Smile for the Camera!

School picture day! Time to dress up nice, fancy up your hair, smile your brightest smile... and then look messy, awkward, and unkempt by the time the photographer snaps the pic. I do love to chronical their tense, faked smiles from every year though. 

Beaker's Smiling Lunch includes:

Happy bunny hard boiled egg with carrot disks

Starry watermelon and apple slices

Cheery gummy bears

Sweet yogurt

Smiling gluten free granola bar

When you lunch reminds you to put on a happy face!

Inside the Planet Box inner dish is tasty yogurt topped with brightly colored sprinkles. 

Hotel Transylvania 2: Baby Dennis

My kids love the first Hotel Transylvania and are looking forward to the sequel, which is being released this week. Beaker has been watching the previews, waiting impatiently until we are able to go see the movie. He was quite put out when I explained that we have to wait until the movie opens before we can see it. "Just tell them to open it now! Isn't that what you do?" Uh, no kiddo. Mama isn't a mover and shaker in Hollywood. I'm not quite magic!

In the meantime, he loved this Baby Dennis lunch I made for him!

In this lunch:

Gluten-free open face (get it? face? ha!) sandwich

Carrots

Rice crackers

GF mini pretzel bites

GF chocolate chip cookie

Grapes

Baby Dennis is a simple sandwich built on a base of Udi's gluten-free bread and cheese with thin sliced turkey lunchmeat. His bright orange curly hair is made with carrot coins, and his eyes are mozzarella cheese with food dye details painted on.

Next, creep on over to Bento Monsters by clicking the button below, and see what is lurking there for you:

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First Day of School

Time to break out the books, bags, and bento gear - it's back to school they go!

Every year I marvel at how fast the time went. This year is not really different! Beaker is in full day school for the first time, so this is his first experience with having lunch at school every day. Of course, with his allergies that means taking a lunch every day. So far it looks like the biggest challenge is going to be getting him to sit still and eat his lunch, instead of shoving a few bites in his mouth and then rushing out to play at recess with his new friends!

For the first day of first grade, Beaker took a Planet Box Rover full of deliciousness for lunch and snack:

Schar Gluten-Free Shortbread Cookies

Schar Gluten-Free Cheese Bites crackers

Carrots and cucumbers with dip

Gluten-free ham and cheese sandwich with Schar bread

Mini grapes from our garden

Starfruit slices

Lulu is in fourth grade now, and still thinks she is too grown up for cute lunches, so this may be one of the few I get to make for her this year:

Snack mix

Mini grapes

Starfruit slice

Carrots with ranch dip

Turkey sandwich

Brownie bits

Luckily for me, Bean still loves decorative lunches! Bean also cosplayed Hermione Granger for her first day of seventh grade. This kid is all sorts of awesome!

Brownie bits

Snack mix

Carrots and cucumber with ranch dip

Turkey sandwich

Mini grapes

Starfruit slices

Of course, Brick and G-man are big high school kids now. Neither of them wants lunches packed - apparently the high school has a pretty decent cafeteria and both prefer to buy lunch rather than carry a lunch kit with them daily. G-man is a Freshman now, and Brick is a Junior (and talking about colleges and jobs!)

Okay, but seriously though... where did the summer go?! How is it already September? And how did my itty bitty babies get so big and grown up so fast?!

This year I have two kids at the elementary school, one at the middle school, and two in high school. HIGH SCHOOL, people. That's like, almost an adult! How is it even possible for my kids to almost be adults? I'M not even an adult! Okay, technically I might be an adult, but whatever, yo. You can't make me adult. If you need me, I will be hiding in my blanket fort with my coloring book and a fresh box of crayons.

Anyway. This is what the Chaos Kids look like now!

Looking forward to another fantastic year!

If you want to wander down memory lane with me (*sniff * they were so small!), CLICK HERE to see a few blog posts from previous First Days.

Also, Beaker and Bean picked out the BEST backpacks for this year!

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Zoo Day

As the last school year came to a close (yeah, yeah... I'm more than a little behind in sharing these lunches!), Beaker's small school had a field trip to the zoo for the entire school. It was pretty neat to see all of the students from the whole school, kindergarten through high school, there together with their families! Lulu tagged along with us, and Beaker was thrilled to introduce her to his kindergarten teacher and the friends he had met at school.

And of course there was lunch...

Beaker has a cantaloup field for a friendly giraffe, and grape and strawberry stripes for a silly zebra. Enter the zoo through a gluten free sandwich on Udi's bread, with cheesy letters and animals greeting you at the carrot stick gates. Smoked gouda cheese with rice crackers are hanging out in the foliage.

He thought a few of his animal friends should check his lunch out to make sure it was safe before we could close it all up. The zebra approves, but the lion needed a closer look.

Lulu prefers her lunches with a little less flair, so she has a pretty toned down version for hers. Carrots with ranch, cantaloup, strawberries, a sandwich, and rice crackers with both smoked gouda and spreadable cheese make up her meal.

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Harry Potter and the Bento Blog Hop

We are huge Harry Potter fans here. We have been ever since Brick was tiny!

We first discovered Harry Potter when Brick was four. A friend mentioned that her son liked the books, and hey, did you know they just put out a movie? We bought the first book and read it to Brick and G-man (who was a tiny toddler, barely over a year old at the time) at night before bed.

We were all instantly hooked.

We went out immediately, before even finishing Sorcerer's Stone, and bought Chamber of Secrets and Prisoner of Azkahban from the bookstore. We also bought the first movie, which had just been released to DVD. It was an instant hit with all of us, and became a favorite. We blew through all three books in lightning speed, and then impatiently waited for Goblet of Fire to be released in paperback.... then bought it in hardcover, because we couldn't wait to read it!

We pre-ordered Order of the Phoenix so it was delivered fresh to our door the day it was released. I won the coin flip, so I got to read it first. I spent the next three days curled up in bed with Bean (who was brand new, just a few months old), burning through the whole book. Then waited impatiently for the Dude to finish it so I could read it again! Four year old Brick was reading the second book all by himself. Harry Potter was the first book he ever read independently.

When Half-Blood Prince came out, we took Brick, G, and Bean to their first midnight release party. Bean fell asleep on Dude's shoulder and Brick read the last few chapters of the fifth book while in line waiting to buy the sixth. G and I almost missed the unveiling because we had to potty - little fetus Lulu was playing a drum solo on my bladder in anticipation. A couple of months later Brick started first grade and the teacher didn't believe us when we told her that he had already read the entire Harry Potter series on his own.

But the best was when Deathly Hallows came out. We took Brick, G, Bean, and Lulu to a midnight release party in full costume. Lulu wasn't yet 2, and was so charming in her cloak and curls that she was featured on the front page of a local newspaper. Brick and G were old enough to really enjoy the games and fun events at the bookstore leading up to the release, and Bean had been learning to read with the specific goal of reading the series herself. It was a blast, and is still one of our favorite family memories.

We recently started reading the series to Beaker at night before bed, and seeing him fall in love with the characters the way the rest of us did is nothing short of magical.

Bean has been asking for a Harry Potter lunch for some time, and I finally got around to making her one for this hop. She was utterly thrilled (and has put in a request for a lunch from each of the books)!

This lunch is gluten free and also nut/peanut free, and is packed in a Planet Box Rover. Details:

Moaning Myrtle mini Baybel cheese

Baby carrots

Aragog's apple slices

Diary of Tom Riddle gluten free crackers

Gummy basilisk

Turkey and cheese sandwich on Udi's gluten free bread

Tom's giant snake pet is slithering around this tasty sandwich.

The (gluten free) Diary of Tom Marvalo Riddle...

...And a cheesy Moaning Myrtle.

This year Bean and Beaker were even Harry Potter characters for Halloween!

Beaker was an adorable little first year Harry Potter.

And Bean was a lovely third year Hermione Granger, complete with Time Turner necklace!

Now keep going to see what awesome Potter-ness Organized Bites has to share! And of course be sure not to miss the rest of the great posts in the hop!

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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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It's Pirate Day!

Arrr! That it be, Matey!

 It's Pirate Day - International Talk Like a Pirate Day, to be precise.

We have a deep fondness for Pirate Day here in the Chaos house. A day when everybody dresses up and acts like [the fun, PG, much cleaned up] pirates, purely for the fun of it? YAR!

I found this little bit o' treasure at a grocery store over the summer and snagged it just for such a day:

It's exactly the right size for pirate-y lunches for Beaker!

In this lunch, he has:

 a pirate isle apple

pirate pear halves

'gold dubloon' Van's Say Cheese gluten free crackers

ham and cheese, run through

mini 'mud pit' 

A spinach stem X marks the spot on this sliced apple pirate isle...

Arr! And the pair of pirate pears are happy to see ye.

But beware the bloody bones sinking in the Smudge nut free cocoa spread mud pit!

Another pirate lunch from this week, on the same fun little plate...

This lunch includes:

half a skewered min orange

gluten free multigrain crackers

ham rolls

organic fruit snacks

a cucumber X

carrot sticks with onion dressing

Beaker even took pirate treats for his kindergarten snack today, packed up neatly in a tiny Jake and the Neverland Pirates tin!

Snack box holds:

gluten free pretzels

apple slices

Schar gluten free shortbread cookies

Tween Bean was totally into the Pirate Day lunch theme too, and she took this tasty treat filled Planet Box to school for her hearty repast.

Her PlanetBox Rover contains:

gluten free pretzels

skewered salami with green olives

a checkered apple isle

10 carrot gold dubloons (get it? 10 karat/carrot? Ha. Pirate pun!)

cucumber slices

a pirate pal mini cheese wheel

and a pair of delicious Schar gluten free shortbread cookies

We here on Chaos Isle be wishing you a festive Talk Like a Pirate Day, full of festive fun!

Want to see more piratey lunches? Check out these pirate posts from years past!

Also, check out the Bento Bloggers and Friends Talk Like a Pirate Day Link-Up Party! SO many awesome, amazing pirate themed lunches!

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The Clock Strikes Twelve

Hello, new Doctor! Tomorrow premieres Deep Breath, the new episode of Doctor Who, kicking off a new season, with a brand new Doctor!

Peter Capaldi stars as the Twelfth Doctor, newly regenerated and all set for a brand new start!

What will this new Doctor be like? Will he be serious and strict? Will he be funny, silly with a wild sense of humor? Will he be adventurous, or stick to familiar ground? And what will become of Clara, now that Eleven is gone?

So many questions, and we'll just have to watch to find out! Here in the Chaos house, we are counting down the minutes until we see Twelve again. Can't wait until Saturday night!

And with every new Doctor comes a sad good-bye. We look forward to seeing what the new Doctor will bring, but with a tinge of sadness, thinking of all the Doctors who came before. We've already said good-bye to Matt Smith, when Eleven regenerated at Trenzalore in the last episode, but we couldn't say hello to the new guy without remembering the last.

But don't dwell on sadness - there is a new adventure ahead! After you watch the episode, come back and let me know your first impression of the new Doctor. And that's not the only adventure - keep going on the hop to see what's next! Click the button below to visit Biting the Hand That Feeds You to see what Whovian deliciousness is waiting:

* Lunch Details *

This lunch contains a simple open faced sandwich made with gluten-free bread, thin sliced roast beef, and provolone cheese, surrounded by kale. The hands on the clock are clipped from a cucumber peel. The lunch also has thick cucumber slices and halved grape tomatoes, and orange triangles. For a bit of sweet, the lower portion holds vanilla pudding with a raspberry fez.

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Top Five Back to School Essentials

(*Note: This post contains affiliate links.)

I cannot believe it's that time again already! It seems like summer just started, but already it's just about time to pull out the school supply lists and peruse back-to-school ads. Getting five kids ready to return to school is a pretty massive undertaking, and I really have to be organized in order to pull it all off successfully. Having a list ready in advanced, or at least a pretty good idea of what I'm looking for, is crucial!

To help get you started, or maybe just give you some good ideas, here are five things which I find to be essential for making going back to school as smooth as possible!

#1: A great lunch dish.

As a bento-packer, having a great box to pack lunches in is definitely my number one essential school supply! A good bento box can make lunch packing both easy and fun. Some of my favorite bento boxes are pictured below:

Clockwise from the upper left: Laptop Lunches, Lunchbots Trio, Easy Lunchboxes, and the Planet Box Rover

#2: A few fun tools.

A good sharp knife is the best bento tool, but there are a few other common kitchen items that can make lunch packing vastly more pleasant! Colorful silicone baking cups, a few sturdy shaped cutters, and a variety of fun cupcake picks are great ways to brighten up any lunch.

Clockwise from upper left: Wilton's Silicone Baking Squares, Crayon cupcake picks, leaf cupcake picks, CuteZCute Cuddle Palz sandwich cutter and stamper.

#3: A sturdy backpack.

The higher kids climb in grades, the heavier their backpacks seem to get. I remember lugging around a bag that seemed to be filled with bricks when I was in school, and they haven't gotten much lighter since! A strong backpack with sturdy straps is worth the extra cost over those made with flimsier materials. I am still hunting for a great backpack brand that can stand up to the beating my kids put them through.

#4: A good water bottle.

Yes, for us this is a school must! Water fountains and breaks to visit them can seem few and far between, so to keep hydrated we take reusable bottles filled with cool water with us everywhere. They are easy to wash with hot water and a good bottle brush, and by using reusable bottles instead of buying bottled water we are reducing both our spending and our impact on the environment. My favorites for the kids are the Reduce Water Week bottles.

#5: Your own style.

This one is the most fun! Whether you're reinventing yourself with a whole new style, or just adding a few new pieces to spruce up an outgrown wardrobe, back to school clothing and accessories shopping can be a blast! It can also get crazy expensive. Try going in with a list of specific items to avoid impulsive over-shopping, and watch for sales! A lot of retailers offer good clothing deals right before the new school year starts. Our favorite accessories this year are brightly colored shoes, backpacks with patches, and super fun Jamberry Nail Shields!

The special letter for the Bento Bloggers & Friends Back to School Basics Hop & Giveaway code is...

Keep going through the whole hop for a chance to win! Collect all of the letters for the code, unscramble the secret message, and follow the instructions to enter to win an amazing prize. Click the pic below to continue through to the next post in the hop:

Thanks for playing with us, and good luck!