Live Long And Prosper Star Trek Lunch

I bet Spock would describe this bento as "Fascinating, but highly illogical." :)

Sailor Boy and I are both a little bit Trekkie, so I know he'll get a kick out of it! Inspired by the Vulcan salute, his PlanetBox lunch contains:

• Turkey & cheddar on wheat Vulcan salute sandwich (should have skipped the turkey since Vulcans are vegetarian, but I forgot)
• Freshly picked cherries! Sailor Boy has been looking forward to cherry season, these will be a welcome surprise :) 
• Greens salad topped with cheese "live long & prosper"
• Gouda Babybel carved with a Starfleet Insignia
• Mandarin & sesame dressing for the salad
• Safeway cheddar cheese star crackers
• Trader Joe's yogurt covered star cookies

The Vulcan salute sandwich was made using a cookie cutter & stamper from this most excellent set by ThinkGeek:

I love them!

If we can arrange for someone to stay with the younger sproutlets, Sailor Boy, Beanstalk & I will be seeing Into Darkness this weekend - I can hardly wait!

We Trekkies bento bloggers have linked up with a hop! Awesomeness awaits you next at Organized Bites! And when you've landed back here, maybe you'd like to check out some of my previous Star Trek-inspired lunches : 

Some stuff used to make today's Trekkie lunch:

Ladybug Lunches

I'm guest posting over at Ladybug Lunches today...  so I've made ladybug lunches for the occasion, what else? You can see Birdie's ladybug lunch here, and Sprout's similar but different version there!

Birdie's Yumbox bento lunch contains:

• mozzarella string cheese
• strawberry hearts
• cherry tomatoes
• a ladybug cheese sandwich
• raspberries with a little heart fork
• chocolate covered raisin treat

Kindergartner Sprout's ladybug lunch is even cuter, I think!

Get Sprout's lunch details in my guest post at Ladybug Lunches!

Birdie's ladybug themed preschool lunch is packed in her new & improved Yumbox Leakproof Bento Lunch Box!

The Yumbox shell still needs to be hand washed, but the inner tray is now made of dishwasher-safe Tritan plastic. We have Nalgene bottles made of Tritan, and they've been through the dishwasher hundreds of times, so I know it's tough stuff and can be confident this new tray will survive, yay! Sailor Boy is the chief dishwasher around here and I don't like to make things difficult for him by having too many things he has to hand wash :) 

Some stuff used to pack this lunch:

Hello, I Love You!

Bella has a Hello Kitty Thermos Funtainer filled with spaghettios, with a Light My Fire spork, and a LunchBots Quad filled with cucumber, cauliflower, pistachios, almonds, a little sauce cup full of rainbow chocolate covered sunflower seeds, and some animal crackers.

Pickle has Lunch Punch ice cream cone peanut butter sandwiches:

Mother's Day FunBites Giveaway

Since this was supposed to be a Mother's Day giveaway,  I was going to have my littlest sproutlet make ME a lunch using her favourite FunBites cutter... but she just didn't want to cooperate :)

No, she didn't want to make mummy a heart sandwich, she wanted to make pizza hearts. She reminded me that I did say "last day" (meaning any day prior to today) that we could make pizza hearts. So that is what we did. Using our brand new extra special RED Luv it!

We've made pizza hearts several times since seeing Bento for Kidlet's Pull-Apart Heart Rolls. We usually cut the hearts out first, then spread sauce on top and sprinkle them with cheese - but when I let Birdie help, a lot of sauce and cheese ends up burned to a crisp on the baking sheet - so this time we tried a different method. I let Birdie spread the sauce & sprinkle the cheese before we cut out the shapes, as she demonstrates in the photos:

 

 

I folded the dough in half, then helped Birdie cut the hearts out & put them on the tray, so there are no photos of those steps, but you get the idea :) We also took the leftover bits and twisted them into pizza breadsticks! Yummy!

They may not be the neatest but other than that they came out great! Birdie loves to help in the kitchen, and brushing on pizza sauce with a pastry or barbecue brush is like food painting fun for her. For more tools you can let your tot help out with, check out this MOMables post by Michelle of Creative Food:

10 Kid Friendly Kitchen Tools Little Helpers Should Have

The FunBites hearts pull apart easily & are full of doughy pizza deliciousness!

So easy I'm sure Sailor Boy could manage to help the sproutlets make them for me for Mother's Day! Oooh, or how about a cinnamon bun version! The frosting would dribble & pool in the nooks & crannies, mmmm...

Want to win a FunBites Luv it heart cutter? 

FunBites is sponsoring an exclusive giveaway of 4 RED cutters for Bent On Better Lunches readers only! You can't even buy these red ones yet :)  But if you prefer, you can choose the original pink ♥

Enter via the Rafflecopter widget below:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Congratulations winners! No, I didn't forget how to count... One of you commented that you'd like the pink Luv it... and since I have 4 red to give away... bonus winner! Please email me within 48 hours to claim your prize :)

Orange you looking forward to lunch?

Bella asked for her GoGreen LunchBox today. The orange theme was unintentional at first, but when I realized all the food that was going into it was orange, I chose orange picks & cups to match :)

Bella's orange lunch contains:

• Turkey & cheddar flatbread sandwich. 
• Cheetos puffed corn snacks.
  Yes, junk food. I allow it sometimes :)
• Mozzarella cheese stick cut in thirds. 
• Cantaloupe chunks.
• Organic baby carrots.
  Their healthiness cancels out the Cheetos, right?
• An orange sweet pepper.
• Iced tea in her GoGreen bottle.

Some stuff used to make this lunch: