What is the Plural of TARDIS?

Is it TARDISes? TARDI? Or is TARDIS already pluralized? Hmm.

Anyway, here is a double TARDIS lunch for Bean!

In this lunch:

Two TARDIS sandwich halves

Peeled clementine

Rice nori crackers

I was seriously about 3/4 asleep when I made this lunch. I even had spinach (which she loves!) pulled out of the fridge, ready to go, right next to me and completely forgot to pack it. This is what happens when I try to get up fifteen minutes early to pack lunches in the morning instead of getting them ready the night before! Not quite enough food for an active 12 year old, but luckily Bean had a granola bar and a pack of seaweed snacks in her backpack to nibble. Lesson learned - zombie packing leads to lunch errors!

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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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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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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 Koala

An adorably simple lunch for Lulu today!

This darling little koala sandwich was made with the new Cuddle Palz set from CuteZCute. These sandwich cutter and stamper sets are both super easy to use and super adorable. The set comes with the tools to make a little mouse, tiger, bear, or this sweet koala:

The outside shape is included along with the cutter/stamper for the details, a body shape, and an adorable little pick for pushing out leftover bits. We are loving the new set!

In this lunch:

Koala sandwich

Yogurt with sprinkles

Apple slices and grapes

Carrot sticks with ranch

Pretzel twists and mini Oreos

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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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Love Makes the World Go Round

This is my little Beaker:

Beaker is a fun and fabulous four year old boy. He has soft and wavy hair that he likes long, and lovely hazel eyes. Beaker's favorite TV shows are Jake and the Neverland Pirates, My Little Ponies: Friendship is Magic, Ninjago, and Strawberry Shortcake. He loves to play Minecraft and Barbies, likes to color, draw, and practice writing letters. He loves to cuddle and be read to - his favorite books are Green Eggs and Ham and Fancy Nancy. He loves the movie Frozen right now, and also The Lego Movie, and he spends all day long singing the songs from both.

I have been criticized for keeping his hair long (his choice). For painting his nails (he loves the pretty colors). For letting him watch "girl shows" like Strawberry Shortcake and My Little Ponies (his first choices during TV time in the evening). For buying him the pink twirly tutu that he begged for at the store, and sparkly silver flats to match. All of these criticisms, because he is a boy. My girls were encouraged by strangers to like these things.

I'm not naive enough to think that we can raise our children to be entirely gender neutral in the current society, but I am darn sure going to try. My children, regardless of their gender or sex, can love anything and anyone they choose. I will, again and again, stand up for their rights to do so, and to not face harassment for their choices.

For the BBF Anti-Bullying Blog Hop, I am re-running one of Beaker's favorites, the Strawberry Shortcake lunch I made for him:

He adored this lunch, just as he loves the show. And why shouldn't he? Because he is a boy? Ridiculous notion!

The sandwich is gluten free bread with spinach, turkey, bologna, sweet red pepper strips, and with strawberries tucked in the side, all served in an Easy Lunchbox.

Click here for the original post.

Click the button below to follow the hop to see all of the wonderful messages of love and acceptance the BBF community has put together to share!

Bullying has always been a problem, but lately there has been a slow, steady increase in awareness of the problem. Victims are gaining support and schools are putting policies in place to discourage bullying and protect the children in their care. The issue is being address with a rising amount of seriousness by many.

However, the mark is still frequently being missed.

When the victim is being blamed; when children are being told that in order to avoid bullying they should conform to fit in and repress their own selves; when kids are being punished for not being feminine or masculine enough... This is a problem. This is not okay. This tells us that we, as a society, have a very long way yet to go.

I would like to say that things have improved since I was a child. When I was a kid, especially in middle school, I was bullied. I was a kid who did not fit into the mold. I was very into books and sketching - my favorite things to do in the world was to escape the world, either into art or a good novel. I was completely oblivious to fashion, never cared about makeup or hair. I would read anything I could get my hands on, and all of my notebooks were full of sketches and doodles. A sketchpad, colored pencils, and my library card were the greatest things in my world. They were magic.

There were those who clearly did not like me, and they set out to make my life difficult. I couldn't really say why, except that I was different and to some, different is bad. I responded by attempting to blend in to the background, never doing or saying anything that would make me stand out. By the time I was halfway through high school I had ditched that idea and had found a niche among other bookish and art-loving kids. Now, as a grown adult? I am happy to say that I like who I am, and I am not at all afraid to show it.

One of my main goals as a parent is to help my children find their place in life without the struggle. To help them to be who they want to be, and not wait 30 years to get there. And to instill in them a strong sense of kindness and love for those around them. It is very important to me that my children accept and love people for who they are, and that they also accept and love themselves. We are all a work in progress, but I think we are getting there.

I would like to say that things have improved since I was a child, and they have, in some ways... but not enough. We still have a very long way to go as a society. Inequality is still a current issue. Bullying is still a major problem. We need to work on loving each other, being accepting and tolerant of our differences, and celebrating the diversity that makes each of us so special and wonderful.

Love makes the world go 'round. So let's send more of it out into the world!

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It's Super Bowl Weekend

Our whole state is buzzing in excitement. The Seahawks are in the Super Bowl!

The Dude has been a Seahawks fan practically since birth. He grew up in the Seattle area and has always been a big football fan, so of course he eats, sleeps, and breathes Seahawks from August through February. He is thrilled that they are going to the biggest game of the year!

I made him this lunch after they won the last playoff game.

He has a roast beef football shaped sandwich with Scrabble Cheez-It letters cheering on his favorite team. He also has football cookies and some grapes, which are sort of football-ish shaped, if you squint a bit.

Now it's your turn! We want to see all of your sports themed bentos! Link them up below:

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Strawberry Shortcake

Beaker has recently become interested in the newer Strawberry Shortcake show on Netflix. It's a little saccharine for my tastes, but he thinks it's funny and cute. It makes him happy and buys me twenty minutes to work through homework or load the dishwasher, so who am I to complain? And then some wet blanket had to tell him that Strawberry Shortcake is only for girls.

He was sad, and he asked me if that was true. What?! No way! Strawberry Shortcake is for anyone who likes Strawberry Shortcake! It's for girls AND for boys. We talked about how toys and tv shows and things don't belong to one particular gender or another, and how he can like anything he wants. And then he asked me if I could make him Strawberry Shortcake for lunch.

You betcha, Beaker!

She is an open faced sandwich made with UDI's gluten-free bread as the base, with spinach and turkey. Her hat is a bit of turkey bologna and a spinach leaf, held up at the back by broccoli, and her hair is sweet red bell pepper slices. Of course she is surrounded by strawberries! Beaker also has some strawberry gelatin mixed with banana chunks, and a little handful of Pirate's Booty.

He loved it. He even ate some of the veggies!

And he still watches the show. Because boys can.

I dare anyone to tell him otherwise in my presence.

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The Doctor's Wife

Can you hear it? The loud squealing of millions of fans as we gear up for the premiere of the biggest Doctor Who episode ever. The 50th Anniversary!

How many other shows can say that they are still going strong, with world wide popularity and a deeply loyal fan base, after fifty years? Doctor Who has stood through time and tide, and today is loved more than ever. Because? The Doctor is awesome.

And who has been his most loyal friend, from the very begining? The one shining constant on a show which has spanned five decades, the only face which has always been there. Companions have come and gone, the Doctor has changed his face again and again, but the leading lady has always been there.

Obviously I am talking about the TARDIS.

Time And Relative Dimension In Space - T A R D I S. Occasionally known as the Doctor's wife. The constant companion. Or as the Doctor calls her... Sexy.

My lunch for the big day is a tasty TARDIS open faced sandwich with half a plum, cheese, and grapes.

The Doctor has said that he 'borrowed' the TARDIS from a museum, always intending to return her when he was done. But did he steal the TARDIS... or did the TARDIS steal him? As Idris says in The Doctor's Wife, "I wanted to see the universe so I stole a Time Lord and I ran away." Who chose whom, we may never truly know. Maybe it will be among the answers revealed in the big episode today!

I have to work, so the Dude is DVRing the episode so that we can all watch it together tonight when I get home. The kids are every bit as excited as we are - they're even planning snacks out for the show. The youngest three even dressed as Doctor Who characters for Halloween this year.

My little Whovians <3 Beaker was the Eleventh Doctor, Bean was the TARDIS, and Lulu was a (very abstract) Dalek.

Keep following the hop by clicking the pretty button to see what wonders await from Blame it on the Bento and the rest of the group!

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Pretty Layered Sandwiches

These open faced layered sandwiches look super fancy, but are actually pretty easy to make.

All you need is lunchmeat, preferably in more than one color or shade, cheese, one slice of bread per sandwich, and a set of cookie cutters in multiple sizes.

Using the largest cookie cutter, pop out the shape in the bread. Cut cheese and bread in graduated sizes, then stack them up. For this lunch, I tucked grapes and carrots around the sandwich, with an extra layer of grapes underneath.

Honey-wheat pretzels and a soft cheese wedge round out the lunch.

This lunch is the same ingredients, but a different cutter shape.

The cookie cutters aren't terribly expensive either. I think the set for this sandwich was only $2 for 6 sizes.

For a different take on the fancy sandwich theme, I made these simple rolls. They are made by laying a slice of cheese on top of ham lunchmeat, rolling up, and slicing.

Included in this lunch is cantaloupe, grapes, and star shaped crackers.

For the smaller appetite, Beaker has a pair of tiny flowers made with turkey and bologne, topped with a little bit of melty cheese.

He also has GF cheese crackers, halved grapes, and cantaloupe pieces.

For flavor and to keep the sandwiches from shifting, I put a little dab of mustard or mayo between each layer of the sandwiches, or warmed the sandwiches a tiny bit to melt the cheese just a touch.

My kids love these little layered sandwiches, and I love how easy they are to make. Double WIN!

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