Okay, we’re now four months into 2022 and I’m just going to give myself a big pat on the back for sticking to bento lunches every school day.
(I floated on cloud 9 for a full week when the teachers told me she proudly shows off her daily lunches to the class.)
Not only that, I’ve even added new “clients”, namely Daddy and Grandma!
Thankfully, the adult clients only request lunches once a week. I don’t know if they’re missing their childhood or something, but they insist on getting the same molds and cut veggies as the preschooler too! At least my daughter is less likely to complain if she gets fish cake and tamagoyaki three days in a row.
Oooh the feeling of accomplishment. It’s probably even better than when the very first time I was promoted to manager back when I used to have a 9-5 career sitting at an office staring at a computer screen and some very white walls.
Granted, I’m now paying in both money, time, blood, sweat and tears but I guess that’s something that comes with the job of being a parent. The benefits, on the other hand, are much sweeter than free RMT and dental (“Mommy, when I grow taller and bigger I can get a star for you because you’re my Mommy.” ❤️)
Now my challenge is to find more variety in veggies and fruits to expand her palete. Ah well, something to do in February.
To start January off, I decided to try and make a Bento box lunch for my daughter for school.
After checking out a LOT of websites from some very creative mommies, racking my brains to plan out fun and varied meals and digging deep into my wallet to invest in miniscule but very cute lunch accessories and food containers, I tentatively began my journey into the art of lunchbox creativity.
There were definitely some mornings (and nights) that tested my resolve. It’s so frustrating when the end result looked nothing like what in pictured in mind (and that morning where I burned the bread trying to make grilled cheese while simultaneously trying to feed her breakfast and make my coffee).
But the payoff was well worth it. From coming home with barely two bites taken out of her lunch, she began to come home with lunchboxes that got progressively lighter, and would proudly tell me at the school entrance that she finished her lunch “all by herself”. It was sooooo satisfying and on top of her eating normal amounts of food at normal meal times (instead of begging for snacks after we got home), I could even ensure that she was getting a good serving of veggies and fruits.
I’m determined to keep this going for as long as I can. Not only because I have to make all that money I spent on lunchboxes and cutesy accessories pay off, but because it’s such a joy to see her face light up when I show her what she’s going to eat at lunch that day. Also, the Facebook bragging value, totally worth it.
Actually finished this about a week or so ago, but it took awhile to find the time to post it #momlife
This was an interesting project since it was the first time I knitted for someone other than a toddler. Not only did my husband have a bigger head, but he has sharper eyes and was potentially going to wear this to somewhere that could be seen by his colleagues. The pressure to do well was real!
But, as high as the pressure was (real or self perceived), the project itself wasn’t that difficult and was actually very interesting. It also allowed me to practice a whole lot of knit and purl stitches and sewing the ends together.
All in all, I’m pretty happy with the end product. Unfortunately, we’ve now hit a warm spell so there’s been no need to wear it at all!
I found a random ball of blue yarn in my parents’ garage the other day, most likely some remnant from decades past. Figuring that no one would miss it, I decided to use it for my next project.
Technically, this would be my third project, since my idea of an infinity scarf hilariously failed the first time. I totally failed to take into account that in order for my daughter to wear it, she needed to be able to pull it over her head, and the circumference of one’s head is typically a lot bigger than the neck!
And even though this house yarn has the little nubbly bits, I decided to do a seed stitch to practice some more. No one can see if I screwed up the stitches anyway, but I didn’t drop any stitches at all!
Husband is now asking for a knitted hat, so stay tuned and pray for me!
A little late, but here’s a cake I made for my daughter’s birthday just before Christmas.
Over the years, we’ve learned to scramble to change from birthday to holiday decorations in our house in order to celebrate both.
And in the same spirit of things, our kitchen is especially busy during these times (although given the state of the world it’s been relatively quiet the last two Christmases).
This year, I decided to create a marble fondant cake, which was a lot simpler than I expected but also harder than I thought. Definitely will try again!
This scene, at the end of a long day of pelting torrential downpour, reminded me that no matter how dismal life may feel sometimes, things will and can get better.
Who knew everyone’s lives would be drastically changed over the last 1+ year?
One of the things I found during the pandemic was cooking up a lot of food I never thought I’d cook in my own kitchen.
Like a king crab.
A giant, live crab that made creepy noises the entire drive home in its styrofoam box that weighed more than my child (or at least felt like it). And left us scrambling to dig out the biggest plates we owned while our poor old wok worked overtime.
It was delicious, and much cheaper than if we had ordered it in a restaurant, but I found it hard to enjoy it properly because of all the shuffling we had to do between the table and the stove. There was no way we could steam the whole thing all at once, and even if we could, half the crab would have gotten cold while we ate.
What we did realize was that our child has very expensive culinary tastes…
On the heels of the birthday cake (pun intended) I made for my mother in law in August, I decided to go for a fashion theme for my aunt’s birthday.
Originally, I had wanted to do a fitness themed cake since she goes to the gym every chance she gets for as long as I can remember, but I really didn’t want her birthday cake to be covered in black fondant, even if I managed to make the weights really realistic. I also thought about building the weights as a cake topper, but just having a set of dumbbells on a cake seemed dull and I couldn’t think of anything else gym related.
So fashion it was. As her favorite color was green, green and pretty much nothing but green…
I actually had to Google what colors went well with green.
This was a different experience than my usual cakes, which allowed for the decoration to be premade at least a day or two in advance. With this cake, since the cake itself formed the purse, everything pretty much had to be done in the moment and there was no room for error.
Gafaye's Hobby Notes 