Mothering Corner

It’s the first week of the new school year, and both kids are doing well at their new school. In fact, they love it. There are a few playgrounds at the school, so both kids like to spend some time playing at the playground after school, even if I am already there to pick them up. Thus, we go home later and I don’t have much time to get dinner ready in time.

On the first day, my boy came home very hungry and he was looking all around the house for biscuits and snacks to keep himself stuffed,while I was busy preparing dinner. By the time dinner was done, he had lost his appetite for a proper meal. So, I’m back to packing after school bentos, but I will keep the bentos at the office with me.

He’s so happy to be given pocket money which he uses during lunch break. Lunch is provided but kids can still buy some junks after that. So, he’s enjoying his new freedom in paying on his own, and he only uses half of his pocket money so far. He said he wants to save up. Of course, he is buying junks just like his friends. That’s why I’m reluctant to let him have too much snacks after school while waiting for dinner. That explains why I’m back to packing his after school bento, which he will have on the way home.

Nonetheless, I won’t decorate his bento as much as I did previously, he’s a BIG boy now. LOL!

As for my gal, this is what I packed for her yesterday. A simple back to school bento!

Have fun at school kids.

It’s Mother’s Day tomorrow, and even if it’s not celebrated here in May on the land of smiles, I still feel like packing one for my kids. They will have this tea bento by the swimming pool in the afternoon.

Here’s how I prepared today’s bento:

I started by flattening the bread with a rolling pin.

Spread some jam on the bread and roll it up. Since it’s flattened, it’s unlikely to tear.

Wrap the sandwich rolls with cling wrap for a couple of minutes to hold the shape.

Then, cut the sandwich rolls into smaller bites. Since I planned to decorate one as mommy and another as a kid, I cut them in 2 different length.

I wrapped them with red artificial wrap meat and kamaboko.

Spread some jam on nori and wrap it on as fringe. Then, wrap the whole piece with food wrap so that the decorative bits will stick onto the sandwich.

I cut some cheese as fringe too.

And again, wrap them up with food wrap.

After that, I punched some nori for facial details and added them on sandwich rolls. So, here are the bentos:

Mommy and daughter bento for Mother’s Day.

The little girl gave her mother a stalk of rose.

Ok, it should be carnation but it’s easier to fix a rose. Just roll a small strip of kamaboko and pin it with spaghetti strip.

Here’s my boy’s bento, with a little boy giving his mommy a smooch on her cheek.

To all mommies, Happy Mother’s Day!

When my boy was a toddler, he was very fascinated by owls. I bought him a couple of books about owls, but there weren’t many. Even clothes with owl characters are not a lot, except one or 2 from the Owl in Pooh’s bear collection. After some time, he switched his interests to horses and dinosaurs. LOL!

Then last night, out of the blue, he took out his old owl books and asked me to read to him. They are in Chinese, and my boy can’t read Chinese. Nonetheless, I read and translated the stories to him, and he said, “I remember these books, I used to love owls.”

That’s why I felt like fixing an owl bento today. There are a mother owl and 2 owlets, cut from quail eggs.

Owls Bento

My gal’s bento

As much as I felt like I’m walking down the memory lane, the owls didn’t excite my boy anymore. He said he would prefer me to fix him a Naruto bento. O.o

That shows how much my boy has grown up!

My kids will be having a long school break soon, and I might be slowing down in bento-ing again. So, don’t be surprised if you don’t see any bento posts but lost of cr*ps and rants here ya? LOL!

But this morning, I felt like packing a repeated theme again, chickens (or chicks)! If you are interested, check out the previous related bentos here, here, here, here and here.

This time, I’m using sandwich rolls. I used to pack sandwich rolls for the kids, and did some decoration such as this panda bento. Oh boy, that bento was like 2 years ago!

Anyway, this is what I did this morning:

I spread some jam on the bread and roll them up as shown. Wrap the sandwich rolls with food wrap for a few minutes, so that they will stay in shape.

Then I cut them into halves.

Pack them in bentos.

And prepare some heart picks.

Pin the heart picks on the bread.

Add some nori and artificial crab meat as details and that’s it!

It’s the same preparation steps just like my previous chicken bentos huh?

Here are the bentos:

My boy’s.

My gal’s rooster and hen bento.

I am so not ready for Chinese New Year this year. So far, I’ve only done some shopping for my kids, and got them some new clothes. As for hubby and me, I will do it later during LUNCH HOUR!!! Did I mention that I haven’t change the angpao (red packet) money? It should be hubby’s responsibility but he said he won’t have time today, so he shall  try at the ATM tonight. OMG….

I couldn’t even get up early this morning for bento-ing, I mean I thought of fixing a nice Chinese New Year bento. So I could only came out with something simple like sandwich balls, wrapped in nori and ham. I should have used a bigger piece of ham for wrapping the sandwich balls, but I only cut them in circles, so I couldn’t wrap the sandwich ball as a whole. One lesson learned.

Anyway, here are the bentos:

My gal’s Happy Chinese New Year Bento, with bunny kids.

My boy’s bento.

Happy Chinese New Year to everyone. May the Rabbit Year bring us a lot of prosperity, health and wealth.

I would love to fix a Chinese New Year bento, but I’m too tied up this week. So, I shall see if I have time to fix one next week, before our short break for CNY. It’s not public holidays in Thailand, but we shall take a few days off celebrating it.

So this morning, I fixed my kids some simple sandwiches, decorated as Marie the Cat and Cinnamonroll.

My gal’s Marie the Cat Bento.

I can’t remember how many Marie have i fixed, but they never appeared the same. LOL! Check them out here, here, here and here.

But I did a consistent job for Cinnamonroll, most of my Cinnamonroll bentos (here, here, here, and here) look similar but with different ingredients.

Today’s Cinnamonroll.

I would like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year.

Have a great celebration with your loved ones ya!

I’m trying my best to keep my promises of fixing my kids’ dream bentos. Of course, I can’t fix them all, especially those hard ones like Ben 10 aliens, Naruto, rangers and etc, due to time constraint and busy working life. But if it’s within my means, I will try to fulfill their bento fantasies.

As promised, I fixed Alvin and the chipmunks for my boy. My gal is not really into the chipmunks thingy.

My boy’s bento with Alvin, Simon and Theodore. The chipmunks are sugar and butter toasts topped with cheese.

My gal has Alvin and Simon in her bento, with lots of fruits.

My gal is back to school today after a long rest. I packed her something simple, just toast bread and white bread in her bento, which were topped on a piece of corn and rose apple. I try not to introduce too much fruits in her diet now as advised by her pediatrician.

Rilakkuma and Korilakkuma toasts bento

It will take a few more days before she can regain her normal appetite and back to her normal diet. As for my boy, I packed more fruits and added a piece of cheese in his bento.

Kiiroitori cheese and toasts bento

Actually, yours truly here has caught the bugs from my gal, and I’m not feeling very well. I hope that I can speed up my work, finish off printing the reports with the office brother printers, and try to head home early for a nap before picking up the kids from school.

Today’s bentos are very simple and speedy, and I only used this set of Piglet puncher and cutter for preparation. I bought this set of puncher from Bentocraft.com.

So, here are the bentos:

My boy’s Piglet bento, with ham and cheese sandwich, mango and blueberries.

My gal was rather moody this morning, so I decorated an unhappy Piglet for her. LOL!