Mothering Corner

I fixed something simple this morning. With my busy schedule, it’s hard to come out with anything fancy lately, but as long as my kids are “well fed” after school, I guess I’ve done my best.

Hubby started work at his new office today, but judging from my workload, I will still have to pick up the kids and bring them back to the office and wait until mommy is ready to go home. Hopefully, the bentos are sufficient to keep them “stuffed” and they won’t scream “in hunger” while the mommy frantically get dinner prepared after work. Sigh…

Here are today’s bentos:

My boy’s bento with 2 chicken balls, some blueberries and mango

Here’s the side view of the chicken balls in my gal’s bento

The chicken balls are decorated as little chicks, just like the previous  bento.

Hubby and I have different views when it comes to house chores. I would prefer to hire a maid and let her do all the dirty jobs. But hubby doesn’t like to have a “stranger” living under the same roof. He said he would have lost his privacy. Frankly, I’m not sure what kind of privacy he’s referring to as we are only at home at night during working days, and some time during the weekends. He can just get door hanger printing stated “Don’t disturb” and hang it on the door for more privacy in the rooms. LOL!

With both of us getting busy lately, I am not sure if the house chores can be properly done. Thus, we came to the agreement of getting a part time cleaner twice a week. Too bad she doesn’t do the laundry and ironing!!!! But I got her to water my plants and rack the leaves. Gee…my garden is dying.

I did a mouse bento previously, and I felt like fixing this theme again because it’s quick and easy. But this time, I used 2 quail eggs for a mouse, instead of one like the previous bento. Today’s bento are quite light, with only kiwi, mango and a piece of jam sandwich. Thus, I packed 2 quail eggs in each bento.

I didn’t manage to snap the step by step photos on how I decorated the mouse’s head, but I shall explain in detailed.

The mice, decorated from quail eggs

1. Cut a line diagonally on the equal egg and slip in the ear. You can cut the ears from kamaboko, with the orange cutter as shown in this post. This cutter comes with the quail egg cutter set.

2. Then, I added the eyes, nose and lip punched from nori.

3. Break 2 tiny bits of spaghetti strips and pin them on the mouse as whiskers. I only added whiskers at one side since I wanted to create a “side-view” mouse.

4. Pin this pick on another quail egg as the tail.

5. Join the quail eggs with spaghetti strip. (Tips on Spaghetti Strips)

Then, I slipped the mice in the bentos, and here they are:

A Mouse Bento

There’s lots of gap in today’s bento, but the mouse should be stagnant in the silicon cup, unless you swing the bento around.

This mouse belongs to my gal.

Most of us who follow some Japanese bento blogs might have seen these new arrivals over the weeks, but I still can’t find any online stores that carry these products.

Pic Source

Pic Source

Have you seen these picks at 100Yen?

Pic Source

Those are the hat picks I mentioned previously! So cute!!! Where to get them though?

There is another blog that featured some cute piggy picks, but I can’t find it in my feeder. Those piggy picks and barans are very cute too.

So, anyone is going to Japan lately?

Hubby has a cousin who died of drug abuse more than 20 years ago. He was the only son in the family, and being a typical traditional Chinese, his mother adored him more than other siblings. He got on drug due to peer pressure, and when his parents found out about it, they kept quiet and protected their son, instead of sending him off to rehab. They are not very well educated, and didn’t want to take the advice from other relatives.

Furthermore, the condition of the rehab centers during that time was not well equipped, thus they did the wrong decision of not sending their son for treatment. If they have known of rapid detox center, maybe they would make the right decision. Rapid detox compresses 8 days of quitting process into a few hours, thus the withdrawal is claimed to be minimal. This procedure is done by an anesthesiologist doctor with 20 years of experience, so maybe it’s worth a shot.

Until today, this auntie still has tears in her eyes when she speaks of her son. He died before he turned 20.

My kids have enjoying their 10 weeks summer holiday now, but the bad mommy is sending them to 4 weeks of holiday camp. I can’t have the kids “disturbing” at the office because I’m pretty tied up with my new tasks. My hubby is going to work at a new place soon, so I’m taking over his work officially. *patting my own back* I’ve always wanted to get back to workforce anyway, so I’m glad that I’ve “found” myself a new job, without any job interview or healthcare job search. LOL!

Even if I’m getting busier, I will still try pack bentos if possible. Bento-ing releases my work stress!

Today’s theme is Sanrio characters again. I’ve always wanted to fix Shinkansen with blue egg sheets, so I fixed the egg sheets yesterday in yellow (yolk only), light blue and darker blue. I’m not sure how much time I used for the preparation as it was done when I was preparing our dinner yesterday. Anyway, the cutting part was not too hard since it’s mostly done free hand with exacto knife.

I did the decoration on a piece of white bread, and kept it refrigerated in an air tight container. After I had packed the fruits and spread some jam on the sandwiches this morning, I topped the decorated white bread on the rest of the mini sandwiches. A quail egg was decorated as tiny Shinkansen too.

My boy’s Shinkansen overloaded bento.

As for my gal, I fixed her Hello Kitty and Cathy.

My gal’s Hello Kitty and Cathy quail egg bento.

I packed lesser fruits for my gal as she already had some jackfruit and pineapples for breakfast. Their summer camp is full of games and activities, so by the time I pick them up at 4.30pm, they should be quite hungry for their tea.

So, what do you think about Shinkansen now? I think it looks nicer in blue, as comparing to my previous Shinkansen here and here.

I’m very lazy to pick up Thai. After almost 2 years here, my Thai is pretty bad, even worst than my kids. But it’s time to blush up my Thai so that I can correspond better with my staffs. I should be listening to the Thai Cds and ipods, instead of my favorite musics now. *sob sob*

Hopefully, I will be able to speak fluently in a year. Then, I should start learning about Thai characters too.

I haven’t packed buns (pao) for quite some time because my kids don’t like them anymore. Their taste buds change from time to time, so it’s best to pack their “preferred” food at the moment to avoid food wastage. I’ve always wanted to fix Hamtaro again since it’s so cute. But without using pao, just like the previous Hamtaro Char Siew Pao Bento, I resolved to using cheese with this cutter:

Rilakkuma cutter

It’s a last minute decision, so I didn’t have time to snap the step by step photos. Hopefully, you can figure out how I did the cheesy Hamtaro.

My boy’s Hamtaro and garlic bread bento, with lots of fruits too.

My gal’s Hamtaro has a smiley expression because I was running out of time to cut the eyes.

From the way I arranged the fruits, I guess you can tell that I was packing these bentos as fast as I could. LOL! I was trying my best to slot everything in before running late. It’s been awhile since I last pack papaya too. My boy doesn’t like papaya and kiwi, and he will only have them at school due to teacher’s pressure. I hope that he will finish his papaya and kiwi today!

A friend told me that she can tell if my hubby is working away for days. I would normally pack less bentos that week, and hardly update my Facebook. She’s right, whenever hubby is away, I don’t need to pack much, and I don’t have time for FB. You can easily tell that I’m too occupied with work, kids and chores and I’m trying my best to keep my sanity. LOL!

Hubby came back from Malaysia with my latest purchase from BentoCraft. I love the Tomica Fire Engine bento, and so does my boy. So, I packed something simple for the kids today.

My boy’s Tomica Fire Engine bento, with cheese sandwiches, a mini wiener and fruits.

My gal has smaller sandwiches.

Very simple huh?

I’ve just made my order at Bentocraft.com yesterday, and I’m so excited to get these 2 items:

Tomica Fire Engine BentoAnimal Picks

Animal Picks

There are a lot of new bento boxes, especially sandwich bento box. I was tempted to get Shinkansen and Cinnamonroll sandwich boxes, but I know that I’m really running out of space to keep more bentos! So, if you are interested, do take a peep at BentoCraft.

I found a few new picks at some Japanese bento blogs, and maybe Carmen, the owner of BentoCraft, will bring them in soon. I just can’t wait to get the picks with the cute characters with custom hats. I have seen them somewhere, but I can’t remember which blog it was.

Anyway, it’s nice to have a few more cute items added to my bento tools collection!