Backdated post - Girlet's Birthday Party

Girlet's birthday was on the eve of CNY. Since most people including us were out of town, we postponed the celebration for two weeks. It was held at Jungle Gym in Bangsar Shopping Complex at Girlet's request, due to the rollerblading rink there, Girlet's latest hobby. They had a blast on the trampoline too. At least Babylet did, made a change from jumping on the bed.

If the cake looked familiar, that's because Babylet had the same ice-cream cake for her birthday last year. In fact, Boylet had the same cake 3 years ago, in blue . We love this cake because (1) Girlet is a dog lover (2) It's two treats in one, cake and ice cream, (3) It's cheaper than other 3D cakes (for mummy).

What else but a bento each as part of the kids' party pack? Each bento came with tuna, and cheese sandwiches cut with various cutters, jelly moulded in the shapes of stars, Hello Kitty and bears, quail eggs dyed yellow with curry, and moulded, mandarin and Korean strawberries. And a pick each too. Kept the bentos simple as I had to pack 22 of them.


I used various bento boxes from the 100 yen shop.
I didn't have enough time to take pics. I cropped the photo above for a close up look of the bento.

Bento #110 & #111- T-Rex Rampages

Made this two weeks ago, as requested by Boylet. Two T-Rex (which is factually incorrect as they are solitary animals) attacking a group of herbivores - stegosaurus and triceratops. The T-Rex were tuna sandwiches, and the dino pasta was accompanied by cheese sauce in the container supporting T-Rex's head.

Boylet had just recovered from allergies /asthma and had poor appetite. The dinosaur bento was a big hit, and he finally finished all his food for the first time since CNY.

The following week made another dinosaur bento for Boylet. Thought the previous T-rex was too white, so used lunch sheet dress it up. The green and orange dinosaurs were a big improvement. To fill the gap, added some stars - sausages and Honey Stars. I spinned a story that the T-rex (green dino) was attacking at night, this time attacking another carnivour, maybe an Iguanodon (orange dino). The Iguanodon was trying to protect it's two eggs, of which one was hatching. A dino pick was used as the hatchling.

This proved to be another favourite. Now to spin more stories.

Valentine Bentos

I have plenty more bentos unposted, but thought better post the Valentine Bento first in keeping with the season. Haha... that's coming from someone who hasn't posted the Christmas and CNY pics. I've actually been bento-ing practically every schoolday. But more misses than hits, so not inspired to post them.

Anyway, although Valentine was on a Saturday this year, Girlet had school as replacement for the long CNY break. So she had her Valentine bento on the day itself. Made her a heart shape onigiri and two stewed drumnets wrapped with ribbon (made of Jap lunch sheet) for ease of holding.
The day before, I made heart shaped Nutella sandwiches. Now that I put the photos next to each other, I realised the similarities between the two. Same box aside, the lettuce and mandarins were at the same position, and the colours are alike. I'm really stuck in a rut or what??!! Accompanying the wheat shaped pasta was cheese sauce in the orange container. I admit that the lettuce is purely for decoration. While Girlet now is eating lettuce, this particular bunch of lettuce was yuckily bitter even for me. The pet rabbit gets to enjoy it instead.

Didn't make any Valentine bentos for the men in my life. D'hubby had conferences and didn't need any bentos, while Boylet preferred dinosaurs to hearts.

This skipping of posts really messed up my numbering system. Sheesh.... I'll just label them as Bentos # 108 & 109 for continuity sake.

100 Yen Shop and My Current Korean Drama Craze

The 100 yen shop at Taman Desa had new stocks in. Emily and I went to check it out on Sat. Unfortunately the things that we ordered weren't in yet. That'll only be shipped over in March. Anyhow, we both still bought quite a number of stuff. For more details and pics, head over to Emily's blog.

Is anyone else following the Korean version of Hana Yori Dango, titled Boys Before Flowers? (Taiwanese version was Meteor Garden). Anyway, there was a very cute bento last week depicting the lead male character with curly hair and all. Simply kawaii! Pix were taken from Javabeans.

The male lead, Gu Jun-pyo, acted by Lee Min-ho.
The bento which makes me laugh each time I see it.

Ox themed bentos for CNY

I'm jumping into the fray by making ox-themed bentos in conjunction with Ox Year this Chinese New Year.

Bento #105 is an ox onigiri for Girlet, with salmon sausage and corn. Thanks to shoppingmum for the idea of using the bone pick for the ox's horn. Saved me lots of time. I made the ox from a Pikachu (pokemon) rice mould and moved the ears down to resemble an ox. Was late and didn't have time to shell edamame, so the middle portion of the bento was left empty. Bento # 106 - A simple cow made of cheese on top of sandwiches, with salmon sausage, broccoli and corn. Lastly Bento # 107 was a snack bento for Boylet. It contained an ox made from quail egg, ham and spaghetti strip. Surrounded the ox with various farm animals cut out from bread & cheese. Corn, salmon sausage and a rooster pick completed the bento .

GONG XI FA CAI to everyone.

Of Emily and 100 yen shop

Met up with Emily two days ago at Taman Desa's 100 yen shop to pass her some edamame. She is so familiar with the staff that she store her frozen edamae in their fridge while we go for breakfast. Then the 'si tau poh' came and Emily asked to look at their catalogue. We ended up spending almost an hour going through all the items. The si tau po has agreed to order all the cute bento stuff such as picks, baran, silicon cups, cutters. So exciting!! There'll be about ten different types of picks from clickety click picks, jewelled picks, animal picks etc. And the silicon cups are different from the Daiso ones. Depending on the supply in Japan side, most of the stock should arrive in March. Will let everyone know then. Watch this page.

Edit: The 100 yen shop is a franchise, and each shopowner/branch order their own stock, which accounts for the different items carried in different branches. So only this Taman Desa branch will order the things mentioned above.

In the end, instead of breakfast, we went for lunch at Francais Alliance. Thanks Emily for lunch and for the things you gave the kids. Hope you enjoy the edamame.

Bentos # 102, 103, 104

Bento # 102 - for Girlet. Tried to fashion a small charsiew pau and two pieces of fishpaste/ seaweed roll into a dog, with dismal results *sigh*. How did I pass art exams last time? Anyway, my mum gave me some mini papayas from her tree, and they were the perfect size for bentos. I halved 2 papayas and they just evolved into a man. Added edamame for some green as we're out of lettuce. Babylet had the rest of the papayas for brunch.
Bento #103 was for Boylet. He started classes in a new nursery, and they serve mainly fruits at snack time. It must be insufficient for Boylet as he would gobble down his lunch when he's home. On one hand I'm happy that he's eating lunch unlike last year where I have to either persuade, bribe, threaten or force him to have lunch. On the other I'm afraid he's starving. Am hoping that his appetite is growing as he's getting older. Fortunately many of the kids bring their own snacks, so he's not so adversed to a snack bento for himself. I tried to make a bunny out of the mini pau & grapes, and a flower out of jelly & edamame.

Bento # 103 was a breakfast bento for d'Hubby. Consisted of pancakes with maple syrup and mandarin oranges. The pancakes were just too plain and I couldn't resist adding facial features. A first cutesy bento for d'Hubby. All the container were too small to store the maple syrup, so made do with a silicon cup covered with a clingwrap.