Well, moved, actually.
johnslunchbag.blogspot.com is the new stomping ground!
All previous posts have been moved. Tonight at work I see about making it feel like home 
John has a half day tomorrow so will be eating lunch at home. Think that gets me off the hook? Not a chance!
Yesterday he brought his giant stuffed yellow Angry Bird and said he wanted it in a Santa hat. So here he is with grapes and a gingerbread cookie.
Last night John proclaimed that for his lunch on Thursday he wanted his cat, Cheerio, in a Santa hat.
I’m real glad he clarified that he wanted a sandwich and not his actual cat!
The sandwich is ham. Also in the box are grapes and Cinnamon Cheerios, all separated by sticks of colby jack cheese.
John can’t decide if he likes marshmallows or not, but maybe he’ll have a better idea after Wednesday’s snowball fight lunch
The kids are bologna and cheese.
The snow is made up of mini marshmallows.
Go-alongs are pretzel sticks and cheddar twists and a clementine holding the countdown pick!
Two little cheese sandwiches for lunch tomorrow with Turkey Bites and raisins and a jello/fruit cup on the side.
John picked out what he wanted for the sandwiches from the Advent calendar my Momma made for me when it was time for me to head off to college based on the one that we used when I was growing up. It’s very much a family tradition as she made them for her siblings, as well, and then when it came time for my cousin (now John’s godmother) to head to college we worked together to make her one of her own. After my mom passed I made them for some of my other cousins and I’m sure the day will come when I’ll have to remember how to make John his own. Maybe I should start on it now!
The calendar -- each person's is individualized in some way with the ornaments. My angels HAD to have dark hair like me & mine was the first tree with an Elf! (I just noticed John decided to tip some of them sideways. Sorry about that!)
In case you couldn’t guess, the ornaments John picked for Tuesday’s lunch:
No more worries about forgetting the countdown or trying to fugue out how to fit them in!
Thanks to some paper, frilly toothpicks, and packing tape I made a pick for each remaining day. If worse comes to worse I can just plop one in his box and voila! Instant countdown!
Simple lunch for Monday. We’ve had a busy weekend & I’m just not in a super-complicated mood.
The house is a Ritz Crackerful.
The snow is swiss cheese.
The tree trunks are Mini Slim Jims and Turkey Bites, with a watermelon AirHead cut for the branches.
Cinnamon Applesauce on the side for lunch!
(No countdown numbers because I initially forgot & John said we’re just skipping it.)
Too cute not to post
Several weeks ago in our quest for fun holiday apps for the iPad, John and I came across an offering by Hallmark called Jingle All The Way. John immediately opened the app, read the book, played the games, and fell in love with Jingle.
As soon as the tv version hit the air we DVRed it and have watched it at least half a dozen times since. Hallmark really hit it out of the ballpark with this one!
Of course, it had to be made into a lunch.
I’ve had quite a few comments about how I get things so detailed and true-to-character. Well, here’s how.
I start by finding and printing an image for whatever story/movie/whatever I want to make:
I cut out the most important parts (in this case we’re focusing on the faces & the cardinal), and trace the outlines using food gel. I have been using mostly AmeriColor gel but just got some great jars of gel made by LorAnn Oils and used those for the majority of this lunch.
After the image is traced, transfer it on to the bread by flipping it onto the slice and pressing down.
(John almost NEVER has white bread but since Jingle is a white pup I decided to go a little crazy.)
After the transfer, fill in whatever details you want or that may have not transferred completely. For Jingle I used some watered down grey on a paintbrush for his fur detail and the red collar. (Watering down the gel not only stretches it out, but also makes it easier to dry and therefore less likely to get all over your little ones hands/face/everything!)
Since I already had the white bread out for Jingle I decided to also use it for Andrew’s face:
I then cut the face part out of the picture and went to the normal whole wheat for his hair.
After detailing Andrew’s earmuffs I placed all of the painted bread into the microwave for about 10 seconds on level 3. Heating the bread helps make the gel set and makes it a lot less messy for me.
I cut all of the individual pieces out of the bread and pieced them together on the slice of wheat that would be the bottom of the mini sandwiches.
I then cut each shape out using normal scissors (a lot easier than trying to do it with any kind of knife), cutting Andrew’s head as a whole.
It’s a Strawberry Cream Cheese sandwich day, so I smeared the bottom slices with the cream cheese and placed the tops, well, on top.
John really wanted me to include the cardinal that helped Jingle, so I grabbed a pack of AirHeads and molded the cardinal out of a cherry one using the picture I printed as a reference. (AirHeads are amazingly handy and versatile on top of being inexpensive! John also loves getting the little bit of candy since he really doesn’t get any at home except of very rare occasions.)
Placed all together with some baby carrots that will probably go uneaten (a Mom’s got to try, right?), here’s the lunch:
(The 23 for the countdown ended up being drawn onto the bell on Jingle’s collar — also made out of a little piece of AirHead.)
One of my favorite aspects of blogging John’s lunches is the amazing community made up of other moms who get creative with their kid’s food. A lot of them have more experience than I do. A lot of them do more traditional bento style boxes. All of them have amazing ideas.
Keeley makes lunches for her Little Miss and does some of the cutest lunches out there! This past Monday she posted about how she was going to do a countdown to Christmas in each of Little Miss’s lunches. I loved the idea and asked if I could use it with John. In her awesomeness, she said I could.
I decided to start the countdown with tomorrow’s lunch since it’s the first of December and also the day we’ll officially start the Wintery/Christmasy lunches … and put up the actual Advent calendar!
We’re starting with the classic How The Grinch Stole Christmas from Dr. Seuss.
The entire family loves the tale and both the cartoon version and the modern live-action movie with Jim Carrey get watched repeatedly each year. What better way to start things off?
The Grinch and Max are small bologna and cheese sandwiches (Grinch on white, Max on wheat).
Max’s reindeer antlers are a broken up Rold Gold Cheddar Tiny Twist Pretzel, which he’ll get more of on the side in a separate container.
Cindy Lou Who is made out of a cut Nilla Wafer with a Pink Lemonade AirHead for her pajamas and the bows in her hair.
An Orange AirHead was used to make the 24 for the big countdown!
As usual, I used AmeriColor Food Gels to do all of the coloring and detail work. (Which reminds me, I’m running low on white. VERY low. Santa? If you happen to glance at my blog at all you can take that as a big ol’ hint! Actually, just get me an eBay gift card so I can stock up on gels and other lunch goodies. Mkaythanksbye.)
