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Leave it to some of my lunch packing and super crafty friends to come up with all kinds of adorably edible Halloween ideas! You’ll want to check out the below links to find out how you can make the above.
Pictured above:
Allergy Friendly Halloween Bento
But wait!… There’s more!… MwaAAhhh HA HA (evil laugh)!
From average to accessorized – it’s easy to jazz up a lunch
If you’ve got a halloween lunch you’d like to share, please link to it in a comment below. We’d love to see it!
OK, I’m just going to break down and ask the question that’s been burning in my brain since I first saw one of these super cute lunches a few years back.
What do they look like by the time your kids open the boxes?
We homeschool, but once per week I pack my ELB for them to take to their arts classes. And with my boys, almost every one of those lunches would be a jumbled mess. The skeleton veggies would be in a pile, the yogurt spider webs would be all mixed in, the parts of the eyeball pasta would be swirled into the mixture and unidentifiable, the little bat thingees would be smooshed into the exposed jam on the vampire sandwich (which would be stuck to the lid).
Yes, that’s as deep as I can get on a Saturday morning going on three hours of sleep. (And, btw, I’ve already packed one ELB today.) 🙂
Hey Alison – I’m sure it depends on how complicated the design is. And I know, especially if carried sideways, sure, it will mess up. But if you carry upright then it doesn’t move around much. And sharing a cool lunch you created with your kids before leaving the house, and reminding them to not swing it all around, can inspire them want to keep it steady so that they can show it off to their friends later on when it’s time to eat.
If I have a design that has a lot of extra pieces I “glue” them down with honey or soynut butter (PB alternative since my daughter is allergic) so that they stay in place during travel and being moved around. And if I don’t want her sandwich to move around I can “glue” it down to the ELB too 🙂
Packing Eastlunchboxes in a bag that keeps the container upright makes all of the difference in the world. Kelly’s Easylunchboxes cooler bag works great along with many others.
I agree with Bobbi, the carrying case is the biggest part of keeping things steady. My Kindergartner is very “spirited” but her lunches stay pretty much in place. We made the spider webs in the yogurt and she said that two of her three stayed on top. She liked the surprise of the extra one that was covered up by the yogurt.
The lunches aren’t always the same as when we made them, but if you put things together so that they don’t move, use picks to keep things in place or even put a napkin on top of dry things, you’ll find that they look pretty close to what you started with.
And ultimately, motivating them to take care of their lunches leads to valuing and taking care of other things in their lives. If they want their cute stuff to stay put, they’ll put in the effort. If not, then who cares? Let them toss it around!
Yes, I make these for her. But I also do it for ME. She’d eat the foods if I DIDN’T cut them into cute shapes or add faces. But I love doing it. And if she’s enchanted by her lunch, she is willing to try that broccoli again, or something else new I add in, to see if it’s fun too.
So if she doesn’t care what it looks like at lunch time, then I don’t care. I got what I needed out of it. And I took a picture to blog or share on Facebook, so my art is immortalized.
And the folded napkin on top helps too. I use cloth napkins, so they don’t get too wet and dissolve!
I agree with Michelle, Bobbi, Shannon and Kelly above. The most important thing for me is the little more effort put in preparing lunch helps make my family happy and spend time together. You don’t need to do it every meal but it’s always good to bring a little smile to your kids’ face every so often 🙂
My boys’ lunch carriers are set up to hold the ELBs vertically. I use a napkin to hold things in place – open it and spread it out over the biggest compartment and let it crinkle up a bit so it gets pushed down onto the food when you close the lid. They are pretty rough on there lunches, but they say they are always in tact when they get to them. 🙂
I agree with all the above. The most important being the bag to carry the box upright. I usually carry my daughters lunch and place it in the firdge at preschool so it does not usually get bounced around a lot. If my husband is taking her to preschool then I tend to pack more as there is less room for shifting or use a “glue” like honey or peanut butter.
Right now I tend to be in charge of carrying too, so I know when to be extra careful. But soon she’ll be in charge of carrying them into school, so I’ll work with her at home and we’ll practice first.
I also “pack” some lunches to eat at home (or at least begin eating at home.) The EasyLunchbox is no harder to clean than a plate, but is easier for my daughter to carry from the kitchen to her table without things spilling, because of the high sides. And I don’t need to add a bowl if I’m including something runny like yogurt. And I tend to include more healthy and balanced options with those compartments staring at me. On a plate, I tend to get lazy and only offer a protein and grain.
And then if she’s not done before we have to head to preschool, it can come in the car with us for her to nibble on the drive!
I agree that the best way to assure that the lunch looks the same way is a cooler that carries the ELB flat, attaching the pieces with honey or picks and packing the ELBs tight so nothing can move. I like using salad leaves, cereal bars and cute cups or utensils to prevent food from sliding. Another great idea is to show the kids the design and then pack the pieces for example in the Mini Dippers and let them assemble their food at school. I have done that on occasion and my kids loved that! I also like to draw designs on the sandwiches with chocolate or peanut butter and those stay on for sure 😉
Wow everyone! Thanks for all the comments about how to keep the lunches looking as good as when you packed them. Please keep the ideas coming and I’ll repost them with a link back to your blog (if you have one) in a future post 🙂
Another fun trick is to hold pieces together with raw spaghetti. It softens by lunch time so it’s not dangerous like toothpicks can be.
[…] Halloween, when I posted an amazing collection of Halloween-themed lunches, the first comment I got was from long-time reader Alison who had been dying to ask her burning […]