Engleberts in Missouri [miz-er-ree]

I made another bento box for Violet this morning. It took me 30+ minutes to create a Strawberry Princess-themed lunch and sadly, it didn’t turn out exactly as I’d planned. Violet seemed happy enough with it although that may have been due entirely to the beef stick princess wand.

It seems as though there has been an exponential increase in the number of school lunches that she would prefer not to eat lately. The school lunch calendar is littered with “Pack Lunch” notes. I’m pretty sure that if I reverted back to a sandwich in a bag the appeal of school lunches would rise once again. April is jumping on the bento bandwagon too. In the last two days, she has asked me approximately 9 million times to make her a birthday bento. Hmmm…. I found this inspiration bento that I might be able to replicate.

On another crafty note, check out this new outfit I made for Violet’s Felicity doll. It turned out really well. I love the apron.

Today I’ll be spending lots of time in the kitchen baking cakes. First, I have to make a birthday cake for April. It will be a pretty simple raspberry layer cake but will have a replica of her 18th Birthday plate for a topper. Then I’ll be making a wedding cake for my friend/neighbor Donna’s reception. She recently married my other neighbor John in the Bahamas so I’m going to try to make a beach-themed cake that will look something like this. I am praying that it turns out well otherwise tomorrow will be spent scouring the bakeries in town for a replacement cake!

I can’t remember my mother packing me lunch for school when I was a kid. Maybe when I was really young. I never wanted to pack my own lunch, that’s for sure. Mostly I just ate in the school cafeteria. Occasionally, when I was teenagish, I would pack my dad’s lunch for work during the summer. Boring. Sandwiches in a brown bag.

My own children have mostly eaten school lunch. There have been times when a packed lunch was required. Field trips. The first and last weeks of school when they all attended St. Philip’s. And when I felt sympathetic to their absolute hatred of what was being served at school on a particular day. I tried to make the lunches a little more exciting. Packing thermoses of soup, or my own homemade luncheables of crackers, cheese and meat. Still pretty boring. More often it was sandwiches, chips and cookies in a bag.

But now I’ve discovered Bento. Do you know about bento lunches? Apparently Japanese moms are expected to prepare appealing boxed lunches and they spend a good part of their mornings preparing bentos for their families. Like most things moms do that are on display for others to see, it turns out there is even a sense of competition among mothers to see who can produce the cutest, most appetizing, and healthy lunches for their children. And boy do they take it to an extreme. Their bento are very elaborate with the food often arranged in such a way as to resemble other objects. They are edible works of art.

Computer:Spray Bottle:

Giraffe: Bird in a Nest:

Of course, not all bento are that elaborate. Mine certainly won’t be. The main thing is to create a visually pleasing lunch and add a little fun to the meal.

As a beginner bento artisan, I am facing a couple of real challenges. The biggest one being that my daughter isn’t really into Japanese style cuisine. So I’m trying to come up with ideas to make her American-style bento cute and healthy.

I took a little more care packing Violet’s lunch yesterday. It wasn’t a bento but it was better than usual. I am ill-prepared to create truly beautiful bento because I don’t have all the cute little containers and what-not. But after a shopping excursion I was able to make a somewhat cute bento this morning.

Violet was thrilled with it. And really that is the most important part of making something like a bento box. It is said that when you eat a bento lunch prepared by a loved one, the preparer’s feelings for you are transmitted through the food. So today Violet’s getting some love with her lunch - and that’s always a good thing.

My AWOL camera reappeared and although Steve’s birthday pictures were still intact there are a lot of new pictures that look like this:

Guess we know where the camera’s been :-)

There are about 3 million photos of various pieces of equipment in the camera now and unfortunately, those are the good pictures. The birthday pictures I took look like a whole lot of fuzzy.

I uploaded them to my Flickr account but don’t expect a lot- seriously, they are blurry.

I’m not a professional photographer but I try to take good photos. I’ve read up on picture composition, light and shadows, and all that other photojunk that the professionals do to get great pics. I’ve tried to incorporate it into my picture taking and have gotten a few really great shots in the past. Lately, though, I can’t seem to get a decent picture. They’re always coming out blurry.
I’ve tried to hold my breath. I’ve tried lean firmly onto a counter or other stable surface. I clench my arms to my sides. I click as fast and furiously as I can hoping at least one shot will come out. But no luck. My camera constantly screams at me that I’m shaking and the photo is out of focus.

Remember when my face froze and Google told me I was getting Parkinson’s disease? Steve thinks I’m being silly but I think this shaking could be a new symptom. I thought I might be relegated to using a Polaroid camera where my shaking could be put to good use developing the pictures when they pop out but it turns out that shaking ruins Polaroid pictures too.

I suppose I could start using a tripod to steady my camera but that seems like it would be really awkward and impractical for action shots. “Wait a minute sweetie, let mommy get the tripod set up before you kick the ball.”

I think the real solution to my picture shaking problem is to purchase one of those dSLR cameras that have all sorts of auto focusing features built in. Like the Canon Digital Rebel. Not that I’ve been looking around at new cameras or anything. But this one’s “perfect for children, pets, wildlife and other unpredictable subjects” - like birthday parties. After all, we’re talking about photographic evidence that our children’s childhood wasn’t completely devoid of fun, happiness and loving moments. Capturing a photo like this one is definitely worth a few bucks.

Eric finally made it home yesterday morning. He got delayed a couple of days. Luckily his leave days didn’t start ticking down until after he got to the states since they’ll only have a couple of weeks of family togetherness.

One of the first things Eric did was take the little hairball to the barber shop.

Sadly, the haircut has completely eliminated all traces of babyhood from Alex. He looks like a toddler now. Alex doesn’t seem to be too thrilled with his new look either. It’s okay Alex, Grandpa never liked a high-and-tight either.

You can see more before and after pictures of Alex and new pictures of Eric on Steph’s flickr site.

Eric should be home any time now. He’s due in for his R&R this morning. Steph is going to pick him up at the airport in Savannah. I wonder what Alex’s reaction to his daddy will be? He hasn’t seen him since he was a couple months old.

They call it R&R - Rest and Relaxation. I’m thinking Eric’s going to get precious little of that over the next couple of weeks. With a wife, small child, family & friends all eager to see him, talk to him, and do things with him, R&R will be in short supply. Steph will probably be exhausted by the time Eric heads back to Iraq too. She was so excited yesterday that I doubt she was able to get any sleep last night. I don’t think she’s planning to waste a minute of Eric’s leave with mundane things like sleeping and resting.

I am happy Eric’s coming home too - for a lot of different reasons. I’m glad he’s safe, I’m happy Steph & Alex will get to spend some time with him,  and it means his tour is nearly over. But mostly I am happy because now Alex can get a haircut. The child is nearly a year old and has never had a haircut. Steph’s been waiting for Eric to take him. All I can say is Thank God Alex Can Get A Haircut Now! because he’s starting to look like a distant relative of Cousin It.

You’d make these faces too if your hair was this annoyingly long!

Cut my hair!!!