinach leaves.

#8 - Chopped iceberg lettuce.

#9 - Chunked, cooked chicken.

#10 - Chopped salami.

#11 - Mozzarella cubes.

#12 - Top with croutons.

However, if you include croutons in your mason jar salad and store it even for a short while, the croutons will get mushy, which defeats the point of croutons. Which is why I pack them in a snack baggie on the side, so that I can top each day's salad with crispy, crunchy, satisfying croutons. Yum.

Check back later in the week, and I'll give you my review of this salad.