Guess who's gonna be in a COOKBOOK?!?!?!?!

THIS GIRL? Shocked? Yup- me too!


I was invited to contribute to the Cooking With Trader Joe's Easy Lunch Boxes cookbook!!

I am thrilled to be included in this book with so many amazing contributors! And it's no secret that I love both Easy Lunch Boxes and Trader Joe's. So this is a huge deal for me!!

I will keep you all posted and let you know exactly when it's available on Amazon.com!

Slacking on lunches again.....

So... I HAVE been making Taia lunches lately. I've just been forgetting to take pictures. They've been rushed lunches, but at least I've been making them! :)

Today she had:

-Trader Joe's Cinnamon Alphabet cookies
-Grapes
-Carrots
-Turkey
-Trader Joe's crackers
-Trader Joe's FiberFul Fruit strips
-Cheese Butterfly

It's not much. But it's what I can handle right now! :)

Bento Bunny Blog Hop!!

It's time for another awesome Bento Bloggers & Friends blog HOP! At the end of this post, be sure to click to the next blog to see what awesomeness they have going on for Easter/Spring! And then on to the next and the next and so on!


Taia and I tried something new for our Easter Eggs this year! One of my Bento Buddies told me about Henrietta! I thought an egg cooker seemed silly until I randomly saw her at a discount kitchen store for $20. I'm sure my sister-in-law, Meghan, thought I was nuts for buying her. Well, she rocks. And I betcha Meghan buys one after she reads this! (hehe! Love you Tigger! You asked for a review- here ya go!!) Today was the first time we tried her out.




She is quick, relatively mess free since there's no big pot to deal with, and she chirps at you when she's done cooking!! You fill the little water reservoir to a different level based on your desired level of egg "doneness." We made 21 eggs so we had to do 3 cooking sessions. We had so much fun with it! I'll never boil eggs the old fashioned way again!!





We also used our natural food coloring from Chocolate Craft Studio to dye eggs for the first time! The egg kit comes with their basic powdered natural colors, some paper decorations (which we didn't use) and some glitter powder. We also used some of our additional colors! The dye was easy to mix, all natural and as you can see, pretty vibrant!!! We were pleased. The red didn't turn out too red but I think I should've added more dye and vinegar. We may try again another day!

This picture cracked me up. I'm not quite sure what she was doing other than waiting impatiently the entire 45 seconds that the eggs took in the dye!

And the lunch that I made using one of our eggs! I love that the egg is almost polka-dotted from the pink dye! I tried to shape one into a bunny but my eggs were too big and it broke in the mold. :( But it tasted yummy anyway!


She has:
-A vanilla cream cheese and chocolate cream cheese swirled sandwich
-Cheese bunny with a vanilla cream cheese eye and marshmallow tail
-Melon and Strawberry bunnies with a bunny pick
-Spotted boiled egg
-Trader Joe's Yummy Bunny Tummies (SO GOOD!!)

Now head on over to Creative Food and take a gander at some more fun food!!

Dino lunch!

First off, please excuse my absence lately. Hopefully I will be back to regular blogging SOON!!

Taia's class studied Dinosaurs during the month of March! And I managed to send ONE, yes ONE, dinosaur lunch. Embarrassing, I know!

She has her usual Nutella sandwich. But this one is SPECIAL!!!! Taia's Papaw brought back REAL Nutella from Germany! SO SO yummy! I never believed that there was a difference but oh yes. There definitely is!!

On top of the sandwich is a dinosaur (she can tell you what kind it is...me? Not so much! ) with "DINO" spelled out in our favorite Trader Joe's Cinnamon Cookies! And some Plums and Carrots on the side! All in an Easy Lunch Box!