bento madness. madness I say!!!

Before I left for Canada I ordered some cute lunch boxes and accessories that I learned were called Bentos. I bought them because I wanted something cute and fun to help me with my portion control and it turned into something else.
A monster!!!

And so it begins. The pig head is a single level box found at the Dollarama. It was the only one left in the store so yoink. I so wish we had a Dollarama here in Orlando. It seriously rocks!  The shark box is a snack box found at Publix and the Hello Kitty box along with the top left and top middle box were bought at the T&T Super Market while in Edmonton. I wish we had one of those here in Orlando too. *sigh* I'm getting homesick already. How is that possible?

The two yellow rectangle boxes and the triangle boxes were purchased from this cute online shop BentoBonanza. I love that they have a spot for the cutlery and chopsticks and that it fits the Target dollar spot cutlery I buy for me Maribel.

I seriously can't wait to try out these egg molds. Basically you boil your eggs and while they are hot you peel the shell and gently fit it into the mold and submerge in ice cold water to cool down and they come out in that shape. It still boggles my mind a bit but I couldn't resist the chance to try them out. I'll let you know how it goes. I also fell in love with the little monkey jam containers. I think the banana as the spoon is so darling. Maribel gravitated to those right away and are already a favourite.

No Bento box is complete without some way to cut the sandwiches into fun shapes for a cute presentation and well, it's also one of the only ways to get them to fit into those tiny boxes. I found the butterfly and dinosaur sanwich cutters at one of Target's dollar spot and ordered the fun animal shaped cutters from BentoBonanza along with the food picks. Maribel liked eating her rolled up lunch meat from these sticks so much that she used the sticks to pick up every bit of her sandwhich. So silly.

Other Bento goodies include: silicon grass food seperaters; little animal cups from the Dollarama; purple trainer chopsticks for Maribel from her Aunty Vic; Wilton silicon cupcake cups from Michaels, little sauce containers with animal heads.

So I think this is a good start. And upon further research on what to fill these little treasures I came across a couple blogs that are so inspiring and have since added to my ever growing blog reader list. Wendolonia and Another Lunch. I think what I love so much about these is that they use leftovers which makes lunches easier for the busy morning rushed mom that I am.

So here is my first Bento. This is Maribel's for daycare today. I'm a long ways away from my lunches looking like any of the fun ones linked but I'm a newbie and will pick it up as I go along.
I fear I may turn into a Bento monster. It is a full moon after all.

>^..^<