First day!

Nate starts camp tomorrow for the first time, and he'll be going all-day for the first time. I admit these past two weeks, with no school and no camp yet, have been a little rough but we've also gotten a lot closer - I'm going to miss him! I also admit that I'm looking forward to it a lot. I have all sorts of fantasies about how much I'll get done during the day. Probably I'll just shop online for more Bento boxes, but at least I'll do it without feeling guilty that I'm neglecting him by not building the 173rd Lego tower of the day with him.

I have to send him, each day, with two snacks and a lunch. I already have the Lock & Locks for the food and yesterday I picked him up two lunchboxes at Target and let him choose. One was super-cute and non-character with a neat thermos attached. The other was a Transformers one. Guess which one he picked? Yup, Transformers. I hate the character thing, but I saw it and I knew he'd love it and I had to let him make the choice. That's what the first day of camp is all about, right?

Here's what I packed for his big first day:



Snack 1: cucumber/hummus sandwiches and pretzels filled with peanut butter
Snack 2: raw almonds, dried cranberries, and veggie sticks (Trader Joes)
Lunch: Veggie hotdog wrap, mandarins, sugar snap peas, carrots, and a little fun-pack of M&Ms hidden underneath.

As long as I'm packing Nate's lunch I figured I'd start packing Stewart's lunch:



Salad (with lettuce from the garden!) with mandarins, dried cranberries, and avocado. Cucumber/hummus sandwiches and carrots, and a fun-pack of M&Ms hidden under the dressing.

And as long as I had everything out, I figured I'd prep Jack's snack and lunch to make my day even smoother tomorrow:



Snack: veggie sticks, pretzels filled with peanut butter, cucumber slices
Lunch: veggie hotdog chunks, mandarins, avocado slices, dried cranberries, and raw almonds

It took me about 30 minutes to put these all together. I'm going to try to use the same ingredients for the lunches, even if the end product isn't the same (for example, the foods from the kids snacks were the toppings for Stewart's salad.) I'll work leftovers in as much as I can, though I haven't been cooking at night much these days (we scrounge a lot).

Do you guys like seeing these? Should I try to keep up the bento posting?