The Pumpkin King

My favorite holiday... and my favorite movie about this holiday!

On the weekend evenings leading up to Halloween, we've been having a little movie fest. Every weekend evening (school nights we just have too much to do, between homework and dinner and cheer/soccer practice!) we all snuggle up together after dinner and watch a different Halloween themed movie. We've watched Paranorman, Hocus Pocus, and many more. All were great, some even excellent, but the number one overall family favorite was DEFINITELY Nightmare Before Christmas.

Tim Burton's Disney film is just exactly the mix of creepy, cool and cute to keep the entire family entertained. We watch this movie at least 3 times each year and will never get bored.

Bean requested a Nightmare Before Christmas lunch this week, and this is what I came up with!

This lunch is scary good. It's also gluten free, and tucked full of 'hidden' nutrients.

The sandwich is sliced ham on Udi's gluten free bread, with a grinning Jack Skellington painted on provolone cheese with food safe dye. Tucked inside is a handfull of spinach leaves - Bean's favorite!

Jack's faithful... um, dog? ghost? Ghost dog? Uh... Zero is made with cream cheese frosting spread on a chunk of gluten free chocolate zucchini cake, with some Glutino pretzels tucked in on the side.

And of course, the Pumpkin King wouldn't be complete without a pumpkin. This grinning Jack O' Lantern is actually a clementine, with a face painted on with food safe dye. There are also some crunchy sweet carrots for snacking.

Keep going! Click the button to see what tricks and treats are next on the Halloween bento trail....

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Beware the Bones

Make no bones about it, this delicious lunch was a big hit with my Halloween loving Bean!

Lunch is packed into an Easy Lunchboxes bento box and includes:

Tiny mini seedless grapes

Clementine

Cucumber slices

Turkey hoagie half sandwich on a Schar gluten free roll

Mini carrot cupcake

Glutino pretzel sticks

Vanilla yogurt

The skull & bones are made with vanilla yogurt frozen into a fun shaped silicone ice cube tray. They're nestled into green sludge - also vanilla yogurt, mixed with a bit of green food dye. Fun, fast, and festive!

Speaking of fun and fast ways to make food festive, we love these little bloody bones candy decorations! They're a sweet way to add a little touch of creepy to any treat.

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Cute Little Witch

I LOVE Halloween. Out of all of the holidays, it's easily my favorite.

And I love packing cute Halloween themed lunches!

Like this cute little witch lunch I packed recently for Lulu:

This lunch includes:

Carrot slices

Watermelon pieces

Snap peas

Ranch dressing

Annie's Organic bunny grahams

Turkey and cheese sandwich

Vanilla cupcake

To make the sandwich, I used the outside cutter from the CuteZCute sandwich cutter set. It is made with turkey and cheese, with candy eyes and details drawn on with food dye. Easy, cute, and tasty!

For Bean, I packed a simple hoagie/sandwich lunch. She really loves these Schar gluten free hot dog rolls for hoagies. They are a nice, soft, fluffy bread, perfect for sandwiches!

Gluten-free turkey and cheese sub on Schar GF rolls

Gluten-free pretzel sticks

Gluten-free cupcake

Watermelon chunks

Carrots and peas with ranch

Both lunches are packed into Laptop Lunch boxes. The thing I like best about these boxes is that the individual compartments have lids that you can use to keep food where it's supposed to be, with no touching or spilling. No watermelon juice on the sandwich, and no cupcake frosting on the peas, even when the kids drop their lunchbags repeatedly. Pretty great feature!

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Simple Pinkie Pie

Simple, but delicious. Kid loved it!

Been a long week! When Lulu asked for a My Little Ponies lunch - Lulu, who barely allows me to pack her lunches at all most days because she doesn't like the attention she gets when I pack her cute lunches - I jumped on it. But I had to keep it toned down, a minimum of cute, so that she would actually eat the food without the distraction of people wanting to see.

Pinkie Pie is my favorite Pony, and I happened to have gummi 'gators on hand, so the simplicity worked out nicely.

She has crackers with cheese, orange slices, spinach wrap sandwich rolls, carrots with Sunbutter, and a gummi treat.

Gummy the gummi alligator cracked me up. I couldn't resist the one really cute-d up detail. Gummy has his party hat on and is chilling out on the graham cracker sand beach.

Lulu approved!

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