A happy Jack O' Lantern

Bento # 342

Halloween hits the shopping mall this year and seems to be quite appealing to young children in our neighbourhood.  There were some pop up stalls and the decorations were not so creepy.  Even the mascots; a witch and a bat were so cute!  The shopping mall also provide free pop corn and candy floss as well as kids friendly activity like face painting.  My boy was ecstatic when he knew that there would be blue candy floss. Whilst he enjoyed every bits of the candy floss,  he cheekily asked if his teeth turned blue too ;P 

Above bento, I made a Jack O' Lantern using a tiny mandarin orange gifted by my mum.  And added some facial details with seaweed and plonked a party hat foodpick on top of it.  On the left side were two cherry tomatoes eyes (made of cheese and nori). His main was teriyaki chicken sushi roll with tamagoyaki.  Happy Halloween!

How was your last weekend?  Last Sunday was such a beautiful sunny day! I could not stand my son idling and/or watching TV since we have been stuck at home for the last two weekends.   I just need to get outside and get into nature (sounds like the Dinosaur Train TV show)!  We decided to cycle to Sun Plaza for sand play and then to Pasir Risk park via the park connector together with Nitro.  It was quite hot in the late afternoon and Nitro was panting heavily although he did not walk much since I was his chauffeur. A jogger was quite amused and commented that "Your dog is so comfortable." Nitro was obedient and quietly sat inside the shopping bag as I pedalled which gave me a peace of mind to enjoy the sight and breeze.  Along the way, we spotted a couple of Egrets. My poor sense of directions actually got us lost going back home.  But I managed to find the correct way later (since Papa, my compass, did not come along this time).  My little man complained that I should heed his 'advice'.   Well, perhaps I should.  It was a good exercise indeed, he said.  Except I reprimanded him for not following the traffic rules because he cycled across a traffic light junction when it was still in red.  He explained that there was no car turning towards his direction.   This young man is too over-confidence.  Nevertheless, we were happy to cycle despite we were all smelly and tired.

Cycling with Nitro

Egret perched on the branch

Bat and Monster - Not-so-scary Halloween 2014

Bento # 341

We had Japanese food for dinner last night.  I used the leftovers to prepare the bento above for my boy's breakfast.  Yeah, not lunch but breakfast!  There's some changes to his daily routine.  My boy has been growing well and was fit like a fiddle.  At 6 years old, standing at 1.2m tall,  he's still on the chubby side and a round belly like a baby.  Lately, he began to feel conscious about his appearance especially his round stomach.  He has requested to skip lunch at home and just have the light snack the preschool provide.  In which case, he would stuff more than usual like woofing down two breads rolls at one go and kept asking for more, more, more food in the late afternoon after school.  There were times he over-ate and we have to delay our dinner time and of course, his bedtime as well.  Therefore, instead of a light breakfast in the morning, I prepared a full meal for him in the morning which could last him till 1 to 1.30pm before snack time at school.  Then he would not gobble his food like a hungry wolf when I picked him up after school.

In the box, he has tamagoyaki, chukka wakame (store-bought), pickled cucumber, fresh cherry tomatoes into half and an onigiri (with wasabi furikake) that I created a monster face for the Halloween theme.  Also, a freehand cut out bat from nori and cheese (eyes only).  Afterwhich, he gulped down a cup of cold fresh milk and a few blueberries.  What made my day was he actually said "I like it, Mommy!".   :)))

Finished his bento breakfast!

 

Halloween festive mood is in the air.  So is my boy.  He drew bats and ghost each on a discarded box with black and blue marker.  Isn't it nice!

Ham and Cheese carrot sandwich

Bento #340

 

 

A simple ham and cheese (carrot blend) sandwich lunchbox to school on Monday.  I browned the bread slightly with some butter first on my Happy Call pan.  Then layered with low fat cheese, honey baked ham, tomato slice and baby spinach leaves. Cut into small triangles to fit into the bento box. Threw in a few raspberries that I bought from Cold storage which was on sale for buy 1 get 1 free.  This was the first time my boy got to try fresh raspberry because it was expensive here normally.

 

Since berries are in season and there are abundant in the supermarket with great discount, we made very berry overnight oats again.  To serve in the morning, I  topped it with some banana and drizzled some honey for sweetness.  We enjoyed the healthy breakfast except our Papa who frowned and questioned "What is that?!!"  Yeah, Papa does not like oats in any form even though Doctor advised to eat oats in the hope to reduce his bad cholesterol.  That was why we only have it once a blue moon and only upon request by little one.

 

 



Shoebox Angry Bird Star Wars and a DIY catapult



 

There was a book sale at Giant last week. And I saw a very hilarious Angry Birds star wars book which creatively renamed all characters as Red Skywalker, Princess Stella Organa, Yoda Bird, Obi-Wan Kaboomi, R2-EGG2, C-3PYOLK, Terebacca, Chuck 'Ham' Solo, Lard Vader and Emperor Piglatine.  It was going for only S$5! Definitely a steal not to be missed. Needless to say, I bought it for my boy because I remember he asked me to buy a similar book at Times bookshop which cost me more thann S$20.  And I rejected his request flat.  He was elated to receive the book after school.

 



 

 

We did one of the activity - create a miniature model of a space scene.  Besides the characters we cut out from the book, all you need to have are :-

 

• Shoebox
• Paints - Colour black for the space
• Star stickers       )- Decorate inside with star stickers or cut outs planets
• Colour papers    )
• Glitters - Create a meteror shower
• Sewing Thread/tape)- To hang the pig tiefighters from the roof of the box using tape & thread

 

 





 

To inject more fun, I DIY a catapult using pencils, ice-cream stick, rubber bands and a bottle cap.   However, Papa disapproved the idea of using pencils and dismantled our first catapult.  I was quite pissed off with him for not able to show due respect of what we had built.  Afterwhich, my boy has been asking me about the catapult.  So I ransacked our kitchen and found some disposal chopstick which I thought could work equally well!  Not so excited as the scene in computer games.  Nevertheless, it was quite entertaining.  He has a ball of fun trying to shoot the targets using aluminium foil balls.

Built with pencils

Use disposable chopsticks