fun food friday: monster fun

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Since my adorable little Cam was an adorable blue monster for Halloween, I decided to make him an adorable monster lunch. He absolutely loved it. I had found these plastic blue monster thingy's at a store and picked them up for his monster birthday party coming up next month. I thought they would make perfect decorations for this lunch and they looked super cute on the plate. This was super simple to make and I think it turned out pretty cute. Here's how I made it:

Ham and cheese sandwich cut into circle shape. I cut arms and legs for the monster out of fruit leather. The monster's face is made out of mozza cheese and an icing eye, and a green onion and mozza cheese mouth. I served a silicone container of yogurt with sprinkles and a silicone container of sliced pears.



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Halloween pics of the kiddos

Pin It I meant to post these pics yesterday, but we're having Internet issues at home. Boo! I really hope they get resolved soon. The kiddies had a blast trick-or-treating last night. I can't post all their pics, but if you click on any of the images you'll get to my Flickr account where you can see them all. FYI, Kirsten is an ice cream cone and Cam is a monster. I hope everyone had an awesome Halloween!

















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fun food friday: ghosties

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This isn't the fanciest of lunches, but Kirsten helped me make it so it's pretty special to us. She doesn't often help me make the fun food fridays, but when I was going to make this particular lunch she asked if she could help. Absolutely! She was very proud of the outcome. Here's how this lunch was made:

Ham sandwiches cut into ghost shapes with food marker faces. A silicone cup of yogurt with Halloween sprinkles. Red and yellow ghost apples around the plate.



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halloween faces

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This craft was so easy. While Kirsten and I were walking through the dollar store she spotted a bag of halloween craft foam shapes. She really wanted them badly so she could bring them home and decorate them. I happily obliged. We tried to get Cam to make one too, but he was too busy playing with his cars and didn't want anything to do with craft time! Here's how we made this:

What you'll need:

craft foam halloween face - if you can't find them you could make your own
glue
canvas
markers
googly eyes
glue

Directions:

1. Glue your Halloween faces onto your canvas.
2. Using your markers, draw faces on your Halloween shapes.
3. Glue on some googly eyes too.



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fun food friday: the good witch

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I really love the way this turned out. I used the pumpernickel bread which I used for the spiders last week and this time neither of the kids ate it! Oh well, the loaf is finished now so I suppose I don't have to torture them with it anymore! This was really easy to make and super cute. Here's how I made it:

Witch - 2 spinach tortilla cut into face shape using scissors. I filled the tortillas with cheese and chicken and made a grilled quesadilla. I cut a piece of pumpernickel bread into a witch's hat. She was cheesestring hair, icing eyes, cucumber nose and food marker smile.

Pretzel stick and cheese broom and a mini silicone cup of ketchup for the quesadilla. My kids love dipping everything in ketchup!



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paper plate owls

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I know I've been posting more than usual lately. That's because I've done so many fun things with the kiddos and I have to post them while the season is still appropriate! Here's a craft to satisfy my owl obsession. I had some leftover mini brown paper plates from Cam's last birthday party and I figured they would be absolutely perfect to make owls with. This was a craft just Kirsten and I did together. We tried to get Cam to join us but he was having too much fun playing with his cars! Here's how we made these:

What you'll need:

brown paper plates - or paint white ones brown
scrapbook paper
white cardstock
scissors
glue
paper punch
orange craft foam
buttons and other embellishments

Directions:

1. find some cute scrapbook paper and cut out 2 wings and a body for your owl.
2. using your circle paper punch and white cardstock, punch out 2 eyes
3. using an extra brown paper plate, cut 2 ears from the edge of the plate.
4. using your orange craft foam, cut out 2 feet and 1 orange beak
5. glue everything on your owl and add any embellishments (like the cute felt flower) you wish







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mini pumpkin pies

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Yummy, yummy, yummy. I just love pumpkin pie. I had some leftover pie crust and pumpkin from making my pumpkin pies for Thanksgiving and I wanted to use it up. I didn't want to make big pies again, so I had an idea to make mini pumpkin pies, or pumpkin tarts. These were delish. James liked them even better than my original pumpkin pies because there is more crust to pie ratio, lol. These were really easy to make and I'll definitely be making them again. Of course, I had to cute-ify them somehow to I used my mini halloween/fall cookie cutters and cut shapes out of my remaining dough and put the shapes on top of the pie. Super cute!



Here's the recipes I used:

You could use some frozen pie crusts (2) and let them defrost. Once defrosted, roll them out and cut your circles out from them. If you like homemade crust, I like this recipe:

Ingredients:

5 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons salt
1 lb tenderflake lard
1 egg, stirred slightly
1 tablespoon vinegar
7/8 cup cold water

Directions:

1. Stir the flour and salt together.
2. Cut in the lard with a pastry blender or 2 knives until the shortening is in pea size pieces.
3. In a measuring cup, combine the egg and vinegar.
4. Add enough cold water to make one cup.
5. Stir the liquid into the flour mixture, adding just enough to make the dough cling together.
6. Stir the water in with a wooden spoon until mixed thoroughly, then gather the dough into a ball, and separate into 6 portions.
7. Cover and refrigerate for one hour, you can chill overnight, covered, providing you leave it at room temp for 15 mins before rolling.
8. Lightly flour surface and roll dough out into circles. Using a 4" circle cutter, cut circles out of your dough and place in a greased muffin tin.
9. Using the remaining dough, roll it out and cut cute shapes out of it. These shapes will be placed on top of your mini pies once the filling is in.

For the pie filling:

Ingredients:

2 eggs
1/2 can (28 oz/796 mL) E.D.SMITH® PURE PUMPKIN
1 cup (250 mL) packed brown sugar
1 tsp (5 mL) ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp (2 mL) ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp (1 mL) ground ginger
1/4 tsp (1 mL) salt
3/4 cup (175 mL) evaporated milk

Directions:

1. Beat eggs lightly in medium bowl. Add E.D.SMITH® PURE PUMPKIN, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and salt - stir until well combined. Blend in milk. Pour filling into your mini pie shells in your muffin tin. Place your cute cut outs on top. Bake at 425ºF (220ºC) for 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350ºF (180ºC) and continue baking 15-20 minutes longer or until knife inserted in centre comes out clean.



Recipe for pie crust from Tenderflake
Recipe for pie filling from E.D.Smith



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this week in bento's: halloween style

Pin It Yup, I'm still having fun with this. Kirsten loved all the halloween bento boxes she got in her lunch this week. I must admit that I probably have as much fun making them with her and she does eating them. I figure I have to make her school lunches anyway, I might as well have a little fun while I'm doing it! Here's some bento's we made this week:



I just love this one because I have a slight obsession with owls. I made 2 mini circle sandwiches with turkey and cheese and decorated them with mozza cheese and food marker eyes, carrot nose, cheese wings and carrot legs. A container of orange jello - remember I make 1 package of jello ahead of time and it fills 4 of these containers so I can put jello in her lunchbox anytime. I also sliced a red apple and made a yellow apple moon cut out for it.



Here's an adorable bento for her morning nutrition break. I decorated a yogurt drink with athletic tape and googly eyes to look like a mummy. She also got a peeled orange with a food marker face and a cereal bar.



And another adorable morning bento. She got a container of cheerios and I peeled the label of a small container of yogurt and drew a ghost face on it. She also got a banana with Boo on it - I used a toothpick to write the word.



Here's a bento for her afternoon nutrition break. Half a ham and cheese sandwich with little mozza ghosts. A container of applesauce with halloween sprinkles and a container of baby carrots.



Another great afternoon nutrition break bento. She got a ham and cheese sandwich on flatbread. I used a mini pumpkin cutter to make a jack o'lantern in the bread and used food marker to decorate the face. A container of baby carrots and a container with rice crackers and a cheddar babybel jack o'lantern with food markers.



Here's another morning nutrition break bento. She got a cereal bar, a container of vanilla yogurt with a fruit leather ghost face and a container of pretzel sticks with 2 cheesestring ghosts. To make the ghosts I just sliced a mozza cheesestring in half and used a food safe marker to draw on a face. Just slightly start peeling the cheesestring at th bottom. This helps give it a better ghost-like appearance and also helps Kirsten start peeling it too!



And lastly, another afternoon nutrition break bento. Half a chicken and cheese sandwich with fruit leather bats. A container of applesauce with halloween sprinkles and a container of sliced cucumbers using my awesome crinkle cutter.

Here's some of the stuff I used to make these lunches:



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fun food friday: the itsy bitsy spider

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Here's a fun food friday I made for the kiddos with a halloween-ish theme. They had never had pumpernickel bread before and I wasn't sure whether they would like it or not. Cam ate it and liked it and Kirsten didn't. I've still got a whole loaf to use up, so Kirsten might find herself having to try it again, lol. This was super easy and fun and this is how I made it:

Sandwich made on pumpernickel bread cut into circle shape. Icing eyes and pretzel stick legs. Mini cracker "sandwiches" with peanut butter. Pretzel stick legs and food safe marker faces. I used mozzarella cheesestrings for the spider's web. Then they have a mini silicone container filled with bugs - aka raisins. Super cute and easy.



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Happy Halloween!

Pin It I cannot tell you how excited Kirsten is to go trick-or-treating for the first time tonight. She keeps asking about it every 2 seconds. We're going to bring Cam along too, so this will be the first time for both of them. To be totally honest, I'm a little excited too! I just love seeing my kids do things for the first time. I'm pretty sure they're just going to love this. Here's some pictures I took of them in their costumes last weekend. I had so many good pictures I had a hard time narrowing it down. I may have had to bribe Cam with a lollipop to sit still, but it totally worked. He only had a few tastes. And can you believe how long my 3-year old's hair is?!?! Kirsten is a cupcake and Cam is a monkey. I can't wait for tonight!



















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fun food friday: happy halloween

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So this one is pretty lame, but that's what you get when you've got two impatient, hungry kiddos. I wanted to add a few more things to the plate, but the kids had other plans. Regardless, it's still pretty cute and they thoroughly enjoyed it! Here's how I made this cute pumpkin and bat lunch:

jack o' lantern - chicken sandwich cut into pumpkin shape, shaved carrots, cucumber stem, and fruit leather face

bats - fruit leather cut with bat cookie cutters



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flashback: handprint ghosts and handprint spiders

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Here's a couple Halloween crafts we did last year. These are super easy and make great keepsakes. I just love turning my kids handprints, footprints, or thumbprints into animals and other cute stuff. I just can't get enough. Here's the super easy directions:

Handprint ghost:

What you'll need:

black paper
white paint
paint brush
googly eyes
glue
sharpie

Directions:

1. paint your child's palm and 4 fingers white (excluding the thumb.
2. stamp your child's hand on the black paper
3. glue on 2 googly eyes
4. use your sharpie to draw a spooky mouth

Handprint spider:

What you'll need:

white paper
black paint
paint brush
googly eyes
glue
sharpie

Directions:

1. paint your child's palm and 4 fingers black (excluding the thumb).
2. stamp your child's hand sideways on the white paper
3. repeat this process with the opposite hand and slightly overlap where you stamp.
4. glue on googly eyes
5. using your sharpie, draw a face on your spider Pin It

thumbprint spiders

Pin It Kirsten's spiders



Camden's spiders



Here's another great, easy Halloween craft. Simply turn your child's thumbprints into adorable, friendly little spiders. Normally I hate spiders, they really creep me out. But these little guys are just the cutest, it's hard to be afraid of them. Here's the super simple directions:

What you'll need:

paper
black paint
black sharpie
googly eyes
glue

Directions:

1. stamp your child's thumb in black paint and have them stamp their thumb on the paper.
2. using your sharpie, draw legs on your spider and a dangling web
3. glue on googly eyes



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